Happy (non) Anniversary.

in 5 days, it would have been our 6th anniversary. the milestones are hard. his birthday, my birthday. all 5 kids birthdays. summer. our anniversary. then halloween. thanksgiving. christmas. new years. and finally, the one year mark. i'm3/4 of the way through. but this one. this one brings quite a bit of reflection, where the others i can  . . do my best to skim over

sept. 15 was the first day we spoke online.7 days later I met him in person. i can still see him clear as day, standing outside watching me walk from my car, across the parking lot. the grin from ear to ear. it took about 30 minutes and i knew. this was special.

i could write a novel based on what life put us through over the next 5 years. mistakes we made. both of us. i can see it much more clearly now. the things we could have fixed. and the things we never could. none of that matters now. you cant go back and undo things said. actions taken. decisions made. we held on for all we were worth. and in the end, love WASNT enough.

so. what would i say.

thank you.

thank you for recognizing that all the love and respect in the world wasnt going to change who we inherently are, and what the structure of our life was. thank you for having the balls to sit here and cry with me and tell me, that it sucks. and it hurts, but we were done.

thank you for letting me go so i could find myself again. i loved our life and i loved our family but the stress had sucked me dry. i was tense, and stressed and FRUSTRATED and unhappy. and i didnt even recognize how bad it was until i had some time to get back to me.

thank you for 5 years of filling me up. for taking me when i was broken and angry and patched together and soothing out the edges. for holding me late at night when i would cry in my sleep. for encouraging me to leap. for respecting me for the woman, mother, citizen i am. for being my biggest champion. i have no doubt that every bit of good that i accomplish, has a bit of you with it.

thank you for teaching me. teaching me to be softer. kinder. gentler. teaching me grace. and also to have a back bone. teaching me how to have a system (tho i still dont load the groceries right), how to run a chain saw, and how to drive a boat. it takes infinite patience to teach someone who already knows it all.

thank you for the late nights. the hours and hours of social commentary and parent brain sessions. it always felt like we could solve the world.

thank you for letting me love your boys. i know they are the most important thing in the world to you, and i'm thankful for my time with them. i miss them every day.

thank you for teaching me spontaneity. that its ok to decide to go on a road trip with two hours notice and no planning. there is always a shit hole motel somewhere to crash in.

thank you for 5 years of better than most people ever get. we were pretty fucking lucky.

there are so many things. so many over 5 years. i could fill pages and pages of things you brought to my world.

thank you for being my best friend. i can still say, despite the anger and sadness,  that only your best friend could possibly end what we had, knowing it was best for everyone. it sucks. but its true. you were right.

Happy (non) Anniversary. Love h.

aggravating.

Man its hard to keep coming up with ING headings! So i'm trying to write this without being AGGRAVATING (wait, thats what this should be called ..  . changing heading . . )

Ok. So, to make a long story short, I was an athlete most of my life. Ok, well I was an athlete the first half of my life. Then I wasnt. And for 20 years I really didn't do any sort of exercise. I had three kids. I ate like a beast for three pregnancies.  And my weight went up and down, up and down and after all three kids I settled in at a weight marginally above my HS weight. I wasnt thrilled but all things considered I didnt have much to bitch about. Then I got divorced when my kids were little and I lost a ton of weight. and life was good. except for the poverty and stress and panic attacks. but i digress. 

Then I discovered craft beer and for four years my partner and I drank a ton of it. Tons and tons and tons of exploring, road trips, the quests for the best beers. Well you know what happens when you are pushing 40 and drink lots of really good beer and have almost no form of exercise?

You put on 25 lbs and wake up one day and go WTF?!

Well then I had this break up and my sister was fearful I might fall down the well and not be able to climb back out, so one night after a few vodka cocktails she offers to pay for 6 weeks with her and Mariah and their personal trainer.

So for the first time in a long long long time, I went to a gym and let someone abuse the hell out of me, in a totally constructive way.

And it was HARD. And i didnt like it at all. Because i was slow and thought i might die. But I was pretty sad and angry about the break up so i pushed myself. And i went for 6 weeks and then my free ride ran out and i quit.

Well,  Jason (the owner of catalyst) convinced me to come back. And the thought of skinny as revenge was pretty appealing so back i went.

