Maybe He’ll Notice Her Now

“She wrote I feel just like that painting
Collecting dust on the wall
Every day you walk right by me
And don’t know I’m there at all…”
-Mindy McCready

In the past two days, I think I’ve spent a combined two hours with my husband. This is not counting the hours spent sleeping – especially since last night I popped a Tylenol PM and slept the sleep of the dead for more consecutive hours than I have in a long time. My husband works a lot. He leaves early. He stays late. He comes home to help tuck in the kids. He goes back to work. And in this time, we kind of move around each other because the times he is home are kid-centered.

But it’s lonely.

I get to a point frequently – drifting to and away from it – where I withdraw myself and just do my own thing. I live my life sometimes almost as though I were a single mom, because somedays, that’s how I feel. I’m up with the kids in the morning and he’s not here. I’m changing the diapers and giving the baths. I’m packing the school lunches. I’m doing the cleaning. I’m planning the menus and preparing the meals. Most of the time, I’m doing that alone.

And part of me loves my alone time – I do. I have always been a lover of solitude and time to myself. Part of me gets pissed off because this partnership doesn’t always work like a partnership – it’s a I-do-everything-ship.

Sad thing is, sometimes it would take so little for him to do something to reach out to me, let me know I’m loved, and make me feel like I’m not just a piece of furniture. We have a stack of gift cards to restaurants that we haven’t even used – we can’t even find time to go out for free food together. What the hell does that say? For me, it’s so important to have that feeling that someone is thinking of me during the day – I’ve told him before, those 30 second phone calls randomly in his day to say, “Hey, what’s up” make a huge difference to me. It’s nice to know that it’s not a case of out of sight, out of mind. Usually, I don’t know that. I don’t know because I exchange a minimum amount of words with my husband daily.

When the words we exchange are his unfunny jokes or silly innuendo, it becomes even more frustrating.

Today, he called me up from work. He hasn’t in a long time, but today he called me. He said, “Do you have plans for Wednesday night?” I checked the calendar, and no, I don’t. He told me we’re going out. I was stunned. Literally, just completely stunned. I asked if one of my friends had called to give him shit for ignoring me (I honestly have a friend I was concerned about having done this! My friends love me something fierce!). He said no, he just wanted to do something special for me.

I’m not so naive to think that one date is going to change or fix everything. I hope that it can be step in the right direction for us for patching up some of what has been so shitty the past several months (year?). I can only hope that maybe he’s seeing that something has got to give. I’m cautiously optimistic, but I really needed him to take this step. Time will tell.

No One’s Gonna Love You

“Anything to make you smile
You are the ever-living ghost of what once was
I never want to hear you say
That you’d be better off
Or you liked it that way.”
-Band of Horses

Today is a new day. Today I haven’t cried, today I haven’t moped too much. Today my hair is done and I have make up on and I feel, dare I say it? Pretty. Today I have energy and I have an appetite and I was able to eat both breakfast and lunch so far with a side of cookies and a latte from Starbucks. I was able to get a kick-ass stroll on the treadmill while watching a movie with my iPod on (Oh yes, I multitask – how much do I rock?).

Today is the day I start moving on.

I am tired of being sad. I am tired of being upset. Yesterday I cleared the air with my friend, said some things, and we said goodbye and now that I have closure, I’m alright. I don’t do open-ended, what the hell is up stuff very well. I’m pretty rigid, actually! I like to know what’s going on. 

And you know – for all the parts that suck, I’m alright. I have a pretty simple theory for when life hands you a basket of rotten eggs – Breakdown, pick up, dust off, move on. Yesterday, I began to pick myself up and dust myself off. Today, I go back to being the person I was because if there is something that I’m not, it is a victim. I won’t stand for feeling that way, and at this point, the only person “making” me feel anything was myself.

This weekend, I am taking a day trip with BFF and we’re going to spend the day shopping for cheap Swedish furniture, stop somewhere for a long, dishy lunch, and spend hours in the car talking, connecting and laughing. We’ll listen to music too loud (but I can’t sing along with the radio because she really hates that) and we’ll laugh and smile and I can remember that I have people in my life still who do love me and want nothing but good things for me. It’s a good thing to remember, a good thing to know.

It’s sad. Yeah. I’m not going to lie. My positive attitude doesn’t make what happened any less shitty. It is what it is, what it has to be, and life goes on. It does. It doesn’t stop moving, and I’m not going to sit here and watch the world move on without me.

