_ Crap.  My life frigging exploded, AGAIN!  I was living peacefully alongside the “sisty uglers,” (that is, the cousins, Dancer, Spice Girl, and Kitten) when I had a bomb dropped on me.  I was informed in a one-on-one conversation with Kitten,  (the eldest of the three), that they were really starting to feel the “crowdy-ness” of a fourth person in the house and I had until the end of February to be gone.  The conversation then went something like this: 

Me: “But you know I can’t afford a place of my own until I have a full-time job and I’ve been working really hard to find a steady job.  But I don’t have the finances to move out right now.” 

Kitten:  “That’s not my problem.” 

Me:  “But you all said when I got here, just after my husband abandoned me and left me for another woman, that I could stay as long as I wanted.  Dancer said specifically ‘I have no timeline.  You can stay as long as you like.’”  Dancer actually owns the house. 

Kitten:  “Well, we discovered we have a timeline.” 

Me:  “I guess I’ll be headed back to the Pacific NW then because at this point, I have no other options.” 

Kitten:  “Well you can take this anyway you want.”  She had a definite arrogant sort-of smug sound in her tone.  You know that defensive tone that says, “I know I’m wrong so I’m being totally defensive.” 

Me:  Speechless – nothing left to say; stunned at the fact that a promise was broken and the compassion I was greeted with over the demise of my marriage and the fact that my ex left me financially destitute, had completely vanished for the simple fact that it was no longer convenient. 

How quickly they have forgotten that I spent a full-week in and out of the hospital with Spice Girl, after her knee surgery, advocating for her; sticking up for her; ripping doctors and nurses up one side and down another for allowing her pain to carry on ceaselessly; tending to her toileting because the nurses and CNA’s weren’t doing a proper hygienic job.  Have you ever wiped a grown person’s ass?  It ain’t pretty.  But I did it with love in my heart.  And when it was done, I was so physically sick from worry and strain that I could hardly see straight.  But, I love her, so I did it. 

How quickly Dancer has forgotten the 60+ hours I spent taking care of her back taxes.  She hasn’t filed since 2004.  That’s 8-years of taxes.  But she was in a pickle and needed help.  I even called in a favor from Numberina  (my mom) who agreed to do all 8-years at no charge.  That’s worth about $400.00  And in order to prep the taxes, I had to completely organize her bedroom and go through mounds of paperwork looking for deductions.  That alone was two, eight-hour days. 

How quickly Kitten has forgotten that I committed to helping her with a serious fraudulent charge to her credit card after I was done dealing with Dancer’s taxes.  How quickly she has forgotten all the organizing  and housekeeping I have done because I knew the disorganization and lack of cleanliness really bothered her.  I also knew that she needed the help. She no longer has the strength to keep house like she used to. 

How little do they know that I worried after them, their health, their physical safety, and their happiness.  Was the living situation perfect?  No.   Were there disagreements, fights, etc?  Yes.  Did we get on each other’s nerves?  Of course.  But no “family” is perfect.  It has its good and bad moments, but, in my mind at least, you don’t just give one person the boot because it’s “crowdy.”  When you commit, YOU COMMIT!  And so, for me, the lesson, (at least one of the lessons) I have learned is that I have a tendency to commit to people (like my ex-husband) who don’t have the same definition of commit that I do.  I seem to be hooking up with people (family) whose definition of commit means: until it’s just not convenient anymore, or until I just don’t feel like doing it anymore.  And when they are done, they act as if tossing you aside is not personal and don’t understand why you are so upset.  They live their lives based on this ephemeral sense of commitment.   

And I can see with each one of the “sisty uglers” how this level of  take it or leave it commitment has manifested in their lives.  One of them tossed aside her first husband and son in search of happiness with a married man with three kids of his own because she just didn’t want to commit anymore to the son and husband.  At one point, she even tossed aside her own sister and put her in a financially precarious situation telling her the same thing she told me, “Your finances aren’t my problem.”  You see, it had become inconvenient for her to continue to live with the sister and so she left her terrified and struggling.  She was tired of it and done, unable to commit to what she originally promised.  And I know this much…she will do it to her again!  What folly to trust such a person not to do the same exact thing in the exact same situation.  And what a fool I was myself not to see it coming from her. 

The other sister has had numerous (and I mean NUMEROUS) relationships and one-night stands, unable to commit to just one person, unable to achieve monogamy brushing aside her failure saying, “I’m just poly-amorous.”  After 50+ years, you’d think she’d figure it out. However; she would exclaim, “But I do have a steady boyfriend,” but don’t let the smoke and mirrors fool you.  This man is committed to another woman and is unavailable to freely and wholly give himself to her.  He will NEVER leave this other woman and has said as much, but after 3 years she still holds out hope.  She persistently, according to the elder “sisty ugler,” “seeks out relationships with married or otherwise committed men so SHE doesn’t have to commit.” (That is a close approximation of what was actually said.) 

