It's ok to fail. But failure is not an option!

For facks sake, my head is spinning.  One minute we were at the beach trying to decide whether to eat the watermelon now or at dinner, and the next minute I’m careening through the air, having been shot out of a live cannon.  Welcome to the first week of school. 

When I put the kids to bed last night baby darling hugged me and said, “Thank you for being a good girl today.”  That obviously means I stayed on green all day, without once moving my car to the yellow or red portion of the stoplight behavior chart.  This is more than I can say for my beloved mini-me, who is now in first grade and already missed a recess for misbehaving in music.  “He’s nothing like his older brother!” the teacher chuckled.  Lady, I’ve been trying to warn the establishment of this for five years.

I swear to all things that are holy that I will be a good mom this school year.  Which means that I will now embrace the popular bipolar parenting strategy, otherwise known as “ruining my kids.”  This morning after an hour long conversation with the #2 mutha, it was decided that we should write instructions to ourselves on index cards, for handy reference when that first “D” or “F” test is found hidden in the back of the folder. 

Apparently screaming, “Do you want to live in a filthy ditch under the interstate when you grow up?” is not good for the children’s self esteem.  These types of comments should always be followed by the mixed message goodnight tuck-in, which might go something like this:  “Look, so what, you made an F.  You’re an awesome, smart boy.  Everybody loves you.  Try your best and you’ll pull your grade up in no time.  We’ll study together.”  That’s right.  And if you don’t, you can just live with mommy forever.  Who cares?  I’ll be a lonely, cat lady by then anyway.

Getting this stuff right is so hard.  Especially when ‘what is right’ changes every day.  One day you are to push and encourage and demand that they stand out from the pack.  Be the best!  The next day you are to be accepting and allow the child to establish his own personality and identity.  You are to study with them, and teach them good studying habits.  Oh no!  That was last week.  These children are old enough to be responsible for their own lessons.  Studying with them will make them unable to study on their own.  Just take the video games away so they won’t have violent tendencies.  Great!  Now they don’t have any friends and can’t pick up M&Ms because their hand/eye coordination is so horrible.  Feed them whole grains!  That white bread will make them fat and stupid!  Don’t you know anything, moron?  Grains are the devil!  Stop eating all grains.  Try quinoa.  Whoa, whoa, whoa!  I’m sorry I must draw the line with quinoa.  Especially now that I know it’s not even pronounced kwin-o-a.  It’s keen-wa.  Which is why I can never eat it.  Because I’m not saying “keen wa.”  It’s too stupid.

Outside of extreme circumstances, I think I’ll just do what seems best at any given moment, which means flying by the seat of my pants.  My parents didn’t have a fucking clue what they were doing…and look at me.  I’m the sanest person I know.

The only thing that’s really easy is loving them.  It’s so easy and natural.  It feels good.  I’m good at it.  Really, really, really good at it.  Being perfect is too hard.  And besides that, it’s confusing.  Trying my best isn’t that hard, so I’ll keep doing that.  Apologizing when I yell out the ‘f’ word and say that thing about living under the interstate isn’t that hard.  I mean, saying sorry is pretty darn easy.  Plus it teaches them that it’s ok to fail.  I’ve failed a lot and I’m still not living under the interstate. 

Guest Post for HotMessMom.com

‘Mernin’ Hot Messes.  It’s Madwoman here.  The Hot Mess is holding a gun to my head, yelling, “Type, type!   Move your fingers, skinny bitch!”

Ahhh.  Just kidding.  I’m here because I’ve got madwoman lurve for her.  When she first asked for a guest post I said, “Are you facking kidding me?  I don’t even post on my own blog anymore?”

And that’s why this is perfect, right?  Since the topic she suggested was “My love/hate relationship with my blog.”  At first, I decided to just ignore her.  But then I got scared she was going to tackle me and punch me in the tit at the MILF March in September.  I know her type.  She would pretend she was just really drunk.  She would blame it on being butt-ass drunk.

So now I’m here to reluctantly tell the secret of why I rarely post to my blog or my Facebook page anymore.  The truth is going to make me sound like some kind of asshole elitist.  But I’m not good at lying and I’m trying to care even less about what people think.  So here it is. 

One random day, I was scrolling through my Madwoman Facebook feed, and I suddenly felt extremely BORED and embarrassed.  A wave of something very uncomfortable washed over me, and for once it wasn’t a boy fart.  Meme after meme after meme about drinking vodka, or drinking coffee, or stupid cats, or stepping on legos rushed before my eyes.  I felt assaulted by the repetitiveness.  Good GAWD people, think of something else.   My eyes are bleeding.  This shit is so overdone.  I scanned the list of blogs on Top Mommy Blogs.  I began to feel very sleepy.  Who reads this tired shit?  What if people read my blog and feel sleepy?  I can’t be just another ‘mommy blog’, in fact, that thought makes my asshole quiver uncomfortably.  So I quickly emailed Top Mommy Blogs to remove my blog from the list and I quietly slithered away.  I swore I was quitting. 

What am I?  What am I even doing?