Well that was 8 months ago. I've not gone every week. Sometimes work gets in the way.  I wouldnt say that i'm dying to get to the gym. I dont think i'll ever  be one of those people who gets all excited to have someone make them want to puke. But i do enjoy it. Its an AMAZING stress relief. When i feel moody and blue and depressed, exercise actually HELPS with that.

I've not lost the 20lbs i went in to lose. In fact, after 8 months I have lost 1lb. 1.  Now that might sound like maybe its not working. but it is. I'm building muscle that i havent had in a long, long time. I'm not pushing 40 anymore. I'm 42. What a difference a few years makes. I can see the changes in my legs, when I wear heels I see the definition in my calves that hasnt been there for a long time. I can see it in my face, I'm starting to see cheek bones again. Small changes, slow changes. But changes.

I feel stronger. my back feels 1000x better than it has in years. The trainers work with me every single time on stretching. One of my major issues is that as a former gymnast, I've let my muscles completely tighten up (my phrasing). I have very little flexibility. They work with me on that.

But the main benefit, right now, is walking in that door, knowing I'm doing something positive. I'm getting stronger. I'm being pushed to the max of my limits. TO THE MAX. And I give 110% every single time. And leave with my head up knowing that while I may not look like the buff girls in the gym, I still kicked ass.

Revenge no longer matters, and really it would never have mattered to him anyway. This is about me and how I feel. And as long as i feel good. I'm happy.

I know a LOT of my friends right now are hitting the gym. Either at Catalyst or other places. I know friends who start and stop. Ones who yoga and ones who Zumba. Everyone has a different reason and i think all of us at some point get discouraged. I have found that having a time slot with my sister and Mariah has helped me tremendously. I'm less likely to call off unless work demands it. I push myself harder because we are all type A competitive people and no one wants to wuss out. I always in the past felt like i didnt have the time. That was my number one excuse, which with my life then, it was really hard to work in. But once you work it in, you find its totally do able.

I wanted to share this because I know how easy it is to get discouraged if you have set a goal and its taking longer than you would like to see results. There have been several times I've thought "screw it, i'm 40.  This is how I look". Then i notice how my back feels if i miss a gym day. And i realize how important this is to my over all health, physical and mental.

So yeah, I just booked a time slot for 7:30 am on a SATURDAY MORNING. Voluntarily.

If i can do this. You can do this.  (oh hell, most of you are, I think I'm late to the party).

So thanks to all of my FB friends who have been out there this last year or so, posting about their accomplishments and challenges with exercise and changes in eating habits and all of the positive things you all have been doing. I may not always comment, but it has really helped keep me motivated.

Mostly I just dont want my sister calling me a wuss.

frustrating.

So, we’ve all been pretty up in arms lately. The GOP appears to have lost its collective mind. In Arizona conception now starts on the first day of a womans period, before semen is even introduced to the equation. Public officials are running around saying asinine things like “legitimate” rape and “forceable” rape and in general just collectively pissing off self- respecting women everywhere. And I’ll be frank, I’ve been so frustrated, so completely and utterly aghast that sometimes my only recourse has been TEARS of frustration and anger.  

And tonight when I was driving home I was reminded that the picture, while it already looms, is so much bigger and darker.

Im driving down Fairfiled, and there is a woman sitting on the steps of her sidewalk, down from her porch. Shes in her 20’s or 30’s, its hard to tell. She’s wearing an oversized plain white t-shirt. Her hair is pulled back. Her head is in her hands.

Standing in front of her is a thinnish man, maybe a little older Hes standing above her, pointing his finger her direction. There is maybe two feet between them. He’s obviously unhappy, hes obviously verbally berating her.

Standing off to the side, toe in the dirt is a little boy watching the man out of the corner of his eye.

In less than 10 seconds I feel like I can see their whole life.

And all of these arguments and debates and rhetoric that all of the politicians go on and on about. How does any of that affect these people In THIS moment?

There is a cycle to this life. She didn’t grow up in a strong household with loving devoted parents. She probably grew up in a similar environment, of poverty, abuse, neglect and defeat. I would guess that any fight she may have once had in her, is gone.

