frogblog

2011-11-14T19:37:00.001-05:00

Potentially having potential

I've never had a particularly close relationship with my uterus. It's caused me more than my fair share of pain over the years--pain that I didn't realize was unusual, so I didn't get serious about figuring out what the heck was wrong with me until well into my adulthood.

And, then, they found nothing. They prescribed vicodin and I limped along for another decade or so.

I tried to get pregnant and didn't. I had an hsg and tried to get pregnant some more.

And then I met my Pretty Lady Friend, who's a midwife, and who was appalled to see how much pain I had and what I was doing to cope with it.

So here I am. In less than 72 hours, I'm getting rid of my uterus and all of its little friends. It never did a **** thing that it was supposed to do for me, it's been nothing but trouble. When I turned 40, I came to terms with the fact that I will never raise a child connected to me genetically.

Yet, I'm melancholy about Thursday's surgery. There's so much tied up in our "parts," societal expectations, familial, social, religious. In the trans community, we sometimes hear, "You're a woman if you have a uterus!"

Now, I know that that's ridiculous, that I am a woman, that there are many different ways to be a woman. Yet I'm haunted, sometimes, by the 25 year old me, arguing that real women have uteruses.

I'll say good-bye, in my way, to the proscribed and non-existent relationship with this part and hope that when I come out of the other side of the procedure, it will be the beginning of being much more productive and in a new kind of peace with my body.

2011-04-23T13:16:00.001-04:00

The Fat Man in the Red Suit: On Doing Easter with Kids
We’ve been talking some about prayer around here lately. My wife and I both grew up going to church--she grew up in a West Coast family where going to Catholic school was important to her mom and going to church on the holidays was what they did, but her friends didn’t go to church. The first time she visited me in the Midwest, she was immediately struck by the fact that there’s a church on every corner. Sometimes, there’s more than one. It’s so much the backdrop of my life that I’d never noticed.

I grew up going to church a few times a week. I went to parochial school. I sang in the choir. Holidays had me in church for several hours, singing in choirs and pageants and, when I was older, reading Scripture to the congregation. My friends all went to church, even the ones who weren’t in my school. When we visited extended family, we went to their churches, so while I grew up Lutheran, I can say a Hail Mary with the best of them.

We’ve recently committed to regular church, which includes taking our 9- and 4-year-old kids on the weekends they are with us. Our son, the older of the two, announced after Christmas Eve services, “There are two great American myths: Santa Claus and Jesus. I only believe in one of them, and it’s a fat man in a red suit.” He attends with us, though, and is clearly listening, based on the conversations we have throughout the week.

Our 4-year old is into it. I think what hooked her was the opportunity to be a walk-on angel in this year’s Christmas pageant, complete with sparkly halo. She loves the singing and asks regularly whether it’s time to go to Church School yet. To be fair, last night at the table she announced, “I LOVE Church School. What’s Church School?”

On this Saturday, in the midst of Holy Week for Christians, I have prayer on my mind. We’ve been talking about it some as a family--basic conversations of the kind we never had when I was small, because prayer had always been part of our lives. And because we have a preschooler, we talk often each day about making good choices. During the Good Friday Stations of the Cross, we prayed together for God to help us make good choices. The kids were at school, but my wife and I shared a glance and smile over it.

Last night, I told our smaller one that we’d said a prayer for God to help us make good choices, and she asked what praying was. We explained that it’s a way to ask God for help with things that are challenging for us, to thank God for the good things we have in our lives and the people we love.

She’s had some trouble falling asleep lately and last night was no exception. After tucking her in for the umpteenth time, I sat with her and we played a word game about what we’re going to do outside when it stops raining (if it ever stops). She played, but continued to cry, so I prayed with her. “God, please help me calm down so I can get the good sleep that I need to play and have fun tomorrow. Please help me make good choices. Amen.”

During Holy Week, we remember our liturgical year and Christ’s life. We remind ourselves what it is to live with grateful and generous hearts. At the end, we celebrate the hope we find at Easter, in promises kept.

And next week, we answer innumerable questions about how the Easter Bunny feels about Jesus and about whether, next year, we can pray to God for the Easter Bunny to bring us something specific in those baskets.