I started Diary of a Madwomanbecause not very long ago I was a pathetic little lost widow, randomly typing weird shit like “my husband is dead” into google.  I could barely see the screen through my tears, and at the time, I felt like a complete madwoman.  You know what my search returned?  A whole lotta jack.  Nothing!  Dear God, I’m the only one!  I got no muthas.  I can relate to NO ONE.  I’m a freak.  Nobody gets it.  NOBODY FUCKING GETS IT, YA HURD ME??!!

And so I started screaming and bashing my fingers into the keyboard.  And the Diary was born.  It was insanely therapeutic.  Immediately, people started showing up, by the thousands.  One morning I spent about 15 minutes writing “How Not to be an Asshole When You Grow Up” while I sat at my kitchen counter.  Ten thousand people had read it by that afternoon.  Watching that page counter flip numbers in rapid succession was like watching the gas pump, except it was incredibly thrilling!  The truth is, I still didn’t think it was good.  700,000 readers later and these numbers impress me zero.  Because some blogs have two million.  Or four million.  

There are some unwritten rules if you wish to be successful in social media.  Relentless marketing helps.  Other rules involve being politically correct, not cursing too much, not being too opinionated, staying in the middle lane, and accepting the fact that facebook censors. 

Gag me with a Volatile flip flop.

I’m not ok with any of that.  I try to be a middle of the road kind of person, but it harms me and I have reason to believe it might give me cancer.  I’m a ‘push the envelope’ type of girl.  What can I say?  Not everyone appreciates that.

So the Diary is sometimes left waning.  A victim of not being perfect.  “You are not the best Diary, so you shall suffer and be neglected.”  Now scram!  Stupid blog.

But I love writing.  My writing is best when I am not trying to please anyone.  Many times I reluctantly decide that the writing is too scary for you.  Sometimes a whole awesome, touching, raw, emotional and funny yet scathing blog cannot be published because I fear the impact it would have on a single certain person.  It’s various people at various times, depending on the subject.  It could be Dave’s family, or his friends, or maybe my own family.  Many times it’s the pearl clutchers.  I imagine them clutching their pearls and speaking in hushed tones when I breeze past them in a dress that might be showing cleavage.  “Did you read what she wrote?”

I mostly don’t care what people think but I’m also a realist.  I have to live with the ramifications of the published words.  It’s easy to step into my Madwoman alter ego and fling the words around.  It’s harder to press the ‘publish’ button when I see my real name sitting up in the corner.  I kick myself every day that I didn’t do this on the sly.  A pseudonym.  Just some random crazy bitch.  But the story of the kidnapping and robbery on the morning of the funeral would have found me.  Because who the fuck else has that ever happened to?  Where’s my gah damn lottery ticket since I’m apparently this one in a jacktillion kind of person?

The blog neglect is shameful because it causes the blog to be buried deeper and deeper into the sea of words that is the internet.  I do fervently WISH for it to be accessible to those who find themselves where I was that fateful evening….eyes red and swollen, throat burning from screaming, desperate to hear the real truth from a real person speaking real words.  I’m humbled that the serious words have saved lives and changed lives.  And tickled that the comical aspect serves as proof that if you maintain a good attitude and a sense of humor you will never suffer longer than necessary.  Because suffering is for pussies.

Cue the pearl clutching.

Random funny ecard courtesy of The Klonopin Chronicles

 

If It Purrs, RUN!

Welp.  D-Day is behind us. We survived unscathed. I am getting so good at this, and I feel proud of myself. This year, I just simply refused to let it bother me. Refused to get anxious over it. Refused to give it air time.  So take that, universe.  This mutha will not be held hostage by the calendar. We'll see how the next few days go. Sometimes the gods trick me into thinking I’ve escaped their wrath, only to reach down low and grab me by the ankle after I get a few steps away. 

Things were getting sort of monotonous around here, and I also have a strict rule against staying here on D-Day, just in case I suddenly lose my faculties and decide to lie down on the garage floor where he died to practice my crying, choking and screaming. So we booked a last minute vacation to a very overbooked part of the world.  The beach. When I say overbooked I mean that I had the CEO of 15,000 rental properties personally looking for a cancellation.  At 11:08 a.m. I was alerted by one of the futha’s to the very last condo available all the way from Orange Beach, AL to Panama City Beach, FL and by 4:00 p.m. we had toes in the sand.  Don’t ever get in a packing race with me. 

I made several observations at the beach. First of all, some of you men folk still have not read the memo regarding back hair.  Women hate it.  Shave that shaggy shoulder fro. Also, people need to get better tattoos. Getting tattoos is like designing and decorating your home, permanently.  Mostly that’s best left to the professionals. You can’t just throw random shit all over and expect it to look nice.  Also, I was the only woman my age wearing a two piece bikini bathing suit.  This causes me to feel slightly uncomfortable and whorish.  For about 2 seconds. 

I thought a lot about my own fuckups too. Lord knows there are many to choose from involving much more than cosmetic flaws. Where did I go wrong with Dave? What red flags did I ignore?