This man, this man pointing his finger at her, dominating her head and her heart and her soul, probably grew up watching his father intimidate his mother in the same way. Yell, belittle, beat down, demean. Take away. Hurt. It was probably done to him as a child as well, turning what was once a fragile child into an angry little man.

The cycle.

This is not isolated. THIS is our epidemic.

Poverty. Lack of education. Lack of strong role models. Cycles of abuse. Addictions. All strong contributing factors. But what is the solution? Its not trickle down economics. As a society we don’t even CARE about these people. We want them off our tab. Cut their funding. We don’t want to feed them, or clothe them or give them a hand up. We want to drive on by and look the other way and pretend they don’t exist and get our skinny latte and  type on our macbook about how the system needs changed damn it and where are MY tax breaks! Maybe buy a family Christmas and write it off as our good deed for the year.

I drove on by. I debated going back. What the hell do you do? Grab that skinny fucker and drag him into the dirt? Shake her and say “wake UP!” don’t you see your son there? Is this all you want for him?  To see you slowly decaying and allowing him to suffer as well?

I don’t have any answers. I’m still just frustrated and angry and shaking and wondering how to make some kind of damn difference in a world that feels like its gone mad. 

Coming out.

So Entertainment Weekly ran a spread on celebrities and their official announcements of their sexuality. I didnt read it. But its sitting in my mail pile. Following closely on the heels of this it seems, Anderson Cooper has made the decision to make his sexuality public as well. Now I understand how this is helpful. De-stigmatizing and all that. I also understand that there are people in the world who decry this "lifestyle". The problem I have is,  what is the big deal?

When i was 8 or 9 or somewhere in that range, my dad was doing a play at the Civic and somehow the world of homosexuality was introduced to me. And it wasnt a big deal. I think one of the female actors was a lesbian, and somehow it got brought up and it was all very casual. Now dont get me wrong, it kind of blew my tiny mind. Woman liked WOMEN? Men liked MEN? And they were in relationships. Mind Blown! But because I had open hearted and open minded parents, it wasn't a big deal. Just another fact in a long line of facts you collect and move on with as a child. 

The whole concept didnt stay at the forefront of my radar. I recall there being guys in HS i was pretty sure WERE, but no one really talked about it. I dont recall there being much negative speak either, but i also might have been oblivious.

Sometime around my high school years, I found out my cousin in CA was gay. And a few years later he wasn't any more and was married, with kids. This is when I first was introduced to the power of the church and their ability in the right sects to take a perfectly fine human being and shame them into being someone they aren't.

Homosexuality is one of those things that simply never crossed my mind, unless I needed to defend it. When Steve and I had our first house in the burbs occasionally someone would say something mildly racist or homophobic (mildly? sigh, but you get my drift). Offensive, but not, HATEFUL. And it would infuriate me. And eventually they learned you cant say things like that around me.

I dont recall the conversation coming up with my kids, I've simply tried to raise them in a household of love that accepts all people (except mean people. and possibly Republicans - i kid.  . .). When Taylor was in 7th grade her boyfriend at the time invited her to the Aids Task Force Ball. Which I thought was adorable. One of her Bf's moms called me and very gently tried to explain what the Aids Task Force  was and what the event was. I calmly and gently told her my parents had been involved with the ATF since its inception and that I didnt have a problem with Taylor attending the event. I remember talking to Taylor about who would be there and about same sex couples and I believe she rolled her eyes in a big "duh" moment and that was the end of that.

Our culture, has been pretty open about gay characters in the last 15 or so years.  Will and Grace being one of the first I recall. Im sitting here trying to think of another show, another character, and I know they are out there. But i'm not coming up with anything. To me, its so woven into the fabric of our society, I hardly take note.

So when I saw the article, "Anderson Cooper is Gay", the first thing I thought was, who cares? Because really, why should I care? And then I have to remember, I should care. I should care that he is being open about it. Because its the being OUT THERE, that will hopefully over time de-stigmatize the whole thing.  Where once upon a time it was SHOCKING to have a gay character on TV, now there are just gay characters on tv. And once upon a time it was SHOCKING (and possibly career killing) for an actor to come, out, now its like "well duh".  But really, cant we just have characters on tv and actors who play them? Well no, because . . .