The last sister has broken, dysfunctional relationships with her two children because she is unable to completely commit her love to them refusing to brush aside their father, the man who molested and violated them.  They sense her lack of commitment and so the relationship with one child is marked by frustration, anger, and discontentment.   And the other child ignores her and has almost nothing to do with her and neither do his children or wife.  After she divorced their father (and not because he molested them but because she couldn’t commit, it wasn’t convenient anymore) she ignored them and spent many nights away sleeping with any man that would satisfy her physical need (she openly admitted this to me).  You see, her need was “so great”(her exact words).  So she wasn’t committed to her children, her family, in any way, shape, or form.  Her commitment was to her physical need and not her family.  And now she wonders why she isn’t closer to her children. 

I learned all this while I lived with them in the cottage at the end of the roads in the woods, and some of it I knew already.  In them I see my own lack of commitment in one very important aspect of my life, my inability to hold down a stable job or have a successful career.  But, in terms of family, I am completely committed.  So what is it in me that keeps being attracted to these situations with people who have no sense of commitment when it comes to family?  This is where my lesson is.  And also, I am learning that dedication to a job/career is so important not just financially, but it also represents who you are in your ability to commit!  And I am so much more committed to my career than I ever was before.  I gradually became more aware of  who I am, and what I want out of life, and committed myself to finding a great, good paying job!   And with every passing day that I lived in the cottage at the end of the road with the “sisty uglers,”  I became clearer, and clearer on this.  Make no bones about it – I became CRYSTAL clear. 

And I pray for two things:  1)  The most perfect job for me and the strength to commit and settle in.  And 2) I pray fervently that I can find a partner who feels the same way about familial commitment that I do because I don’t ever want to be cast aside again because I refuse to see who people really are.  Ignorance is NOT bliss.

I think, sometimes, when our world has coming crashing down around us, when things seem the most bleak, when we have suffered a tremendous blow - laughter can be the saving grace for our sanity.  When things are the most serious laughter can do wonders to ease the stress in the body and thoughts whirling about in the mind.  It can bring you up out of the dark place, especially after a loss. I believe that people who can't stop laughing at a funeral do so because its a defense mechanism to keep them sane, and keep them from being completely overwhelmed by their sadness.

When I was in my late twenties, I suffered from a long series of inexplicable convulsions after I had been given a medication.  The doctor's could find no explanation in my brain for this, nothing that would confirm seizures.  But I did learn that a small 1% of the population could react to this medicine by having these convulsive seizures.  I stayed on the medicine for some time before I found this information and pulled myself off the medication.

During this time, I was also in a very dark place, trying to patch together the pieces of my dismantled life.  I had suffered a series of set backs and was struggling to stay afloat financially and mentally.  I ended up living with my dad and step-mom for a while.  These convulsions were exasperating and scary as my parents repeatedly took me to the emergency room and dealt with my failing health.

One day, as I rested on the couch, my dad came in the room to let me know that he and my step-mom were headed out for a bit.  "Are you going to be ok?" he asked.  "Yes," I replied.  "Good," he said, "because I wouldn't want you doing the Aardvark dance while we're gone."  He then proceeded to flap his arms like chicken wings and wiggle his legs as he wobbled about the floor.  I stared at him inexplicably for a brief second then howled with laughter.  My dad joined in.  I relish that moment.  With all the seriousness going on in my life, and my depression, it never occurred to me how much I needed that laugh. And I remember feeling much better for the rest of the day.

October 7, 2005:  Now that was a horribly sad day.  I was driving down a dark country road on my way to visit my then husband.  He had relocated due to work and we were waiting for the time to be right so I could move to join him.  So I was headed out for the weekend to see him.

The winding country road was pitch black so it makes sense I didn't see the cow in the middle of the road till my head lights were on it.  I think I hit it at about 45 miles an hour, dead on.  It rolled up my hood, spider webbed my wind shield and then slid down the driver side of the car.  Within a moment of that crash, I was rear ended by the full-sized GMC Pickup that was following too closely.  It imploded the rear window.  A week later, I lost the child I was carrying.  I was just shy of 8 weeks along.  What a tragedy.

My co-workers were made aware of my situation and at my request, did not bring it up or discuss it around me.  I received a couple of condolence hugs, but that was it.  I wanted to be left alone at work with my grief.