This post also appeared at Epic Parenting.

2011-03-19T09:51:00.003-04:00

I know I said I was going to start blogging regularly again...
Instead, I'm launching a parenting website with some friends called Epic Parenting--articles, information on product recalls, a board community. You should check us out!

Things are good for me--kids are happy and healthy, M and I remain ridiculously in love and we're planning a celebration of our marriage for our friends and family in May. And in February, we did this:

The tabby is Samosa (aka Bitzen) who's two pounds of FIERCE. The gray is Captain Ebey (EE-bee) who is a typically cuddly mankitten.

We're having a ball with them!

2011-01-26T23:36:00.001-05:00

Soon I will be forty
I was talking with a friend of mine--she turns thirty the beginning of February, and she told me that she feels like she will no longer be able to play the young card, that she'll have to get her shit in a pile and stop fucking things up. I was happy to let her know that if she really focused, she could continue to fuck things up for another whole decade. Many people do all sorts of stupid shit in their 20s. It's embarrassing to come out of your twenties tens of thousands of dollars in debt and having been seriously involved with a heroin addict. But when you leave your thirties with that narrative, what then?

For years, I told people that I wasn't going to birth anyone, but I thought that kids would be part of my life someday, that they would just sort of appear. And we would chuckle at the impossibility. So I tried to make it happen--I tried to adopt a friend's sister's kids when they needed a home. I tried to become a foster parent. I tried to get pregnant. And none of it took, no matter how hard I tried or how carefully I charted.

Then Meghan appeared, walking toward me out of that airport and with me into this. I'm tucked into bed with a cat at my feet and another by my side. I can hear The Boy Child snoring and intermittently I hear The Girl Child coughing in her sleep. Meghan's at work and I never sleep early or well when she is, and so I write and think.

When my grandmother was my age, she was five years from becoming a grandmother. When my grandfather was my age, he only had another 22 years to do the hard and good work he did in his family and life. Meghan's set up this bedside table out of a filing cabinet where she's keeping journal articles for her research ideas. It's draped in a batik cloth and there are about 20 books on it--Fun for the Family in Michigan; Bonk; The Accidental Tourist; Shelf Discovery; Otherwise Known as Sheila the Great; Magical Thinking. There's a jadeite bowl, a mac-product charging cord and a few pill bottles, a second-hand lava lamp and a copy of the east village inky. There's a small pink lego and a little girl's hair clip and a sponge that's shaped like an owl.

Soon, I will be forty.

2011-01-21T21:26:00.003-05:00

The one who got away
We all seem to have one--the unrequited love that fills us with could have been longing. The high school sweetheart we lost track of during college.

Mine was my RA my first year in college. Beautiful blue eyes and so very kind. When we first met, there was a quick connection, but something shifted during spring break of that year and things got really intense. We started spending long hours together talking, listening to music. We exchanged letters written out in long-hand, full of dreams and sorrows.

That summer was incredible--I stayed on campus to work and she stayed nearby in a sublet in (what was then) a crappy part of town. When her roommate was out of town, I stayed with her so she wouldn't be scared, and I was there the night the apartment next door was busted for dealing.

Sometime before the start of school that fall, there was a falling out that I didn't understand and she just stopped taking my calls. I was heartbroken and spent the next few years moving between grief and depression and doing so little else that I'm still shocked that I managed to earn a degree. There was never any sex, and maybe that's what kept it so meaningful--it was ALL "could have been," with none of the messy reality to get in the way. When things got tough in my other relationships, I escaped back to that time in my life. I revisited the letters and photos, even if I didn't look at them again. When things were really bad, I'd call or write to her.

After toad and I split, she and her kids visited during their family trip to see her husband's family. Her visit went a long way toward healing the heartache that accompanied what, in retrospect, was a long relationship that should have been a brief fling. When things were bad with turtle--and things got very, very bad with turtle--I called her again. They'd met when I brought turtle to see the place where I'd gone to college. We had dinner together, turtle and me, she and her husband, and turtle drank two bottles of wine. Just before we left, there was a long hug and a reminder that she loved me and would be there no matter what. "No matter what" came sooner and with more intensity than I could have guessed and she was right there, if impossibly far away.