The very first red flag is kind of funny, and Dave would kick my ass for telling this story if he were alive, but alas, this is what you get when you leave yourself defenseless against a scorned woman who likes to bang her fingers into a keyboard. 

It was very early in our dating. We were both about 30 I guess. He had practically moved in with me from the beginning…not really his stuff but himself. I never asked him to stay or any of that…but I guess it didn’t bother me very much or I would have said something, like please leave.  Anyway, I had plans with friends one night. He wasn’t invited or didn’t want to go, I can’t really remember. So I went out and had a good time and returned home around midnight or one to find his mom running around my house like a chicken with her head cut off. “He spiked a fever!” she is exclaiming in a very fast and nervous tone.  Mind you, he is fucking 30. 

Oh my God. I’m immediately thinking this wussy ass better be dead or dying, or this is really, really a bad sign. First of all, spiked a fever? Who says that? I hate that saying. Please just say he has fever. I quickly ascertained that he was mildly ill with a slight fever. Oh No.  Disastrous.  He has called his mommy.  This is not exactly tough guy material.  No.  This is immediate break up material is what this is! Why is this mother here? Did this kitty cat really call his mom to come over because he didn't feel well? 

She has brought soup, and a thermometer, and he is on the couch, wrapped up in blankets. She is hovering all over him, and I’m extremely alarmed. I’m not alarmed that he is sick. I am alarmed that I think I suddenly hate him. She is talking so fast and I’m working overtime in a rather inebriated state to just block out everything she is saying. I’m catching bits and pieces of the drama. He called…he said you went out….he needed help….he felt so bad. 

I’m pretty sure I just stared at them.  My annoyed stare face is not very subtle.  She finally left and I went to bed and closed the door. In the morning I didn’t ask him how he felt. As soon as he felt better, I think I told him I needed a break and he needed to go home for a while. 

When I tell this story to other women, they laugh like there is no tomorrow. Why is this funny?

I can’t imagine that I didn’t break up with him.  Luckily he had some overriding good traits.  He never knew that one moment was almost a deal breaker. 

Let that be a lesson to you young girls.  And mental note to teach baby darling that once he starts dating he must never call me unless he’s in an ambulance.

Time to get right

This week my kids entered a special boot camp I’ve created out of desperation.  It’s called 1976.  Remember what we did in the summer of ’76?  Bell bottoms, feathered hair, tube socks and these songs. 

More importantly, in 1976, we climbed trees, drank from the hose, rode bikes, walked to Time Saver for Bubblicious and pop rocks, and played hide and go seek with the neighborhood kids, usually well into the night.  Funny how none of us were kidnapped, raped or maimed, despite not wearing helmets and our parents not having a clue where we were.

We were not allowed to sloth around in the house all day.  My mom’s favorite saying was “Go outside.”

There weren’t elaborate cooked meals for lunch.  We ate baloney sandwiches.  We weren’t aware of other options, like fancy pita breads, grilled Panini sandwiches, and various meat and cheese selections.  Our choice of baloney was with olives or without.

There was no Minecraft, no Xboxes, no cable TV, and no IPhones.  Therefore, none of these things are present in the 1976 camp.  I’m debating whether I will force them to play frogger.  Remember our version of Minecraft?  It was called “Adventure”…it was the game with the dragons…they chased you through those ‘castles’ and you had to find that secret key.

The reason for the camp is because my kids are asses.

I’ve spent 30 days carting them around to festivals and parties.  They’ve been to water parks and to the movies.  Bowling and miniature golf.  They’ve eaten from cool food trucks and have been to several restaurants.  They spent a day in the French Quarter and have been to the Museum of Art.

I’ve finally come to the realization that none of this matters.  They fight and whine and act unappreciative.   And I’m sick of it.

I was so sick of them last week that at one point I actually refused to feed them.  You think I’m kidding?  The muthas were quite amused with this fracas.

They always get a good snack after swimming.  On one particular day, they wanted hashbrowns and eggs with fresh tomatoes and bacon.  They’re accustomed to the waitstaff here.  I smirked and told them hell no.

I refused to feed them.  I told them I wasn’t preparing another meal until they helped me clean the ENTIRE house.  Then I told them as soon as they ate their snack, they were heading outside.  FOR THE DAY.  They were not to come inside until dark.

They whined that they would be hot and thirsty.  I reminded them that they have a pool and a fridge stocked with water and juice boxes.  A far cry from riding my bike all sweaty with a red face in 1976 and drinking from the hose.  I mean seriously, did we even have trees for shade back then?

The day was quite amusing.  They swam.  They rode bikes.  They dug holes in the yard.  They picked tomatoes.  They caught bugs.  They walked to the park.  They brought rocks home from the railroad tracks.  They found old paint in the basement and painted the rocks.  They did not fight.  They did not whine.  And I did not spend a dime.  It was a jackass free zone.

Somehow, we were all righted.

Now, go here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DX7qvrG9vhc

You’re welcome.  Enjoy your right side up day.

