Ariel and Harry

Ariel and Harry, originally uploaded by scootersbabygirl.

I haven’t spoken about Halloween yet because it was a mixed bag. Some of it was great, some of it wasn’t. The great part? The kids looked awesome. Everyone said that Toad looks just like Harry Potter.

The bad part? We got caught in a torrential downpour. We managed to hit quite a few houses but the next thing we knew there was tons of rain pouring down all over us. It was so bad that it ruined our umbrellas and Toad’s black hairspray started streaming down over his face. It was not a pretty picture and he started crying. I’m sure it hurt in his eyes and it was embarrassing as well.

Later that night Toad said that it was the “worst halloween ever”. I reminded him that he was fortunate to be able to go trick-or-treating, and that a lot of kids were really sick this Halloween and weren’t able to go trick-or-treating.

Tomorrow? Tomorrow isn’t going to be fun. Tomorrow I have to take Toad to get some spacers put in his teeth. I’m worried that it’s going to hurt him and I feel horrible that I have to put him through the pain that will likely happen. I know it’s for the best, but it’s not something that I’m looking forward to.

Another Reason I Hate Numbers

I woke up Monday morning, got the kids up/dressed/fed/ect, and safely in the school doors. Then I came home, fed the dogs and went to grab a cup of hot chocolate. I’ve been trying to drink hot chocolate as a way to keep warm and to be good. See, the amount of sugar that I put in my coffee is ASTRONOMICAL – it even makes Scott gag – so I figured that hot chocolate would at least warm me up and would be much less sugar than the coffee was.

But no caffeine in the morning? Sucks.

Anyway, I just happened to glance at the calendar to make sure that it had been switched to November and lo and behold, what did I see?

Randi OBGYN 10:20 AM (as if I’d go at 10:20 PM)

Oh shit.

I’d had sex the night before.

Are all women like me and don’t want to have sex the night before going to the OB for a pap? I’m notorious for looking at Scott days ahead of time and telling him that there is no way Mr. Winkie is going to be finding any damn tunnel because I have to get spread, poked and prodded by my gyno the next day.

But the damn calendar betrayed me, and there I was. This meant, of course, that I dump the hot chocolate and immediate take a long HOT shower. And pray. Pray a lot.

The appointment time came and it was fairly busy there. I was guilty of not seeing my OB in two years – not good considering the family history I have. The nurse took me back and started to ask me all the same questions. What meds are you on, how are you feeling gynocologically today (I should’ve answered something smart-ass there, but words eluded me for once), ect.

And then the moment I always dread.

“And I see you have two living children.”

“You know,” I said, “I just told my husband the other day that it’s difficult when someone asks how many pregnancies I’ve had because I have to say 5.”

“Notice that I actually glossed over that question,” she said.

Is she kidding me? “Two living children”. Yeah, that’s much better.

The simple fact of the matter is that I have had five pregnancies. And saying that number actually makes me feel shameful. It makes me feel like I wasn’t a good enough mother to hold onto those babies, even though my head knows that it has nothing to do with my mothering skills.

But I remember them. I remember those three little lights that never got the chance. I often feel like I’m the only one who does.

I have a tattoo of morning glories on my leg with a hummingbird hovering near them. When the tattoo artist created the tattoo, which was to be a tribute to my grandmother, he put three morning glories on it. I never asked him why he chose three – I guess he just liked the way it looked.

But sometimes, like now, I wonder if there was a higher power guiding his hand when he designed the tattoo with three flowers on it.

Discovered!

What happens when you have a brain fart and forget that you’ve set it up so that anything you tweet is posted on Facebook?

You get your entire group of Facebook friends, which include relatives and in-laws, discovering your blog.

At first I semi-freaked out about it. Let’s face it – there’s a lot of stuff on this blog about me. Some of it is pretty and fun, but much of it (especially the last few months) is fairly dark and brooding.

I spoke with one of my relatives about the blog yesterday. She said that she was upset about the blog and felt that I had written cruel things to hurt other members of the family. I explained to her that this blog is not meant to be a public forum, but is more a place for me to write down how I feel. A place for me to get out everything that’s inside of me.

To be honest, it’s better than therapy. I’ve met a number of amazing women through this blog who have helped to get me through some difficult times, and women who I have become fortunate enough to know.

After I explained this, and pointed out that I use no names other than Scott’s and mine and that people who don’t know me in person would have no idea where I lived (aside from the obvious of Vermont), she calmed down a bit. She said that the main reason she thought she was upset is because she knew who I was talking about.