She was my fallback and my go to, she was my safe place when I needed one.

I realized last night that I haven't needed her in that way in a long time, and I traced it back to the moment I saw Meghan walk out of that airport. My one who got away--she loved me like no one had before, and like no one had since, until I met Meghan.

So I think I'll call her this weekend. I'll ask about her kids and her husband and we'll catch up on the months that have gone by but don't increase the time we haven't spoken, not really, and I'll finally be able to tell her that this time, I've got it right.

2011-01-16T22:48:00.002-05:00

A good-bye
There's no easy way to say it, so I'll go ahead and open with it. Tamarind died on Friday.

I keep saying it to myself, thinking that if I repeat it enough, I'll believe it and I will stop looking for him in his favorite spots around the house. I won't get into bed carefully, knowing that he's already down by where my feet will be. I can stop expecting to hear him chatter--to himself, to the kids, to the birds, to me.

I went down to the basement to throw in a load of wash and he was laying on the floor. I said his name and there was no response, so I stomped on the concrete floor--I don't know why, to get his attention?--and nothing. I knew, but I didn't want to know so I started calling for Meghan, fairly calmly at first, then more and more urgently and by the time she got to me, which was not more than 30 seconds after I started calling her name, I was sobbing and keening there at the bottom of the steps. I knew, but didn't want to know, so I had her check to make sure.

He looked just as though he was lounging--his little paws were as they always were, fluffy tail aloft, but he wasn't moving and he ALWAYS responded to his name. Our cats aren't perfect but they always come when I call their names.

I started emptying a box, frantically, only to find out that he was already too stiff to fit, so Meghan found a large rubbermaid bin. We wrapped him in a towel and set him in there--his tail didn't fit, really, so it sort of ran along up the side and stopped just before the lid.

I put him in the trunk of my car and Meghan did the hard work of telling The Boy Child that his buddy had died, the cat he'd given a middle name because he didn't think it was fair that the other cats had a middle name and Tam didn't (he decided that Tam went by his middle name, and that his first name was Joe, a play on Toe Jam, this cat was Joe Tam, or J. Tamarind when he wanted to be formal).

On Saturday, I'd planned to go to the vet's office to pick up cat food. I got the bin with Tam in it and The Girl Child said her good-byes to him. "His fur is still so soft! It's just like it was. Good-bye, Tammy."

We dropped her off with some friends, and Meghan, The Boy Child and I went to the vet's, where I stood crying at the counter, telling them that I needed prescription food and that our cat had died and could they take care of him and how should I bring him to them. They offered their condolences and I went and got the bin from the car. The Boy Child wanted to say good-bye, so he did, and I rubbed Tammy's cheek one last time.

He was four years old. When we got him, he weighed one pound, twelve ounces. He taught Kissa how to fetch. He loved feet--the stinkier the better. He loved the stacked cushions in our room near the window. He loved chattering at the birds and the snowflakes. He loved catnip. He loved to lounge on his back with his feet in the air, purring like a little maniac. He loved it when I kissed the top of his head--he would sit on my lap and tip his head back for a kiss, then drop it down and tip it back, over and over again. He loved Lychee and I think that he never stopped looking for her after they were split up, something I will always regret, though I had no hand in it.

I will miss him every day. Rest in peace, babyman.

2011-01-12T12:22:00.000-05:00

Re cognition
I weave my words around my words and my thoughts around my thoughts. I pull them apart and stick them together again with whatever the sticky stuff is that holds brain matter more or less in one place, like glue. When I was in college, I took a class from a great teacher who's a less-great writer and she had us cut our work into individual words, and rearrange it into something completely separate from what we thought we had written. Is it an exercise that students can even do anymore? There was one woman, she agonized over changing her words. "I've worked this over, and I cannot see another way." She'd written in long-hand, something most of us didn't bother to do, for time, for legibility, for ease of change.

I don't print my blog posts, because they're not that kind of writing for me. They're like grocery lists from my brain. Or inventory lists, I guess, of the stuff zipping around while my fingers hover over the keyboard.