 

There's No Cryin In Rock 'n Roll

Well madpeople, father’s day is upon us and my heart is bleeding for my precious boys.  I’m the ultimate over-compensater.  I can spin a bad situation into a lighthearted one, I can force my way through deep shit like a mad bull.  My head is high and my heart is joyful, mostly.  But I’m still just a chick.  A mutha.  I’m not a man.  I’m not a daddy.  I can’t replace him.  And it’s so unfair.

These kids are the best.  They are sweet and gentle and kind and funny and so full of love.  They deserve to be sandwiched between a mom and a dad.  They deserve to play football and baseball and soccer in the yard with their dad.  They deserve to learn from a good man how to treat a woman, how to be a husband, how to be a provider.  And they’ll have none of it.  Not a lick.  And it makes a part of me die inside.

I try not to freak out because I know surely there must exist men who achieved greatness despite not having a father.  I know books have been written and statistics charted that say my boys are likely to be deficient in some way, solely due to their lack of a father figure.  I desperately want to believe that my love, my passion, will make it untrue.

I once boasted that my love was not regular.  Someone once told me that knowing me was like knowing fire.  I try to convince myself that I can be everything they need.  Deep inside I feel it’s untrue.

I don’t need him.  I really don’t.  But they do.  The brutal agony turns to anger so that I can function.  I know what to do with anger.  I don’t know what to do with agony.  The anger fuels me.  The agony destroys me.  This is one of the benefits of being a suicide survivor.  The anger props you up, nudges you.  I’m the best when someone tells me I can’t do something.

I’m sobbing now, but not hysterically because my boys are in the next room.  We’re going to my dad’s today, to get what little bit of dadness we can swipe in a short time.  The big boys recently discovered an affinity for Lynyrd Skynyrd, so we’re going to dry the tears, open the roof and crank it up loud on the way.  There’s no crying in rock n roll.

This was sent straight from Dave today...give it a whirl.  A little Freebird is good for the soul.

If I leave here tomorrow
Would you still remember me?
For I must be traveling on, now
'Cause there's too many places I must see

If I stayed here with you, girl
Things just couldn't be the same
'Cause I'm as free as a bird now
And this bird you cannot change

And the bird you cannot change
And the bird you cannot change
Lord knows, I can't change

Bye, bye, it's been a sweet love
Though this feeling I can't change
But please don't take it so badly
'Cause Lord knows I'm to blame

But if I stayed here with you, girl
Things just couldn't be the same
Cause I'm as free as a bird now
And this bird you cannot change

I'm the bird you cannot change
And this bird you cannot change
Lord knows, I can't change
Lord help me, I can't change

Oh, I can't change
Fly free bird

Bad things come in 3's, or 3000s....

Bad things happen in 3’s….or in three thousands or something if you’re the Madwoman…but who the fack is counting, right?

I know you all have probably heard me mention that it’s termite swarming season here in Nola.  This year I noticed I had way more swarmers than usual.  Like way the fuck more.  I found out it had something to do with the termites actually nesting in and eating my house all up.

I woke up one morning to thousands of wings everywhere and little areas in the sheetrock where I could shine a flashlight and actually see little buggy eyes looking back at me.  Shivers.  I quickly sprayed windex on them then covered the holes with duct tape.  Upon closer inspection, which demanded that I actually walk into parts of my own house that I rarely enter, I discovered that zillions of termites were eating Dave’s old lumber stacks in the basement.  They’re eating the front of my house, the downstairs bathroom and a few other tasty spots too.

The front of the basement is sort of dark and creepy and I honestly never go in there.  There’s not much there except old lumber that hoarder Dave was keeping, and some big ass saws.  (Remember the saw from DemonicAmputating Flowers?)  Yeah…read that if you don’t know what I’m talking about.

Anyway, I went nuts.

I cleaned out the entire garage in about five hours.  I flung the windows open and just threw everything out the windows like it was Hurricane Katrina all over again.  I was rabid.  Extremely pissed.  Many of Dave’s lazy workers cut wood and went in and out of our basement for years, and they were asshole stupid slobs.  I cursed them every step of the way as I cleaned up the messes of grown men while neglecting my kids.  In fact, at one point I got so annoyed I tipped the giant saw from Demonic Amputating Flowers right over.  It hurt my wrists when I did it.  It was so heavy that when I tried to right it again, I couldn’t even budge it.  You know how people get weird adrenaline and can lift cars off of people and stuff?  Yeah…I had that weird adrenaline.  Believe me, if you get stuck under a big log, you will want me around!  I will flick that shit over like it’s a stick or something.  When I was done being the Incredible Hulk, I called a trash guy and he carted off FOUR giant, full loads from the garage.

So, I’m no longer a wood hoarder.  Or any sort of hoarder.  My garage is clean and tidy and it feels more like mine and less like Dave’s, so there’s that.