I can understand that. I can understand that it may be difficult for friends or family to read what I’ve written about them and about how I feel. But I do want them to know a few things.

Nothing that is written on this blog is meant to hurt anybody. Nothing is written maliciously and nothing is here just because I felt like being cruel.

Nothing that is written on this blog about people are things that I wouldn’t say to them. If I were to write that I had issues with someone, and they were to confront me about that, I would stand behind my words. I don’t say something and then deny that I said it. Yes, there have been times when I’ve said something in anger and have then regretted saying it, but I do my best to not have to face this type of a situation very often. I think regretting is a waste of life and I try to do everything I can to not regret.

Anyway, this long rambling post was basically to let friends or family who are perusing the blog and who may read things that aren’t flattering or that are a bit rough to read. This blog isn’t politically correct and isn’t always an easy read, but it’s me.

An Aero Points the Way

I don’t have to verbalize here what kind of a month it’s been. Hell, what kind of a few months we’ve had. They have involved midnight crying sessions, visits to the doctor, medications – lather, rinse, repeat. Just when I think I’m getting my shit together, I seem to fall apart again. I’m having to realize that for some reason this time I’m not able to bounce back as fast as I was able to before, and why that is, I don’t know. Maybe it’s because every time things start to even out a bit, another shit storm heads my way, or maybe it’s because certain parts of my support system that I depended upon aren’t available. Since these chinks in my protective fence aren’t there, depression can slither into the cracks and can take control.

As this week has gone on, things have gotten a bit better. Scott and I have had some great time together since he’s finally adjusting to his new routine, and I’ve been feeling a bit better. On Friday nights we always do the same thing: a few errands, dinner at McDonalds or Wendys, grocery shopping, then home. Sometimes we snag a movie, other times we don’t. The kids love going out to eat on Friday night and, I have to admit, I love not having to cook.

This Friday night I was a bit stressed. Scott seemed to be taking forever to get ready to go and there were tons of time sensitive things that we had to get done before we headed out to eat. We made our deadline (but not without me stressing out a little) and headed to McDonalds.

Things at the golden arches were eerily quiet. Probably due to the Halloween celebration one of the local towns was holding (we go trick-or-treating in another town). Because it was so quiet there was a table available in the play place and the kids begged to sit there. We got the food, corralled the kids, and sat down.

We ate our dinner and pulled off the Monopoly tabs. I love McDonalds Monopoly! I especially love playing it online. A woman who was in a booth in front of us suddenly turned around.

“Excuse me, would you like our McDonalds tabs? We’re from Canada and we can’t use them.”

We gratefully accepted the tabs and started talking to the couple. We live about 15 minutes from the Canadian border, so it’s never a surprise to talk to a Canadian. We were surprised, however, when this couple announced that they were from Ottawa. Ottawa is about five hours away from here, and the couple were driving two more hours to New Hampshire.

With two young children.

Their oldest looked to be about three, and their youngest was almost a year old. Over seven hours in the car with two young children? Actually I believe their trip took even longer because they said it took them over an hour to get through Montreal due to the traffic (sorry Sherry – they had tons of complaints about driving through Montreal and said they’d never do it again!)

We started talking up the adults, correctly guessing that they’d like a bit of adult conversation after being in the car for so long with two young children, and discussed health care (Canada’s kicks ass – something I already knew), the H1N1 virus, and what traveling with young children was like.

I told her that we hadn’t crossed the border since they made the new laws, and how I really missed it.

“I especially miss going across because I can’t get Aero bars anymore!”
“What?” she asked, shocked. “You can’t get Aero bars here?”
“No – Nestle only distributes Aero bars in Canada. I’ve contacted them to ask them why they only distribute it to Canada, and they never really gave me a good answer.”

A few minutes later she asked to be excused as she got some stuff ready for their trip back. We chatted with the husband for a bit and watched and reminisced as he tried to get his youngest off of the slide.

Suddenly the woman came from behind me and placed something on the table in front of me. It was four miniature Aero bars.

“Here! To tide you over. I bought a fun-sized bag of candy for the kids to enjoy on Halloween and they had some Aero bars in them. Enjoy!”

I swear to God that I almost jumped up and hugged her. As it was my eyes were full of tears. This woman, whom I’ve never met before and who I’d never see again, took the time to go out to her vehicle and to pick out four Aero bars to bring in to me.

I thanked her profusely and we wished them a safe trip.

The whole time we were grocery shopping, it was all Scott or I could talk about.

In a world like the one we live in today, random acts of kindness are pretty rare. Even in the small town area I live in, where people wave and smile as you pass them on the street, it is still not normal to see someone do something so sweet for someone that they barely know.

