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Wednesday, April 27, 2011

Two-day Vaca

Two whole days. For TWO whole days I got to be someone else. I got to be free of obligations. Free of baggage. Free of schedules and naptimes. Free of kids.
After a bit of arm-twisting, my parents convinced me to let Mia Girl have her first sleepover. From Sunday evening to Tuesday evening I was footloose and fancy free! And it. was. great!
Sunday evening, hubby and I were spontaneous and went to see a movie that didn't start until 8:30. I know, rebels, right? Then Monday I did a little bathing suit shopping. I saved that daunting task especially for a kid-free moment. I had some coffee and a muffin. Took a leisurely stroll through Hobby Lobby and never once had to yell at anyone not to touch glass stuff or squeeze the fake grapes. I got what I needed for a craft project and headed home for a little R&R. I popped in a chick-flick, grabbed some chocolate, and started working on my project. Then after a bit, we went to a friend's house for dinner and drinks.
Tuesday, last day of freedom: I slept in a bit but had to get up and around to volunteer at the Arts Festival in OKC. I was a little bummed that my day had to be spent volunteering but when I got there, the atmosphere sucked me in. I was surrounded by talented artists, each with their own unusual technique or medium. I met a woman who used multiple layers of tinted bee's wax blown with a torch to create depth in her pictures. One Yosemity-Sam look-alike used junk from a salvage yard to make faces. It was great! I found myself chatting with the artists and asking them about their motivation and technique. I wandered through the statues and stopped to appreciate each one of them as I listened to a local band play. Who was I??? It felt so surreal. Like my alter-ego had taken over.
I thought about all things I got to do while I was kid-free and how much I missed that sense of doing things solely for myself. But then I realized the only reason I stopped to appreciate each selfish act was because of my kids. Without them I never would have known how valuable a lone trip to the dressing is or the joy from an uninterrupted movie. So maybe I got a glimpse of the "old me" but really, the "old me" was just a less enlightened, unfinished version of who I am now.
The kids came home with gusto. Within minutes the house was full with crying and diapers and "Mom. Mom. Mom. Mom!" I breathed a sigh of relief. My kids were back and things were back to "normal".

Wednesday, April 20, 2011

No Boys Allowed!

Mia and I are having a girl's day...for the next three days. Big brother is gone to the grandparents' and we are lounging in the floor enjoying the quiet. Well, almost quiet. Mia is 'singing' right now. It's such a sweet sound, though. Who couldn't love that? I think she's just giddy with the excitement about getting to play with bubba's toys while he's out. I would love to jump up and grab the camera but she would see me walk out of the room and instantly start crying.
I found this entry half finished, well, not even half-finished, just half-started. I don't know where I was going with it, though. I was probably finding myself with ample free time since the big kid was out of the house. I've always thought of babies as the more time-consuming species, but honestly, my four-year-old is a much more demanding breed. He talks and talks and needs things, lots of things, and wants to go here and there and doesn't want to go to the places and do the things I need him to go and do. In comparison, he's exhausting! But I love him! So I'm not surprised I decided a girls only day was something worth warranting. Too bad I didn't finish it. Wait, I guess I just did.

Tuesday, April 19, 2011

We will never forget

There have been several events in my 29 years that I can remember exactly where I was when they happened. I was in Mrs. Moon's third grade class when my name was blasted over the intercom telling me to come to the principal's office. Not unusual, but all the kids still did the "ooooohhhh!!!" sounds anyway. Meenie was there to pick me up. My mom had been in a wreck. I was sitting in my Pappa's orange recliner watching live coverage when they announced Princess Diana had died. On 9/11 I was at Goody's working the customer service desk, hating my job, when the evil shrew Carol came running from the back to tell us about an "accicental" plane crash. A couple minutes later, we knew otherwise. I remember where I was when I got the call that I was getting deployed- walking across Wal-Mart parking lot in Ada. I left three days later. And sixteen years ago today, I was sitting in Mrs. Blanton's homeroom class when Billy Jo Ames came running down the hall to turn on our tv's. The Alfred P. Murrah building had been bombed and there was complete chaos going on in downtown Oklahoma City. One hundred and sixty-eight people lost their lives that day.
I watched the memorial ceremony this morning and remembered that day like it was yesterday. I looked at the faces of the lives that were lost and thought about who they were - mothers, daughters, sons, fathers, wives, husbands, friends. The kids in the nursery would be in college right now. The young parents would be grandparents. So much potential lost at the expense of two evil, truly evil conspirators.
Sadly, there's no spin on this blog, folks. I usually try to end with a good note, to turn an unpleasant, albeit silly situation into a good one. But it's hard to find good in a massacre. I guess all I can do is just be thankful I wasn't in that building that day and be thankful that the names on the screen today are strangers to me. Even still, I will never forget.

Monday, April 18, 2011

Things

Sometimes I feel like I've spent my entire day just moving things around. I wake up, move the baby to change, move her to feed, move her to the other 'side' to feed. I change clothes (sometimes) and move them around - to the dirty clothes basket, or back to the drawers, but usually just to another spot on the floor. Jacer Man wakes up, I move his stuff around. Sippy cups, "special" choc-choc wrappers, blankets, toys. Move baby to the floor, move her to my hip, to her crib, changing table, floor, hip, wash, rinse, repeat.
Why is that? After every task completed, however mundane, things must be moved either back into place or out of the way. Push the dirt around on the floor, move it to the trash, move trash to Dumpster, Dumpster to curb. I need to work out so I move my arms and legs and butt around till they can't move anymore. The only alternative, though, is to NOT move things. And when I do that, I feel rebellious, like I'm going on strike. "Hell no, move no mo'! Hell no! Move no mo'!!" But then I'm met with the inevitable dread when I look around and realize there's a LOT of things that need to be moved. It's a vicious cycle.
So what do I do? Stop moving things altogether? No, that's how people end up on 'Hoarding: Buried Alive'. I guess my real dilemma is that it just seems so pointless, such a time-sucker, like there's so many better/funner/important things I can be doing than shuffling my crap around the house. But again, the alternatives are either working and not being home to move these things or to not have things at all. Hmmm...on that note...
Hi ho, hi ho, it's off to move I go.

Thursday, April 14, 2011

the American Dream

You know, life doesn't get much better than this. Sure. The economy is crap. The world hates the U.S. Gas is high and morale is low. Our politicians can't agree on anything we elected them to do. Our kids are rotten and don't do what they're told and have too many tattoos. Movies aren't what they used to be and popcorn costs a fortune. The small towns are drying up. Cowboys are a dying breed. Unemployment is at an all-time high and Wal-Mart is taking over the world. But.
I've got a roof over my head, a nice new roof that covers a nice new house that I never dreamed I would be lucky enough to live in. I've got food in my fridge, even though some of it is moldy. I've got two wonderful babies, one of which told me I "scared the crap out of him" this morning. And I've got a working, non-alcoholic, non-abusive, loving, caring husband whose American dream is to let me stay at home and raise our kids.
This is a bit sappy, yes. But the world just sucks sometimes. It's exhausting watching the news and hearing how we're all going to hell and how the world could collapse around us at any time. I was sitting on my back porch, absorbing some beautiful sun rays, reading a very sappy book, looking at my green grass, and drinking some iced tea and I thought, okay. The world has gone mad, but here in my little plot of Earth, things are just fine and dandy.