The termite guy pointed out that some of my eaves and rafters on the roof were rotting.  I knew that.  I’ve been pretending not to see that shit for years.  I have to fix it now because they think the termites are trying to build an aerial nest near the wet, rotten wood.  That prompted a call to the roof guy, who quickly told me that whoever installed my roof 12 years ago failed to install a proper drip edge, which is why my gutters are coming loose and my eaves are rotting.  He also took pictures up there of where the squirrels have eaten off all the vent covers, and one of the vents is actually leaking into the attic.  I didn’t admit to him that I knew that vent was leaking into the attic months ago.  I couldn’t fix it with duct tape or a butter knife, which are the main tools in my tool belt, so I threw a thick piece of insulation under it, to absorb the rainwater when it rains.  Genius, right?  I thought so too.  I swear I’m nothing if not a handy bitch.

And last, but not least…..the shitwater is back in the basement.  Remember the shitwater?  You can read about it here.  So I called the plumbers again and they showed up with jackhammers and all of a sudden things got insanely stinky!  In fact, not just regular stinky.  We are talkin’ big stank.  It was more like a homeless person’s ass, actually a dead homeless person’s ass after he had bad diarrhea for 12 years.  Try to imagine it.  They called me down to deliver the news that my master bath toilet and shower are not even draining into the sewer.  All that shit is just pouring under my slab.  Because we are shit magnets.  We actually magnetize shit.  How can I make money off this unique talent?

For the last few months I have conducted an experiment where I did not blog about my strange magnetic abilities.   I was under the impression that I was becoming inert.  Not so, madpeople!

I am laughing right now because I know the majority of you who do not know me will imagine that I live in a rat hole.  I wish I could post a photo of my lovely 90 year old raised bungalow…but alas, some of you might kidnap me and the darlings so I have to practice restraint.  I swear it’s lovely.

I know I promised to blog more, like I’m some kind of famous person that people give a shit about, and I haven’t really done it.  I should take a moment to say that so many of you have taken the time to write to me lately and check in on me, given that it’s our ‘bad time’ right now.  You touch me so deeply, you madpeople you….you really do.  Some people even mentioned that they felt weird reaching out and asking me how I was doing, they didn’t want to seem too stalkerish.  Trust me when I say that there’s no harm in caring about our fellow humans.  I’m so touched that you all care about me and I love and care about you all just the same.  Let’s keep caring about one another.  We’re all occupying this beautiful earth and the good people make it all worthwhile.  Where would we be without good people?  In the shitter, that’s where.  So keep being the good, madpeople.

I have lots more to say but I try to keep these short on account of all you ADHD folks.  For now, keep repelling the shit and I will write more after I finish this delicious lemonade vodka that some of the muthas are forcing me to drink.

How ya like me nah?  I WROTE!

Fuck that day

I was grocery shopping with all three of the darlings this week.  Madpeople, I’m getting so good at this.  A man even stopped us to comment that it was nice to see a mom shopping with her kids and not looking completely frazzled and bent, but instead laughing and being happy and calm.  My response was to laugh.  I clearly remember blogging about being completely overwhelmed and fighting with assholes in the store last year.  I think it took me a solid year and a half to get used to being a single mom.

When we arrived at the display which holds the hummus and cheese, I reached down and pulled out a tub of hummus, and checked the date as I normally do.   Good till July 5, 2013.  Immediately an electrical shock ran through me and I felt my asshole quiver.  D=Day.  Son.Of.A.Bitch. 

I’ll count this as my first warning that D-Day is fast approaching, no matter what I do.   There’s no stopping the calendar.  The arrival of June brings our wedding anniversary, Father’s Day, Dave’s birthday, and then D-Day…all in a span of 30 days.  On my next shopping excursion I need to buy some big girl panties to get ready for the onslaught.  Maybe this year I’ll go for a nice thong.  I’ma try not to wear depends and be in the fetal position with a pack of lit cigarettes in my mouth and one of those silly drinking hats on…you know the kind that holds a gallon of Tito’s vodka and has two straws going directly into your word hole?

Yesterday I was lying on the bed with the littlest darling.  He’s so insanely cute that I was trying to figure out how to just eat him up.  I was tickling him and he was laughing the cutest laugh that has ever fallen over the earth.  Then all of sudden “Dave” flashed across my mind.  It was intense.  I quickly pushed it away, as I am so good at doing.  I didn’t skip a beat….I said nothing….just kept laughing and tickling.  In that instant baby darling went from laughing to crying.  Just like that.  I scooped him up and asked him what was wrong.  “I miss daddy” he cried.  Shivers.  The veil was lifted for an instant.  We are still too wounded.

The two littles are already done with school, and big darling has only a couple days left.  I’m so excited to spend summer with these boys.  Please remind me of this in August when I am lamenting that I haven’t had four minutes to myself in three solid months and I am mere seconds away from clawing my hair out and running wildly down the street while babbling incoherently.  At the very least, remind me to drink more or get a prescription for medical marijuana.

In other news, I stepped on a dead rat while barefoot the other day.  Actually, it was just the rat head and tail, the middle part of the body must’ve gotten eaten.  I realize this will cause many of you to believe that I live in a garbage dump.  I swear I don’t.  I had to quickly spray bleach on the bottom of my foot.  Then I had to pick up the body parts and throw them away.  Ya hurd me?  I had to handle a fucking rat.  Big darling assisted for moral support and to hold the flashlight.  I put my hand inside three plastic bags and picked it up like I see people doing when their dogs shit in my yard.  Through three bags, I could still feel the squishy-ness of the rat flesh.  Through three bags I still thought I could feel some moist rat guts.  I will never get used to doing that kind of thing, and I will curse Dave like a motherfucker every time. 