 . . of that segment of the population, who are so filled with fear and hate.  They are out there, sometimes lying low, sometimes shouting from the bell-tower about this SIN. This sinful behavior.(which i still cant figure out. is it the LOVING of another human? or where all the pieces fit in the bedroom, cause i'm pretty sure there is a whole lot of wacky that goes on in hetero relationships that arent in the bible either . . .)

I try to remember, that once upon a time (and i realize in some circles it still is) completely taboo for different races to procreate, to love one another.  If you were white and your partner was any other shade, you were SHAMED. It went against GOD and the CHURCH and society and well anything they could think of. I remember in the 70's it was SHOCKING to see an inter-racial couple on TV. But in most circles, even religious ones, its now ok . . you would think at least THOSE people would be more open minded. But sometimes even they are not . . how quickly we forget what oppression feels like?


So maybe it is very important for people like Anderson Cooper, to come out when they feel its appropriate for them. Maybe the cliched ONE PERSON will see that and go, huh . . maybe this isnt something that will collapse civilization as we know it.

I only hope that one day, its no longer an issue. Really, who cares?

Sally.

For some reason Sally popped into my head this weekend. And i thought it would be nice to write about something other than my current emotional state.
After steve and I split (really, it does all come back to being about me tho), I spent a year cleaning houses as way to generate income but spend as little time away from the kids as possible. I had mentioned to Taylors 3rd grade teacher that I was looking for cleaning jobs if she knew of anyone looking. She mentioned Sally. Luckily Sally lived not too far from me in a condo off of Airport Expressway. We met for the first time and she showed me around her place and talked to me about what she was looking for. I was completely overwhelmed.

To this day, I dont have a clue how old Sally was. She was simply, old. And her house was a WRECK. Like, OMG wreck. Not hoarders wreck, but someone who hadn't picked anything off the floor in a good long while wreck.  But, when you have three mouths to feed and no other source of income, you will take what you can get. This started a 5 year relationship that overall is probably one of the most interesting and gratifying relationships I've had.

The first order of business was to get the house back to some reasonable sense of organized. Sally was a very active woman. She volunteered for more organizations than I could possibly list here, and loved to entertain. She was also fairly obese and had a host of health problems that made getting around and staying on her feet a challenge. So she maintained her extremely active lifestyle, but anything around the house that wasnt deemed important, was left for me each week. The entry way woud have an assortment of mail and papers laying about, she would simply drop the unimportant ones as she came in. Often there were bags of groceries strewn about with the cold items (usually) removed and put away but the rest left for me. Dirty clothes were piled in her closet and shoes and jewelry could be found anywhere, across a string of rooms and most often in a pile next to the shower or toilet. The kitchen was always a hodge podge of pans and dishes piled mostly in the sink. Tho sometimes I'd have to remove a whole stack of items from the oven. One of her favoriate hiding places when company was coming before I was . . .  and often she'd forget to tell me they were there till weeks later. I learned to check.
I'd occasionally have to deal with a pan that had all but caught on fire as she'd sometimes start dinner, and then fall asleep before it cooked. That wasnt frightning.
 
Despite the chaos of the house, Sally was very particular about certain things. Sometimes it baffled me, how she determined their importance.  For instance, I would want to clean all of the rotten food out of the refrigerator, but only if i had time to feed the birds first. That was her priority.

After several weeks the complete chaos of the house was mostly dealt with and we were heading into fall. Which meant the switching of the closets. First off, her closet was such a diabolical disaster, that was one area i hadnt even started to tackle. And this "switching of the closets" seemed like an AMAZING waste of time. But this is what she did, every spring and every fall. Take everything out of the closet in her room, and put it in the guest bedroom closet and vice versa. The amount of clothes this woman possessed was baffling. This seemingly simple task was quite possibly the most dreaded of all tasks. It took HOURS.

One of the better tasks was every holiday she decorated. EVERY HOLIDAY. And she had what felt like 60 years of accumulated decorations for each one. And she knew where every last piece went. So down came the pictures, pack up the 20 miniature tea sets. Put the hummels away, and get out the Easter eggs, ornaments, flags, hearts, or whatever was the theme of the holiday.  . . . and three weeks later, undo it all and prepare for the next one . . .