I Just Called To Say I Love You

“But what it is, is something true
Made up of these three words that I must say to you…”
- Stevie Wonder

A few weeks ago, a friend of mine introduced me to the ABC News concept of “Your Three Words“. It’s a pretty neat compilation that they have set to music of people defining their week, year or life in three words. I’m pretty drained today – I’ve turned the corner with my feeling like hell – but I’m still working on regaining my strength in order to come up with fantastic things to write about.

In the mean time, here’s my week so far in three words (several times over - you can’t pick just one):

I couldn’t eat
Now I can
Felt like hell
Felt so queasy
Eye got goopy
Eye’s all better
Winter weather sucks
Got new shoes
Drank many cappuccinos
My friends rock
I ordered “Heathers”
“Reality Bites” too
I got closure
I’m moving forward
No more tears
Life goes on

Okay… Join me. Your life in three words…

Hotel California

“Some dance to remember, some dance to forget…”
-The Eagles

In the interest of lightening things the hell up, I thought I would mention something that I like to do when I’m feeling a bit down (besides blog about how down I am, which has gotten to be such fun for everyone, right?). Seriously, y’all… what I like to do is put on the iPod headphones and seriously ROCK OUT and dance in my kitchen. You all do this too, right?

Without further adieu, and in no particular order (well, probably alphabetical, I’m trolling my playlist here…) are the top songs for kitchen-groove-thang-shaking:

• “All Around the World” – Lisa Stansfield (Sing with me: “Been around the world and I I I, I can’t find my baby…”)
• “Baby Got Back” Sir Mix a Lot (The man gave us girls with a booty something to be proud of… thank you, Sir)
• “The Bad Touch” Bloodhound Gang (Yes, you know this song, aka “The Discovery Channel Song”)
• “Blister in the Sun” Violent Femmes
• “Boom Boom Boom” The Outhere Brothers
• “The Boys of Summer” The Ataris (Way better than Don Henley’s version. Sorry, Don)
• “Brown Eyed Girl” Van Morrison (Which I might hate if my eyes were blue, but they’re not, so rock on, Van)
• “Bust a Move” Young MC
• “Dancing Queen” Abba
• “Gett Off” Prince
• “Hard to Handle” The Black Crowes
• “Hey Ya” Outkast (“Shake it like a poloroid picture…” – that’s CLASSIC)
• “The Humpty Dance” Digital Underground
• “I Like It” Blackout Allstars
• “I Wanna Be Sedated” The Ramones
• “I Will Survive” Cake
• “The Joker” Steve Miller Band
• “Karma Chameleon” Culture Club
• “Kiss You Back” Digital Underground
• “Miami” Will Smith
• “Nasty” Janet Jackson
• “Nothin’ But A G Thing” Dr Dre
• “Rent” From the Soundtrack
• “SexyBack” Justin Timberlake (well, duh…)
• “Spring Love” Stevie B (Totally old school, reminds me of 6th or 7th grade…)
• “Tainted Love” Soft Cell
• “Thong Song” Sisqo (“That thong-th-thong-thong-thong…” Lyrical-freakin’-genius… or not… but whatever – still trying to figure out what “dumps like a truck-truck-truck” means. Doesn’t sound like a compliment)
• “Toxic” Britney Spears
• “What You Want” Mase

 So, what songs are a sure thing for getting you grooving in your kitchen (or elsewhere in your house?). Enlighten me, and help me build my playlist.

Who Knew

“I wish I could still call you friend
I’d give anything…”
-Pink

It looks as if the last few days has come to a decidedly unpleasant result and the lingering feeling for me like something is really wrong in my world. I’m not proud of it, that I’ve been crying for about an hour now – with little pause except to wipe my nose or get the eyeliner off my cheeks. I am hurting pretty badly.

One of my closest friends, one I have mentioned here before (this friend also triggered me to write this post, as well) is now no longer able to keep in touch with me for reasons many and various and far too complex to get into here. And though I respect it, I don’t have to like it.

Of the many facets of our relationship that made him such an important part of my life, the fact that he listened to me and really made me feel heard was a blessing that I have not really known before. He offered advice from a male perspective that made sense. He didn’t automatically take my side on issues (and I love my girlfriends, I really do, but you know that’s what we usually do, we tell each other that we’re right and the man is wrong, and that’s fine, because that’s what one expects from a girlfriend).

But I’m reeling, nonetheless.

He said goodbye in an email that was sent about two hours ago. Not even a fucking phone call, which sort of hurts too.

It is so hard for me to let people in. Dammit, I really resisted. I didn’t want to trust anyone, I didn’t want to chip away at this wall I have surrounding me. I feel like I finally let someone get to know me and then I got kicked in the face. I’m not going to lie. It sucks.