One afternoon a mouse got into the building and caused quite a commotion.  One of my co-workers cornered it and placed a small box over the top of it to trap it.  Several of us stood in a circle around the box debating about how to get the idiot thing outside.  My co-worker Sarah said out loud for all the world to hear, "Put it in the parking lot and let Jenny run over it.  She'll try and run over anything."  There was a collective gasp at her audacity.  I blinked a couple of times as I stared blankly at her, then from deep inside, I began to laugh.  And as I did so, so did everyone else.  It was such a relief.  Then the cow jokes started.  It was nothing distasteful or crude, but it was enough to make me giggle.

That laughter was so healing and helpful.  It soothed my mind and kept me in a relatively sane place.  It dispelled some of my grief and helped me fight off the cloud of depression that was hanging over my head like a threat to my very happiness.

These two incidences stick out so clearly in my mind.  They were a moment of grace that helped me to cling to my sanity.  So I recommend if things get too serious that you find a way to make yourself laugh.  It could bring you back from the brink of disaster like it did for me.

Molly Ann

It's interesting how God puts people in our lives to show us ourselves.  I have been given, as of late, a multitude of opportunities to let go of my need to be right by seeing it in someone else.  And I'm actually getting it.

I think the dire need to be right stems from some different but intricately intertwined roots:  1) A lack of control.  2) A lack of purpose.  3) A fear of being wrong.

A Lack of Control:  In a world of uncertainty, when one is plagued by self doubt, it is easy to find comfort in being right, and knowing you are right, and believing that someone else is wrong.  If I am right, then I know something you don't know and I have power. Power loosely translate into, "I am in control," or at least feeds the illusion of control.  When life is out of control, when I am struggling with something internally and can't make heads or tails of it, being right gives me the sense of control that my life is not reflecting back to me.  I may not be able to find a job, which is a pretty scarey place to be, but if I'm right, well that's something I can control because I can't make someone give me a job, but I can prove that I am right.  I can argue that I am right and I can put to ease the lack of control over my own life that sometimes overwhelms me.  It is a most interesting way to distract one's self from all the things we have no control over including other people.  However; it provides only temporary release at best, requiring us to then be right all the time, and so...we become addicts to the need to be right as a means of gaining control when ultimately we are doing it because we feel so out of control.

A Lack of Purpose:  We all need purpose and meaning in our lives.  People who lack these things often find themselves seeking a way to fill the void and usually not in a healthy way.  Lately, I've made it a point to fill my life with things that bring meaning and purpose.  I am really focused in on beginning my writing career.  Something I've wanted for a long time.  I am focused on going to church every Sunday and I am focused on exercise and eating a well balanced diet so I can lose a few pesky pounds.  I have discovered that the more I am purpose driven, the less of a need I have to argue and prove my right-ness because I have something bigger than my need for domination and control to focus on and live for.  I have  goals, objectives to get there, and a rough timeline for accomplishing all this.  But when life overwhelms me, and I find myself ambling about the house with a feeling of boredom, that is when I give in to the need to be right.   My mind wanders stirring up resentments and perceived hurts and I find things to fault others for and set out to prove why I am right and they are wrong.

A Fear of Being Wrong:  Let's face it; who likes admitting they are wrong, being perceived as wrong, or truly knowing they are or were wrong?  I don't.  This fear of appearing like a boob is tricky.  It will cause you to fight all that  much harder to be right thus digging the grave even deeper when we realize we truly are or were wrong.  For me, it's tied up a bit in ego.  Being right equals intelligence.  Being wrong equals stupidity and ignorance.  Being right equals superiority.  Being wrong equals inferiority.  No one wants to be on the bottom rung of the ladder.  The solution is simple, be okay with being wrong.  Chalk it up to humility and say, "Oh.  I guess I was wrong.  Sorry."  Or, "Not everyone can be right all the time; guess I was wrong this time."  It really is no big deal because truly, is it fair to expect myself to be right ALL THE TIME?  That's just not realistic.  When I accept my humanity, when I can look at someone in the midst of an "I'm right, you're wrong" conversation or argument and say, "You know, you could be right," I then give myself permission to be wrong so that if I am, it's really okay.  And, admitting to this foible of being wrong, admitting, "Hey, I'm only human, I could be wrong," frees me of the fear of it.  By facing it dead on, I diminish its power over me.

So day in, day out I am offered opportunities to resist the urge to prove others wrong, and prove myself right.  I have to be okay with letting others be right, or I can let it stick in my craw every time.  Seriously though, who wants to spend their days arguing and trying to make people feel bad?  I release my need for control, I work on living a purpose driven life, and I make it okay to say, "You know, you could be right and perhaps I'm wrong."