As soon as I walked inside I found baby darling in the bathroom wiping his own ass.  Why does baby darling think he’s an ass wiper?  He’s always thought he was one.  When middle darling used to yell for me to come wipe him, I would have to sprint really fast to the bathroom in order to beat baby darling there.  I would usually enter to find him running towards the soiled ass with a piece of toilet paper the size of a dime. 

I’m going to try and update more frequently so that my blog doesn’t get lost in the blogosphere.  Two new suicide widows contacted me in the last 3 weeks, which nudges me to keep this going.  Please help me to do that because I’m not advertising the blog anymore, anywhere.  Just like or comment on the Diary’s Facebook page or invite your friends to check it out.  Gracias madpeople.

 

 

BLESS YOUR HEARTS

Bless your hearts.

If you are from the South, you likely just read that title in a southern accent, and then you probably smiled.  If you’re not from the South, then I almost feel badly that you probably don’t receive these blessings nearly enough.  This is Southern Speak.  It’s just who many of us are.  “She got so drunk she lost her shoe, bless her heart.”  I’m not sure any of us really put great thought into what the word bless means.  We’re just southerners.  We bless people.  Around here, black people always tell me to “Have a blessed day.” I love that!  I love being blessed.  I love feeling the positive energy from a fellow person spilling over into my own personal energy field and offering a soothing vibration.

Here in Louisiana, we even have a special blessing-type slogan regarding our football team, the Saints.  It’s “Bless You Boys!”  That’s right.  We bless the heck outta those boys.  That’s why they kick your asses regularly.  Umm hmm.  Dat’s right.

Lately I'm more aware that the invention of Facebook has caused the neat and tidy little bubble that I was raised in to burst.  I’m not sorry about it.  It’s good to know stuff.   Good to expand your world.  I’ve realized that some people don’t appreciate ‘blessings.’

In fact, they are downright offended by ‘blessings.’

This photo appeared on my feed yesterday.  It was posted by a friend.

 

It’s a traffic sign on the Causeway over Lake Pontchartrain.  The first comment about the photo was from an agnostic person, who posted to say that he was OFFENDED by this sign.  He cited the separation of Church and State provision.  He asked what about the people who don’t use blessings.  Of course I responded by saying something that I LOVE TO SAY…”It’s called freedom OF religion, not freedom FROM religion.” 

I couldn’t help but wonder why this person was so bothered that some highway workers wanted to offer blessings and good tidings to the people of Boston.  People are DEAD.  An 8 year old child is DEAD.  That hurts my heart in a special, stabby kind of way.  It causes me to get that familiar hurt-y lump in my throat, and then I breathe fast and wonder if I shouldn’t take my kids to the Jazz Fest or any large sporting events.  I am immediately reminded of the trauma we all lived through here in this house.  I'm acutely aware that these families will be facing similar trauma.  And I know without a shadow of a doubt that the blessings and good tidings and well wishes and positive vibrations from others are indeed what carried us through a period where we could not have been left alone.  We would have certainly survived without those blessings.  But don’t we want more than to merely exist?

I’m here to tell you all that I’m offended that you’re offended!

That’s right.  Ya hurd me?  I’m OFFENDED that you are OFFENDED.

Here’s the thing.  A blessing is really the same thing as saying “Good tidings”.  No one is asking you to kneel down and pray, heathens.  We are simply spreading good will. 

I’ve heard many agnostic people stating that they are ‘not bad people’.  They are not harboring evil.  They just don’t believe in what others believe in, and they don’t want to pray or be around people who pray.  And to that, I say, “OK.”  Sounds fine with me.  I will refrain from kidnapping you and tying you up with jump ropes and driving you to my Catholic Church and asking you to kneel down and pray.  Yeah, I’m gonna stop doing that to people, okay?  Because to each his own, right?

But I am not going to stop blessing people.  I’m going to keep saying GOD BLESS YOU when you sneeze and expel that demon and I’m going to keep saying BLESS HIS HEART, HE’S SUCH A PRICK, and I’m going to keep bursting with happy when black ladies tell me to HAVE A BLESSED DAY.  Sometimes, I even pretend I’m black, because I almost am, and I say HAVE A BLESSED DAY too.

Why be so offended by those who wish to release good vibrations into the universe?  Are we brave enough to ask people to stop spreading joy?  After all, our prayers and blessings are joyful.  After yesterday, are we brave enough?  After Connecticut, are we brave enough?  After all the BAD that is in this WORLD, would you really dare to say no, we do not need these good tidings at all.  In fact, let’s try to live with less positive energy in the universe.  Less blessings and prayers.  

Some agnostics will no doubt say, “The prayers aren’t working!”  They will say that Boston and Newtown are proof.  And to you I say, how do you know?  Might it actually be worse if all these lunaticsweren’t praying and blessing us all up and down and side to side? Have you thought about that?  My prayers are not hurting you.