I looked at Scott later last night and said, “that’s it, you know. I have to pay it forward. And not just once, I need to try to be an even better person and to do random acts of kindness myself more often.”

He nodded and agreed that it was something we both should work on more and should work on teaching our children. We’re kind people, and we do what we can for others, but we both agreed that doing something nice for someone we didn’t know was something that we needed to start thinking more about.

Happy Halloween everyone. I hope that you have a wonderful, and safe, Halloween.

And I want to thank that lovely woman, again, for giving me a reason to smile.

Why Sometimes Weekends Kick Ass

We had a busy weekend this weekend! First of all – check it out! Babygirl is toothless! Saturday morning she woke up and had breakfast and then looked at me and said “mom! Look at my tooth!” It was crooked! She did nothing more than eat breakfast and the thing almost fell out. So she started wiggling it a bit and then was going to leave it. Um, no! The tooth was barely hanging on and there was no way she’d be able to eat with it the way it was, so we convinced her to wiggle it and twist it for a bit. Yes, there were tears – the big tooth is the worst! Fortunately for her she only has one big tooth!

Anyway, she kept wiggling it and wiggling it and FINALLY the tooth came out! She laughed and immediately put the tooth under her pillow. Of course the tooth fairy would bring a dollar. That afternoon we went to a harvest festival – they tricked us there. It was the first time we’d gone to this festival and even though apparently it was the third year it has gone on, we only knew about it because one of Babygirl’s mothers called and let us know about it. So we headed to the festival and the kids had fun – there were tons of games to play and little prizes to win.

There was, however, a problem – the entire thing was free and I was very suspicious about this. Turns out that I had a reason to be suspicious – after the kids had played for about an hour and a half, and before they announced the winners for the costume contest and the coloring contest, they gave a 20 minute religious sermon! The festival was at a barn of a place that is often used for a Christian camp, although they do have non-Christian things there too, and I felt like they’d suckered the kids in with treats and games in order to preach to them and try to get us to join their church.

I told Scott to suck it up, that it was the price of admission, and that at least now we knew what they were up to. We left as soon as the speech was done (felt rude to leave while they were talking, even though lots of people did), but at least the kids had fun, which is all that matters, right?

On Sunday Scott’s sister and her significant other came over so that we could do pumpkins for the second year in a row – it was really fun! As you can tell from the pumpkins, we all had different ideas of what we wanted. On the far left is Aunt T’s pumpkin – it’s got scars! And then there is Uncle D’s pumpkin…he ran out of ideas and didn’t know what to do. But the back of his pumpkin has an ass! Next is Babygirl’s kitty pumpkin – fortunately we found a template for that one! Then is my pumpkin, and next is Toad’s pumpkin – - he carved it himself!! He found a template online he liked, Daddy helped him to write it on the pumpkin, but Toad carved it himself. We were extremely proud!

The whole weekend started on Friday morning when Babygirl had three friends over – yeah, I was ready for a glass of wine after they all left, but it was really fun. The girls got all dressed up and looked like princesses, even doing their nails! So adorable!

And now Toad is home sick. He doesn’t have a fever – just a nasty cough and a stuffy nose, but I’m hoping that by resting for the day, it’ll help knock the cold back a bit. And he hasn’t had a day off of school yet, so if he plays the DS and the Wii half the day (with a definite nap in the afternoon and a nice hot shower), I don’t think that’s too bad of an idea.

Family Feud

I don’t know if it’s that time of the year, or if we’re just unlucky, but it seems to be that time of year for some family squabbling.

First there was the situation going on with my parents. Oh joy. Oh bliss. Oh not fun. It caused me to deal with a huge amount of anxiety, but hey, at least I got tons of fun meds out of the situation.

Now Scott and his family are fighting.

It’s a long story, but here’s the Cliffs Notes version:

Since Scott’s mother passed away the family hasn’t really included Scott in many of the things that they do. Three years ago we had Christmas here because our house is fairly large and worked for the occasion – everyone said they enjoyed it and we planned on doing it again. Two years ago the sister who does most of the planning and her son both had elective surgery, and so she decided that we should hold off Christmas for that year because she and her son wouldn’t be able to enjoy it. Last year she decided to hold it at her son’s house (which makes no sense to Scott), and we would have gone, but she kept going back and forth about if/when they were going to have it because of her daughter-in-law’s pregnancy.