Molly Ann

Have you ever had a dream hangover?  You know, the kind of waking dream when you open your eyes you still palpably resonate with it.  You can't shake the strong emotions you were feeling in the dream.  And it can sometimes stay with you for hours, or even the duration of the day.  And these feelings can be joyous, depressive, incredibly sad, or make you feel as if you are grieving some incredible loss that never happened because as far as you know, everything is just hunky-dory.  It can even leave you with a light feeling, a calm serenity of feeling everything is just jim-dandy when your senses tell you otherwise.

Well, yesterday, I woke up with a dream hangover, and not the good kind.  I was talking to my recent ex-boyfriend, "Gray Beard," and we were in this strange house I didn't recognize.  I saw him in this room.  I'm pretty sure it was his.  There was a large, oddly shaped water bed and clothes strewn about the place.  Gray Beard said, "I want to explain to you why I broke up with you."  I was amenable to this, so I said, "Okay."

He then proceeded to give me some lame-ass, piss-poor excuse about how I had rearranged a few items in his home, and tried to clean up.  By doing this, I was trying to change him on some deep level.  Huh?  First off, let me explain one thing:  Gray Beard is tidy.  Everything in his home had a place and he did not like clutter.  He wasn't obsessive compulsive, just very neat.  However; reflecting back on the dream, I can see that perhaps I was trying to change something about him in real life.  There was a particular way I was wanting and needing him to behave to help soothe my personal fears triggered by the fact that I felt repeatedly marginalized by my ex-in-laws.  That was my stuff to deal with, not his and I shouldn't have pushed it off on him.

Nevertheless, this thought process did not occur to me upon awakening because I was still hung over.  In the dream I read him the riot act.  I was righteously angry and felt I had every right to be.  I said to him, "You totally misunderstood me and my intentions.  I wasn't trying to change you, I was trying to help."  Uh - yeah.  In real life, I think I fed myself that same line of crap too.  I believe I called him a dumb-ass at this point for being lame.  He then said he wished to get back together with me and I protested telling him I couldn't possibly trust him because he completely lacked the ability to communicate.

Now this last accusation was true to life.  In the real world, he just stopped talking to me.  That was it.  After a few days I received a text telling me all my stuff was packed up and on his porch waiting for me to pick it up.  There was no explanation offered.  No conversation. No let's talk and see what we can work out.  He just stopped having anything to do with me and I was left with a mystery.  Now THAT can make a person angry, and it did me.  Hence, the dream and my anger hangover.

So my day was coated with this yucky "I just had a fight with my ex-boyfriend" feeling. And it did last all day.  I talked briefly with Kitten (see my character list on my home page) about it in the morning, That helped somewhat.  But mostly I walked around feeling really irritated at Gray Beard particularly because he got the last word; and his last word was hollow, empty nothingness.  His silence screamed at me.

I faced the rest of my day pretty well and gave myself a good talking to.  No point in letting my day be ruined, and it wasn't.  Yet I felt these hangover emotions like you do a headache from a real hangover.  You get up and get moving because you either have to go to work, or run an errand, or eat and have a shower, or something.  Yet that headache behind your eyes is bugging you.  So you pop a couple of aspirin or Tylenol, don your sunglasses, and head out to greet the world hoping no one guesses you are hung over.  My aspirin was talking to Kitten and my sunglasses were the prayers I said as I passed Gray Beard's place on the way to work.

I can loosely guess at what I may have inadvertently done to push him away, but I think the thing that angered me wasn't that we broke up, but it was being completely, utterly, and totally disregarded and ignored.  As if hadn't ever mattered and never would.  It was like I didn't exist for him anymore.  I would have preferred a messy fight instead of him just throwing up his hands and slipping into a dark cave of nothingness nursing himself on oblivion.  I felt like I was playing pic-a-boo with a 2-year-old.  They hide their eyes and think that if they can't see you, then you truly aren't there.  Gray Beard's special brand of total apathy toward me was one of the cruelest things one person can do to another.  It says, "You don't exist to me; you don't matter. I don't see you so you aren't there."  It's very ostracizing and brutish.

So yeah, I had some angry dream hangover yesterday.  Perhaps it was a good thing for me to go through that so I could process the break up better and learn something from it.  I learned about myself - It's not my job to try and change others, not even if I'm scared.  And I learned something about him too.  Although his apathy and lack of caring was hurtful, I learned I don't want to spend my life with a man who can't function on the most basic communication level because it pisses me off.