I’m getting pretty damn tired of being asked not to pray. In fact, just to piss you off, I’m praying FOR YOU.  That’s right!  How ya like me nah?

I’m blessing you.  I’m blessing everyone.  And I’ma keep doing it.  You can’t stop me.

So, GOD BLESS YOU.  BLESS YOUR HEART, YOU POOR SOUL WITH ONLY A HORIZONTAL VIEW OF THIS UNIVERSE.  HAVE A BLESSED DAY. 

How Not To Be An Ass When You Grow Up

I have these three beautiful boys under my thumb and raising them is a task I take seriously. I want them to be successful adults. Everyone wants that for their kids. But I want more. I want them to be good husbands. In fact, not just good husbands, but incredibly awesome, irresistible, can’t-live-without-you, can-you-believe-this-guy husbands. Only I have to raise them without a husband as a role model, because they don’t have a daddy. It’s suddenly occurring to me that this is not a damning scenario. (Queen of spin.)

If you’ve been reading my blog a while, you know that I have a fear of my geriatric years. Why? Because the women who marry my sons are going to determine whether I’m in a quaint mother-in-law cottage with some pretty flowers and a carafe of fresh water on my bedside table, or whether I succumb to death in a pee smelling nursing home.  Nursing homes are full of old men flashing their putrid body parts.  I certainly won’t want to see that when I’m 98. I want the cottage, baby. Preferably near the ocean. And to get the cottage, I need to make sure these boys know how to be men. Not just men, but men that the madwoman herself would marry. Who better to teach them how to be awesome men, than a woman who loves men, right? I mean, granted, the madwoman has landed in unfamiliar territory. The madwoman has loved and lost. But, I have extracted superior knowledge from life’s lessons. I know what I like. Hence, the madwoman’s guide to being the perfect man:

1.) Tell the truth. Always. Tell the truth when it hurts. Tell it when it makes you look like a fucking clown. Tell it even when it ruins your day, and hers. Tell it even though the world may crumble and fall apart around you. There is no other option. Truth.

2.) Tell your woman what you love about her. Don’t just say, “I love you.” Everyone says that. If her cooking is extraordinary, tell her. If her ass is to die for, tell her. If you like how it feels when she runs her fingers through your hair, tell her. You can thank me for this later. And you will.

3.) Be a good daddy. Play with your kids. Play with everyone’s kids. Encourage your kids to be like you used to be when you were little. Show them how to climb trees, ride bikes, wrestle and play sports. Build forts with them. Sit down and have tea and dress a baby doll. Your wife is sick of doing this shit. Your kids will think you’re a rock star.

4.) Whatever your career, be good at it. Whether you’re the lawn guy or a rocket scientist, be great. I get that we all can’t be the best, but we can all try damn hard. Being lazy is not sexy. Trying hard is.

5.) Be sexy. Very few women really like the hair on your back and shoulders. If they love you they may lie and say it doesn’t matter. It does. Shave it. And tidy up that cock fro while you have the clippers out.

6.) Burn your copy of Men Are From Mars, Women Are From Venus. Because that shit is over, that’s why. If you want to slink off to your man cave everyday and pretend you don’t have a family, then go marry a cave woman. This isn’t the fucking stone ages.

7.) Put your family first. Making lots of money is great, being non-existent because of it isn’t. Every day is precious. If you knew this was your last day on earth, would you really work till 7 pm? Would you really stop for drinks on the way home? Would you really just get your kids every other weekend like the court papers say? Or would you come home and wrap yourself up like a pretzel around the ones you love? Any old man will tell you the truth. Ask one what he regrets.

8.) Learn to cook. Cooking is important, since without food we die. Participate in meal planning, like you are shooting the fucking game yourself. Women get overburdened when responsible for every meal.

9.) Learn to be funny. Humor is everything. When your world is spinning out of control, a fucking belly laugh is an anchor. Some people are born comedians. It’s in their genes. If it’s not in your genes, then learn to relax enough to find the funny and laugh at yourself.

10.) Be positive. Find the good in whatever you can. Seek God. If that doesn’t ‘speak to you,’ then find a good vibration and hang on to it for dear life. Negative people suck.

I’m not even going to give a number to ‘don’t be an addict, don’t beat your wife or kids, don’t be a gambler, a cheater, or a thug.’ If you are, I hope your wife leaves you until you come to your senses. Because ‘for better or for worse’ doesn’t mean living under the kind of oppression that comes from living with that shit. Been there. Done it. Survived it. I know what the hell I’m talking about. There is no piece of paper marriage license worth living under the black cloud. Sorry, but it’s true. Get right or get out.