Entertaining was always a BIG event. She had special plates, special decorations, napkin rings, cups, for every single type of gathering. She taught me what it meant to entertain old school. The tables were set with precision (she always had to correct me on the order of the forks!) and she was the consummate hostess. And the following day I'd go back and clean it all up again and hear all the stories about who came, who didnt show and who was having what health issue.

Not a single holiday or birthday went by that I worked for Sally that she didnt surprise me with a gift, not only from her, but also from her dog Murphy. Cute quirky items that a broke ass single mom often had little use for, but they were thoughtful and sweet and almost always made me cry at her kindess.

About a year after I started working for Sally I went back to work full time and she asked me to stay on. So I did. I dropped to every other weekend and would spend my sat or sunday mornings working as fast as possible to get her caught up. She'd follow me around as best she could from room to room updating me on her last two weeks and asking about mine. Apologizing again for having done no laundry and leaving it all to me, and me explaining that I didnt mind.  All the while, trying to be patient and trying to deal with two weeks of disaster. At times getting impatient but trying to understand and be gracious knowing how much she looked forward to our visits.

Over time, we developed a nice friendship. I found out in the 80's she had had a partial mastectomy from breast cancer. Of course she tells me this as I walk in on her in her room buck naked as she was struggling to get dressed for church one morning. Sally wasnt shy.

She did find some of her other physical ailments more disconcerting, and would call me from time to time in the middle of a week and ask if I would come clean up some accident or another that had happened. She hated these episodes. And if you know me at all you have no idea how hard it was for me to handle these incidents. But you cant hear the voice of a woman who is embarrassed and upset and not run over and take care of things, as awful as they sometimes were. It was life.

Sometimes I would take the boys with me if I needed to go over on a kid weekend. They didnt particularly like going, but they liked sally well enough and I'd often find them fun little jobs to do. She really enjoyed having them around. Sally had never married and had no children of her own but she had adopted several families over the years that she became a surrogate grandmother to. Every holiday season I would help address and stamp hundreds of cards and hundreds of Christmas Gifts for her to mail all over the country. She was a generous soul.

She was a passionate MI fan and was very proud of the fact that MI was the first major university in the country to allow women to attend. I cant tell you how often she told me this. She had the picture of her class hanging in her bedroom.  She had gone to MI to become a teacher, and taught school for somewhere around 35 years.

I found my visits to Sallys to be, sort of a respite from my life at the time. I didnt have grandparents anymore even at that age and she filled the role nicely. With stories and anecdotes. and gossip about her friends. The ones who she liked, and the ones she found to be irritating or phoney but that she had known for 45 years . . .she distracted me from my own angst.

So Im sure you know whats coming by now. The day came that I went to clean and the entry way had its usual amount of strewn papers and mail. The living room had another stack of mail and newspapers next to her recliner under the tv tray where she ate her meals and watched her shows. Her omnipresent can of coke sitting on the tray.
It was a Sunday morning and she was often at church by the time I got there and would leave my check in the kitchen. The kitchen was surprisingly clean. No pans in the sink.
And the mattress was missing from her bed.
I found the number of the woman who had initially told me about Sally, she was one of Sallys "adopted" children.
"Mary? It's Heather. I just came to clean Sallys . . ."
"Oh my god heather. It never occurred to me to call you. Sally passed this week"

I sat in the living room I had dusted for the last 5 years, completely stunned. And just cried.

One time when I was cleaning, sally gave me 6 large insulated cups with cards in the plastic. They were the cups she used for card night but had found new ones she liked better so she gave me the old ones. At the time I remember thinking "what in the world will i do with these?" But I took them home. It was about a year later that she died, and I was so grateful to have those 6 silly cups.

There are a lot of things I learned from Sally. Family is who you surround yourself with. No matter what life hands you, keep moving forward. Give of your heart generously and you will receive more back than you can imagine. Entertain even if the dog pees on the carpet, your friends wont mind (except that bitch Edith, she ALWAYS has to make a comment!) . And when you get the the point that you have to chose between volunteering at the zoo, or visiting a friend and cleaning your house? Hire a young single mom to do it for you. You wont regret how you spent your time.

being.