I wish I could be more eloquent, or uplifting, but fact is, the bandaid was just ripped off, and I’m floundering. Maybe in a few days’ time I will be able to process it all, but for now, I feel slightly abandoned by one of my best friends. I guess, however, even if I had known that his friendship would get taken away, I don’t know that I would have done anything differently. For a time, I had a friendship that brought me comfort, and I guess that’s a blessing that I wouldn’t want to wish away.

Superhero

“I used to be a superhero
no one could touch me
not even myself
you are like a phone booth
that i somehow stumbled into
and now look at me
i am just like everybody else…”
-Ani DiFranco

I finally feel the last few days washing out of me and I finally am starting to feel a sense of calm again. Maybe that is because the nausea from this flu-like shit is wearing me out and I just don’t have the energy to freak out about this anymore, or maybe it is because I am learning that there are things beyond my control and I can’t fix the world. Or, maybe I’m rebuilding the wall a little more secure this week so as not to let things get to me like they have been.

Whatever the case, I find the older I get, the softer I become. When my friend called me a superhero yesterday, I felt stunned – I certainly didn’t feel that way, but it got me thinking how I was way back when, and damn, if he wasn’t right.

I grew up watching my mom and (now former) stepfather carry on with the most dysfunctional relationship ever imaginable. They would have these screaming matches, then she would pack his shit up in garbage bags and when he would come back from wherever he stormed off to (usually reeking of alcohol), he’d load up his bags into his van and he’d be gone for a week or so… then she’d take him back.

Those weeks when he was gone were always the best weeks. I’m not going to lie – growing up with an alcoholic sucks, and the walking on eggshells sucked, and even though my mom was sad when he wasn’t there, the house was lighter and I was always hoping that this time would be the time he didn’t come back. Unfortunately, the final goodbye didn’t take place until I was 18. This means that I saw this bizarre mating ritual for maybe ten or eleven years of my life. I always swore I would never live my life like that, I would never take shit like that.

When I was younger, it was my way. I just didn’t take anyone’s garbage. If a guy even slightly overstepped any of my unspoken boundaries, he was done. No explanations necessary. No sorry. Just don’t let the door hit you on the way out. It was cruel of me, I suppose. I always figured that I would be damned if I was going to sit around and listen to excuses. Sure, breakups made me cry, but I soldiered on and didn’t get too weighted down by the mess of it all.

When my friend told me yesterday how strong I am, I forgot that the girl he was talking about is the one who threw a dozen roses out of a fifth floor dorm window before calling the sender to break up with him. His crime, by the way? Sending roses. I really hate red roses – they are unoriginal, they are a waste of money, and I felt that any guy who was going to be spending that kind of money to send me flowers really ought to know me well enough to know what I would like. See what I mean? What a hardass bitch, right?

I forgot that part of me because I’m softer now, I think. Maybe it’s maturity (god, I hope that’s part of it!), but I’m more forgiving of flaws, faults, and goofy missteps – maybe because I know I make enough of my own.

Soft doesn’t have to mean weak, though. I’m sick to my stomach with this damn bug, I haven’t had a real meal in three days or something (I’m so damn hungry and the thought of any food really makes me want to puke), I’m losing weight I didn’t have to lose, but I am pulling myself up out of my funk, because I am strong.

I am a strong woman. I have physical strength for sure (well, okay, not this week maybe, but usually, I’m a bad ass – I can do 100 pushups, and not the girly kind!), but sometimes I forget that I have the other kind too. That I am strong and have the strength inside me to endure, cope with and move on from whatever life throws at me. I forget it sometimes, that I have that kind of strength, but it’s there. I just needed to be reminded.

Just a Ride

“Life, it’s ever so strange
It’s so full of change
Think that you’ve worked it out
Then BANG
Right out of the blue
Something happens to you
To throw you off course
And then you Breakdown…”
- Jem

I’m still working on processing my day yesterday. On top of the utter chaos of it all, I’ve been sick. It’s hard to deal with drama in your life on a regular any-ol-day basis, when you haven’t been able to eat real food in three days on top of being stressed to the gills, well, it takes a whole hell of a lot out of you.

I’m trying to keep even-keeled about it all, but it’s hard. One thing about me is that I tend to be extreme – I either am completely ambivalent or I am so deeply feeling something with every fiber of my being. It’s no kinda-sorta with me – I’m in or I’m out. This is why I hesistate to let people in my life beyond the surface level. Once you start letting people plumb the depths of who you are, they also have the ability to cause you pain and hurt. I don’t know if it’s just me but I seem to feel each slight as if it were dagger-sharp, because it always saddens me when someone I care about would turn against me.