See, to us, when you plan a family get together, it should be about the family, not about one specific person. If someone in the family had fallen extremely ill, we would both have definitely understood and agreed about Christmas being postponed or “possibly” postponed. But it didn’t make sense to us to go back and forth about it for a pregnancy. Yes, pregnancy is a magical thing, and we love our great-nieces and nephews, but postponing things for the pregnancy seemed like a very strange thing.

So now fast forward to this Christmas – we were informed that it would once again be at the nieces and nephews house (it WAS held last year, but we did not attend because it was decided so last minute) and Scott decided that he didn’t like the idea of having it there again. He thinks that it should be at one of his sisters houses or at our house, so he made sure his sister knew how he felt about the situation.

And she made sure she got very upset by it.

She misread some of the things he said (for instance she assumed that because he didn’t like the idea of the party being at the nephew’s house, he somehow thought that the nephew and his wife were horrible parents – something that was NEVER said), and responded with a bit of a hostile tone, so he responded with a hostile tone as well. And now the two of them are in a full-blown war.

And I feel like it’s my fault.

I wasn’t responsible for the situation, nor have I done anything but listen to Scott and try to diffuse the situation a bit, but I know that some of the situation is exacerbated because his family really doesn’t care for me.

This is something that I’ve tried to tell Scott for ten years. Yes, TEN YEARS – as long as we’ve been together. He wanted to think the best of his family (of course, who wouldn’t?) and thought that I was crazy. His sister, however, actually made a comment about how the family feels about me in the emails that were exchanged. Basically she said that my “sarcastic nature” offends people in the family.

But here’s the thing – when I first met his family, I was 20 years old. What 20 year old isn’t sarcastic? And I was nervous and desperately wanted his family to like me. Was I a little sarcastic? Probably, but that’s my nature, especially when I’m really nervous, as I was then.

Then, as time went on and I realized that they weren’t liking me, I tried to act more like them around them – smiling and being as sweet as I possibly could.

That? Didn’t work.

So for the last few years, any time there is a family get together, I basically do everything I can to remain unobtrusive. I sit in a corner or talk to one of two people in the family. And yet apparently they still dislike me.

I can understand not really wanting to try to get to know someone who just starts dating someone else in the family, especially when they have the kind of track record with girls that Scott had. But we’ve been together for 10 years. TEN. And we have two children. A mortgage. A happy marriage (most of the time) – it seems pretty clear that I’m not going anywhere. And yet apparently they still have issues with me.

The whole thing makes me feel like the only reason his family is as upset about him now is because of me, which leaves me feeling extremely insecure.

Guess I need those pills the doc prescribed, huh?

Lack O Nookie

Makes Randi a very self-conscious woman.

Scott’s been working tons of overtime lately, which is a good thing money wise. The bigger problem, however, is that he has been having to get up extremely early. He’s working from 6 AM until 3:30 PM. And because my husband likes to actually get to work early (he’s sick, I tell you, sick!), he’s been waking up at 5 am, which means he’s been crashing a bit after 10 PM.

“But”, you say, “if both kids are in bed and asleep by 8, that gives you two hours to get together, right?”

In theory, absolutely. There are, however, two problems with this.

1. He’s been working on his website in the evenings. Scott runs a WWE blog and he’s been doing lots of work on that in the evenings, as we’ve made a rule in the house that unless it’s an absolute necessity, we do not touch the computers from the time that the kids come home until after they’re in bed, so that we can spend some quality time with them.

2. After he does that, he watches TV. We have a few shows that we watch – Heroes, House, Fringe, Mythbusters – those are the basic ones. And after he’s done working he wants to either take a shower or sit on the couch and watch a bit of TV. I can’t blame him – it’s a nice way to wind down after a long day. The television watching, however, makes him fall asleep, and while I definitely think he needs sleep, this has caused a side effect that I hate.

SERIOUS self-esteem issues.

We talked yesterday about how important we think sex is in a relationship. Both of us agreed that it was at least 25% of a relationship. In my case, because I have always had a hard time with self-esteem, when Scott doesn’t want to be with me in a sexual way, it makes me feel even worse.

I know he loves me. I know he’ll always be with me. But sometimes I worry that he sticks with me because of the family we’ve built and because he’s content rather than because he wants to get his hands on me and all over me.

In Favor Of Kevorkian

I spoke with a woman today whose husband is dying. It’s not “may die”, or “will eventually die”, it’s “has been dying for so long that he’s now just plain suffering”.