you know how you read those corny motivational sayings and you think "man, what a bunch of crap" and then one day a situation comes across your life and you think "danm, that cat hanging upside down on the branch was freaking right!" Yeah, i had one of those recently. i was thinking about when people say 'well, the heart is a resilient muscle, and you cant quit working it . ." and i mean, really what a dumb thing to say. but when you consider loss and pain and how it really does, feel as though your heart is physically being ripped from your body, when you are grieving you think "how will i EVER recover from this". Yeah, thats still pretty fresh for me. a lot of people dont actually know, that chris and i have split. I didnt make a grand pronouncement. i was dealt the blow. i spent 30 days inside a bottle, 30 days almost completely prone on my couch anytime the kids werent there and emotionally hemorrhaged. 5 years of life, 5 years of raising kids together. 5 years of road trips and more projects than you can imagine, 5 years of late nights, good beer, endless conversations and 2 people who lived 1000 mph all day, every day. ended on the note of "i dont know how to break up with someone i am still in love with, who i respect and admire and love and adore, but i am". And ignoring the hours and hours of trying to understand why, thats what it came down to. It wasnt working.

And i still feel so much grief. For my kids. for my life. for us because you've never met two people so stunningly well suited to each other. i miss the two boys i spent 5 years helping raise.  . . . but, this is life as we know it. and life is filled with loss.  people come into your life, and people leave and all you can really do with that is to get the lessons. And i do get the lessons. i know what i got from that 5 years. i also know what i'm taking with me, what i'm shedding, and what i hope i can bring to the table in my next relationship, that will allow me to be an even better partner in life.

chris taught me about being kind. about how a smile to a stranger can change a day. he taught me it was ok to be soft. that approaching a situation with kindness is almost always better than approaching it from any other direction. he mellowed me and softened me. and taught me how to properly run a chain saw. 

i know what lessons I didnt get. and what I still have to work on. and the whole time i spent laying on my couch, trying to breathe, i knew, that i would be ok. i've suffered loss. its just a matter of allowing time to do its thing, making it better day by day.  and it gets better.

and the heart IS an amazing muscle, because if you let it, it can still feel and beat and hold the capacity to care for others regardless of how many times its been bruised. i left that relationship with my eyes and heart open. instead of closed and jaded as i have so many times before. maybe it was knowing chris was sending me off on my own, with love and respect, as opposed to humiliation and anger as so many of my friends get left to deal with the rest of their lives. and while i have no plans to look for something or someone to fill the void and place of chris and that life i was leading, i'm keeping my heart open to meeting new people who bring something to the table. in whatever capacity that may be. and its interesting how the universe says "here. check this. this is something you need to look at and learn from." and I think i almost always do.

i'm not sure exactly where i wanted to go with this post. but i'm kind of amazed that 3 months and 11 days after what felt like the worst day of my life, i feel this positive about the rest of it. yes, i miss my family. yes, i miss my best friend. every day. but im also very much enjoying my life right now and all the fun and sad and hard and delightful things that go with it. and all the people i'm meeting along the way.

authenticating.

ive found it almost impossible to tap into my creative side these last 3 months.

2011 was a year of uncovering and uncloaking and digging deep to find some authentic to my world. to slow down. focus on some things that brought me true pleasure. i was working through the Mandala on the soul journey program and was amazed at what gifts that brought. when i look at a few pieces of writing and some photography from that time i can see it. i felt like a balloon being filled up with lightness, that I hadnt felt in a long time.

then the shotgun blast and i'm trying really hard to fill that ballon back up.  to not let the circumstances and decisions keep me filled with lead on the ground.

its hard. its hard to sit and be in my own company. i havent picked up my camera. and i need to. i realize now my pleasure in taking pictures was closely tied to his pride in me. i also realize it was a way for me to be seen. because i had started to be very invisible. and trying to be visible can be exhausting. trying to prove your worth on a daily basis, to someone else, is soul crushing work.  its hard when you realize, that your value to the person you are sharing your life with, is gone. but if you keep spinning, you can kind of blur the frame and ignore it.

and i need to be still. i just have no clue how to do that. i hum with energy not being tapped. i feel frenetic. and i want it to all be better. now. not later. now. i want to move on and be healthy and strong and whole.

im tired of looking for the lesson, the silver lining. i just want to BE.

 i want to write about something happy. like love stories and romance and pretty things.
flowers and sunshine. not lighting and bricks.

and i wonder if im even marginally capable.