I don’t think that’s what has happened these past few days. I don’t. But I’m also in the limbo stage of not really having a fucking clue what is going on. The control freak that I am doesn’t do well with the uncertainty of that. Yesterday I was tremendously on edge for several hours before I was finally able to come down. In the mean time, I talked to a friend who kind of helped to talk me down from my tree.

I talked to that guy again today. I am grateful for the people in my life who can call me a superhero when I’m hurting. That’s what he did. He called me a superhero, can you believe it? Reminded me of my strength.  I said to him, “I don’t want to hurt, I don’t want to let people in because I don’t like this feeling!” And he said, “But if you keep shutting them out, you’ll be isolated and alone.” Which, is kind of how I’m feeling right now. Why would I do that to myself on purpose?! In these reminders, he basically told me that I’m only human, and that means I love and I care and I get hurt and I learn. This is NOT going to kill me. It’s not. It’s very hard, and I’ll get through it – but it won’t kill me.

Sometimes I wish I came with a remote, so I could push a button and slow my head down when I get upset or worked up over something. I was up several times last night with my brain wrapped around the chaos of the day. I instantly think the worst – I instantly think someone’s silence means I’ve done something wrong. I need to pause my brain, I think, and let myself realize it’s not all about me. For someone who is not exactly rollin’ in the self esteem, it’s amazing how often I think that people’s actions have everything to do with me. And that’s ridiculous.

It’s funny, isn’t it? I’m 31 (chug – if you’re playing the Lyrically Me drinking game), and you would think at some point, human nature would stop being such a fucking mystery. That in my 30s, I would be able to figure people out, that they would be able to figure me out – that we’d all just be able to get along. Seems like every year that goes by, a layer peels back and there is more to learn. I wonder if it ever stops.

Cool

“And after all the obstacles
It’s good to see you now with someone else
And it’s such a miracle that you and me are still good friends
After all that we’ve been through
I know we’re cool.”
-Gwen Stefani

Yesterday was probably categorically the worst day I’ve had in a long time. I’m not to the point where I can yet completely process it and I may not be at that point for a long time, but suffice it to say, yesterday was straight up difficult. A friend was having a hard time and in turn, I internalized that and I too had a hard day.

After about an hour of solo panic, I IM’d a friend of mine. I have known him since high school – he’s the first guy who ever said he loved me. We have always had this weird relationship, and we never really seriously dated. My senior year of high school, he joined the Navy and we constantly exchanged letters. The letters he sent me were long letters, some were telling me how much he loved me, some were about how much he hated the Navy. I wrote letters back. Long letters. In writing, there was a lot of love there, I think. Then he’d come home on leave and would not be able to find the time for me. I was sensitive to that to an extent – I realized there was a lot of people to see during the short time, but I also never really understood what that meant – how he could say such things to me in letters but face to face, it never quite panned out.

We had brief moments over the years. I remember kissing in my kitchen at my high school graduation party. Or in his room at one point. I remember him taking me to a bonfire at his cousin’s once – driving too fast and blasting music. I remember dances in the gym when he took one of my good friend’s to homecoming (yeah, I didn’t get that) – she had had to go home early, and I remember he and I danced the rest of the time.

Occasionally, we lost touch. But I’ve always sort of touched base with him periodically – wishing him a happy birthday via email every year and the like. This past fall, we reconnected and though the friendship is long distance, and he’s super busy (and he sometimes makes me crazy), I know when I’m stressing, he’s there. He may not always have the advice I need – he’s not here, and doesn’t really know what’s up in my world – but I’ll say that after all these years, being able to reach out to someone who has cared about me since I was 16 really lifted some of the cloud hanging over me.

It’s funny the parts of the past that people hang on to. If you would have asked me years ago who I was more inclined to believe would be a part of my life – I would have said the Road Trip Friend over this guy. And I’d have been dead wrong. With the IM and a phone call later, I remembered the joy in having a friend with whom you have history – someone who knew you when you were awkward and goofy – and still stays around to offer a shoulder when you need it.

1492

“Oh where did we disappear
into the silence that surrounds us and then drowns us in the end
Where these people who impersonate our friends
Say come again, come again, come again…”
-Counting Crows

Lately, if it weren’t for blogging I think it’s quite likely that my head would have exploded. I have been walking around feeling so much, so intensely and not feeling like there’s anyone I can talk to about it. My trust is becoming exceedingly difficult to earn, and though I wish I weren’t so guarded, it’s the way I’ve always been and I don’t foresee that changing anytime soon. Unfortunately.