This sparked a conversation between Scott and I that went something like this:

Me: That’s just horrible. That’s why I think assisted suicide should not be illegal.
Scott: Suicide – that’s a cowards way out.
Me: I disagree, especially if you’re someone who knows that they’re going to die. If I got word tomorrow that in the next few weeks I was going to die, for sure, and I started feeling really ill and having problems breathing, ect, and it was definite that I was not going to make it, I’d want to be allowed to go peacefully.
Scott: Nope. It’s just wrong.
Me: You mean to tell me that you think it’s okay for someone to suffer in the way that our family members suffered?
Scott: It’s natural – it’s what has always happened.

Actually, that’s not entirely true. According to my research (and I’m hell on research), assisted suicide only became something “bad” when the Hippocratic Oath was introduced into medicine. Most doctors take the Hippocratic Oath extremely seriously and refuse to do assisted suicide because they believe it is against this oath.

See, to me this makes no sense – much in the way that it makes no sense to me that it’s illegal to not wear a seat belt. I agree that it should be illegal to have a child under the age of 18 go without a seat belt (so that the parents do their duty and protect their child), but what about me? If I don’t want to wear a seat belt and want to risk my life, why can’t I? It’s my own life, not yours, and I’m not harming anyone but myself by not wearing a seat belt if I’m in the car by myself. It’s not like I’m driving drunk, I’m just driving without a seat belt.

I feel bad for this woman because for a very long time she has watched her husband suffer and be in pain – pain that he doesn’t want and pain that she wishes she could get rid of for him.

Do you think that assisted suicide is an okay thing?

My Blog

I was told today that someone I know who reads my blog was upset by what I’d written about them. That person (or those people) were upset that I’d said something that did not put them in a positive light. Wait – let me get this correct – that did “not tell the whole story”.

Here’s the thing – this is my blog. Mine. I’m not writing this necessarily for anyone else to read, and even though I don’t give my blog address out willy nilly, some people that I do know have managed to stumble upon the blog. And even though I’m sure I’ve upset more than just those two people, I honestly don’t care. Well, I care – I mean, I don’t want people to be unhappy, but this is my blog – it’s the place where I am able to write down whatever I want to write down.

I have paying blogs – these blogs are business blogs where I have to appeal to the people who read my blog. Here? Here I can be me. Here I can write what I want to write. So if you’re someone who knows me and I’ve said something that upsets you, I’m sorry that you got upset.

But this is my blog, and if you don’t care for what I’ve written, click away.

Stewards of the Flame – A Book Review

I love reading and so any time I’m able to review new novels, I get very excited and immediately delve into them. And when I learned that I was able to review a scifi novel, I was extremely excited. See, one thing that I learned in college was that writing scifi is extremely difficult. Coming up with a whole new world is actually one of the most difficult things that you can do as a writer.

The tale of Stewards of the Flame is a scifi story like none I’ve ever read. The tale starts with Jesse Sanders, a captain of a transport starship. The story starts when he wakes up in a hospital and is accused of being an alcoholic. The country does not allow anyone to be physically ill, and so they attempt to treat him for alcoholism, even though he is not an alcoholic. During his time in the hospital he meets Carla, an assistant to one of the head psychologists at the hospital. She eventually sneaks him out of the hospital and it is there that the story truly begins.

It turns out that Jesse has landed in a country that is controlled by the hospital. They control everything, including ensuring that the people in the country eat healthy meals and even going so far as to make sure that they do not die, by placing them in stasis units and keeping them on continual, unending life support.

Jesse becomes embroiled in a revolution against the hospital/government and learns that Carla, as well as many others, are connected by a supernatural bond that they share. They’re able to control their bodies thoroughly with their minds, including avoiding pain.

The reader gets to follow along with Jesse as he discovers all about this strange world and the revolution, and as he finally learns that having something to stand up for is what makes life worth while.

How did it read? Honestly, it went a little fast. There is tons of dialogue, and while I’m normally a huge fan of dialogue, this one seemed to rush a bit, as though there were too much information to get into the almost 500 pages. But while the book moved quickly, it was the idea behind the story that intrigued me and made me truly think.

I’ve honestly never read a scifi book that made me think has much as this one did, and I found that I started to wonder if it truly was possible to control the pain you feel simply through having great mind control. My tooth was aching due to a problem I’m having with it and I actually tried to focus on not thinking about the pain. To my surprise, it actually worked to some degree. Although I don’t think that I’m ready to join the revolutionary movement just yet.

This is one story that truly surprised me. It was engaging (even though it did go a little too fast) and was fun to read. It made me think and there was a bonus of a wonderful love story between Jesse and Carla. My verdict? Definitely a great book for anyone to enjoy, even those who aren’t huge scifi fans.