Phase II

I started writing this blog one year ago.  I had no idea why I did it…and to be truthful, I still don’t.  Back then I wrote for me, and for me only.  Every night I sat here and vomited the words onto the page, and was freed.  It was cheaper than therapy.  Outside, I didn’t have to answer any questions.  Everyone could just read the blog.  I didn’t want to lie and say, “We’re fine” to the multitude of people who asked.  We weren’t fine.  And I’m not a good liar.  I was in pain, and was intent on taking everyone down with me.  I wanted everyone to feel my pain.  I had never known such pain, didn’t realize it even existed, and I didn’t think it was fair to carry the burden alone.  I wanted people to know that this could happen to them.  I wanted them to know that we started out as just regular people.  I was blindsided, and so I offered myself up as the cautionary tale. The blog became my bullhorn.

I’m not sure what I expected, but I sure didn’t think 600,000 people would read it.  I wrote most of these posts in 15 minutes or less.  I remember back then stumbling upon blogs with thousands of email subscribers and thinking that I would like to be like them.  I wanted to have those readers.  Now I do.  I’ve won blogging contests and awards and have been ranked number one on different sites.  And suddenly…..I’m not really sure it’s at all relevant or important.

I’m not sure what my ambivalence means.  Maybe it means nothing.

I think right now it just means that other things are more important to me.  My kids.  Living in the moment.  Being more present with them.  Moving on to the next phase. 

I’m terrified of the next phase.  In the next phase, I have to go back to work.  I have to make money, rather than just spend it.  In the next phase, I have to do what I do with a whole lot less hours in the day.  I feel I already have about 10 jobs.  Now I’m going to have another one.  And I’m scared.

In the next phase, I have to face reality.  Because this next phase is going to last a long, long time.  Like forever. 

It’s hard for me not to blame Dave right now.  I always hate him when I’m scared and overwhelmed.  It’s his fault.  HE should be working.  NOT ME.  HE should be HELPING ME.  Not rotting in a casket.

I’ve been quietly contemplating my next move from the moon lodge.  I decided I should consult Dave on what to do, since perhaps he can see things I can’t.  I know I’m not that great at taking directions from most people, so I’m not sure why I’m asking a dead person what I should do.  “So here’s the deal,” I say.  “I need $1,092,000 so that I don’t have to go back to work.”  This is no random number.  It’s a carefully calculated figure of what I need until baby darling finishes high school.  By then surely I will have figured something else out, right?

I bought a lottery ticket.  I was quite surprised I didn’t win $1,092,000.  I wrote the number down and folded it up carefully and put it in my wallet.  I’ve made a few wishes since then, like when it was 3:13 on 3/13/13.  Which, by the way, was the day Pope Francis was installed.  Expect great things from Pope Francis, whether you are religious or not.  I know that he will be great because I unexpectedly cried and got very emotional when he bowed his head and asked the world to pray for him.  I prayed for him out loud, as did millions of people in the world simultaneously, and that is a degree of coolness that should not be lost on any conscious person.  How often does that happen?  Not nearly enough is my answer.  That’s a lot of positive energy being released into the universe at one time.  I hope you were smart enough to reach out and grab some of it, and then send it on its way.  If you missed it, take that moment now.  I happen to think the good stuff swirls around for a while, allowing ample time for people to reach out.

Now, where was I?  Oh right…consulting dead people.

During the ‘consultation’, I somehow found myself opening this bereavement box, which is really just me trying to sound cool, because it’s a shoebox, for fucks sake.  Anyway, it became the resting place for a lot of cards and letters sent to me shortly after the incident.  I didn’t torture myself with all that…instead I read a letter I wrote to him in 2009, when I was pregnant for baby darling.  We were separated at the time.  The letter was very meaningful, because as I read it I realized it was ALL THE WORDS I would have spoken to him had I come upon him standing in the garage with the gun pointed just so.

As I read all the words, I realized that all this time I have really assumed that had he just TOLD ME what was going on, I could have FIXED IT. 

No.

I said all the words.  All of them.  I wrote them down, even.  And it didn’t matter.  My words didn’t matter.  Nothing I did mattered.  This was his destiny.  To die.  His destiny was not to be fixed.  Not even by me.  The masterful and powerful fixer of all things.

My destiny, I suppose, is to just pick up the pieces.  Phase by phase.

In this new phase, I’m not sure what I’m doing with all this social media.  I didn’t post a single thing to the facebook page for a solid week.  I felt very free.  I’m not a good twitterer either.  I just don’t like it.  So if you want me, you probably need to subscribe to the blog, via email or google connect or whatever those boxes are.  I will never not write.  Writing frees me.  It shows me things I can’t see.

Whether or not I share them…well…I just don’t know anymore.

I wish I could change that I’m a chronic oversharer.  That I don’t know how to not say everything out loud.  That my best communication occurs via writing. 

You know, someone asked me the other day, ‘what my message was’?  What is the message I’m selling?

I don’t even know the answer to that, which just really amplifies my current state of being.

I’m in a cocoon.  Plotting.  Planning.  Focusing solely on a means to an end.    I’ve received lots of advice over the past few weeks, everything from write a book, go back to school, start a business, or get married.  The last one is most definitely not on the table.

Right now, I’m just being quiet.  I’m listening.  I feel certain a beautiful butterfly will emerge.  I’m hopeful.

Until then, my message is to simply carry on.  Keep growing.  And love.  Especially your children.