It’s sad, too, because I can tell you that anyone of my inner circle of beloved friends would listen to me, would be willing to lift me up, would help me out. But just as often, if I turn to the wrong person and the words are not what I am needing, when I am needing them, I am left feeling worse. Such was the case a few weeks ago when I reached out to a friend I have known for about a hundred years about how I was stressed out, how I was hurting – and he said I needed to get a Playstation 2 with some violent game (forgive me, I’ve forgotten the name because I quite honestly didn’t give a shit) and shoot the hell out of stuff.

Again, it shifts back to the point of if I am expecting nothing, I won’t be let down. Sometimes, though, I have expectations. Silly me.

I think I resist trusting people because a part of me is resisting the hurt that is possible when you let people get too close. I certainly hold many people at a distance, and while I don’t find that to be one of my more endearing qualities, I have a hard time faulting myself for it, because hurt… well, hurt hurts.

I was reading Redbook magazine last night (Oh, shush… It’s not that bad!) and there was an article with Uma Thurman. Now, she’s made some movies that I’ve really liked (Pulp Fiction, for one), but I’m not particularly a fan of hers. I’m reading this interview and the interviewer asked her, “You don’t find people chronically disappointing?” Her response was that, yes, she does but hope springs eternal. She then said, “Actually, of any quality, that’s the one I’m most grateful for: the willingness to reinjure myself. Hope trumps experience. So I keep trying. Absolutely.”

There is something to be said for having the strength and hope and willingness to put myself out there and let people know me and take the chance that maybe things won’t always go my way. Maybe I’ll get hurt. Maybe I’ll be disappointed.

Who knows, maybe I could be pleasantly surprised.

Not The Doctor

“I don’t want to be the filler if the void is solely yours.”
-Alanis Morisette

When my husband and I got into our infamous New Years Eve argument, one of the main issues at hand was that he was upset because I don’t show him affection. He had made a comment filled with innuendo, and busy with… oh, a billion other things, I let it pass. He got stompy and pissy and (my favorite!) passive-aggressive, and I got frustrated and annoyed at the lack of just being real with what he was feeling and the expectation that I would have to pry out of him what had his knickers so far into a twist.

When he finally sat down with me to discuss it (nearly two hours later), he described his frustration that he was the more affectionate of the two of us, that he would like for me to initiate kisses and hugs and all that other stuff more often. He also went on to say how he feels like I think he does nothing around the house, and when he does do something, I don’t acknowledge it.

Admittedly, I wasn’t super moved by this discussion – we’ve had it before to a degree. I honestly just wanted the damn tiff to be over. I am not a fighter – I avoid conflict, and I could tell from the way he would respond when I would try to explain something that he was so set on what he was feeling that my interpretation of things would change nothing.

Later, I sort of polled some people I knew, several of whom mentioned the book about Love Languages. They mentioned that my husband’s love language was probably Physical Touch followed by Words of Affirmation. Fiiiiiine. See, not only does my husband want me to smooch on him randomly, he wants me to point out that I notice if he’s been working out, or “Hey, thanks for putting the seat down” (as if). However, I am NOT a Physical Touch person. I am NOT a Words of Affirmation person (and to be honest, I’m not entirely sure I’m a Love Languages person, because it somewhat borders on hooey to me).

The women I spoke with all said to me – Take the first step. If you do x more, he’ll step up and do y. Little changes breed bigger changes. My efforts would be rewarded with him being so overjoyed that he’d make changes too. Um, no. That’s not what happened.

First of all, I can’t help it if I’m somewhat of a “What’s in it for me?” kind of person. Here we are, he’s the one who has an issue with the way things are – enough to get stompy, and I have to read some stuff about his “language” and make a change? I’m not entirely sure why we are operating under the assumption that men are too stupid to make positive changes too. I’m not sure why his friends aren’t telling him, “Dude, maybe if you just put the dishes in the dishwasher, she’d be more inclined to want to shove her tongue down your throat.” That may or may not be true – If it ever happens, I’ll let you know. Instead, I’m supposed to praise the fact that he remembered to flush after peeing, and give him a squeeze if I pass him in the kitchen.

And hell, I did it.

And you know what? Men may not be too stupid to make changes, but they certainly aren’t observant enough to notice when a woman has. Because he didn’t freakin’ notice, nothing changed except me and how the hell does that help anyone but him? If I’m being perfectly blunt, it just annoyed me worse than the passive-aggressive hissy.

Oy.

I guess I don’t really know what it is a couple is supposed to do when each half shows their love and likes to be shown love in a way opposite of their partner. We can’t be the only ones… can we?