They aren't about ease of change.

Cut apart, put back together into something you would never even recognize.

2011-01-08T23:24:00.002-05:00

On rising up in a non-violent way
Challenge your friends and family who spout the nonsense of the religious right and tell them to do the same. Refuse rhetoric. Support careful thought. Teach our children how to protest without guns and war cries by example. Pray. Seek like-minded people, then talk with those who disagree with you. Breathe deeply. Vote. Donate your time and money.

2011-01-06T11:18:00.003-05:00

Clarity
In my faith tradition, today is Epiphany. It's a day to consider what it means to come to realization, where we are on our journey through this life. I've been thinking about what it is that I've realized this year, what I still seek to realize.

Despite how much of me and my life is online, both real and imagine, both actual and embellished, most of my life isn't here. This is bits and pieces, this is what I choose to share. What I live, what I breathe, those moments and days and years are elsewhere.

I'm closing in on a milestone birthday and my a-ha moments aren't as significant as they were when I was younger, but there's strength in the small realizations, the small happenings that remind me of who's real, who's important, who to trust.

2011-01-06T06:56:00.000-05:00

Full of wist
You know what I need? Someone who can deliver a really good forecheck.

2011-01-03T12:15:00.000-05:00

Be it resolved
I will use the word "amazing" less, but feel it more.
I will eat the candybar all in one sitting.
I will build more Lego creations of my own.
I will find more fluffy blankets for all of us.
I will give thanks.

2010-12-30T23:37:00.002-05:00

Post-Christmas
This is the week when we probably need special songs the most, but it was last week when we had them, so we do what we can.

The Girl Child and her grandmother danced from the living room to the guest room to whatever the song was on Sleepless in Seattle at the time--yes, we do watch it every year around this time. So predictable.

The Boy Child has been completely engrossed by his Legos. His dancing is primarily celebratory and based on whatever he's doing on The Complete Saga.

I have photos, both of the Christmas celebration itself and some of the adventures we've taken since, but I haven't bothered to load them from my camera, choosing instead to play online scrabble, catch up on laundry, eat amazing things that Meghan's making and be amazed at what's going on around me in this family, in my family.

2010-12-25T23:06:00.003-05:00

Aspie Christmas
The Boy Child: Your gift is in this bag.
The Girl Child: What is it?
BC: I can't tell you until Christmas.
GC: What shape is it?
BC: It's teddy-bear shaped.

Merry Christmas! I hope that you and yours have a blessed holiday, full of wonder and surprise.

2010-12-20T20:04:00.003-05:00

What we did with our weekend

Salted caramels, chocolate mint wafers with chocolate mint drizzle, two kinds of spritz, fudge, buckeyes, frosted sugar cookies, ginger snaps, and toffee. My wife will pipe up if I missed anything!

2010-12-17T12:34:00.000-05:00

On being wrong
Meghan and I were totally smitten early on--so early on that it freaked me out some. When we were living far apart, it was really hard and we spent a lot of time just sort of moping about it. We both knew that it couldn't last, that when she moved and we were with each other every day, the bloom would be off, as they say.

In between visits, we were on the phone or online together as much as possible. Like, I racked up a $700 phone bill once. And I'm obsessive about not going over my minutes.

When she first moved to town, we were totally smitten and cooing and disgusting and missing each other terribly when one had to work, which seemed ridiculous and we knew that wouldn't last. We settled in and we missed one another terribly when we were apart for work. The idea of going away for a weekend or something without the other one was just insane and we couldn't imagine it. We knew that that couldn't last.

And here we are, like 18 months into living together, and we're cooing and smitten and ridiculous. We miss each other terribly when we're apart for work, and send email love notes to each other when we are. We surprise one another with gifts and special meals.

I had no idea it could be like this. I continue to believe that this cannot last, but so far I have been dead wrong.

2010-12-15T12:33:00.000-05:00

Reframing
I was poking around on some liberal websites earlier and ran across a "hate email" sent (not to me) under the guise of GO LIBERAL CHRISTIANS, but cautioned against forgetting the most oppressed of all: the unicorn baby.

No, it didn't really say that, but I thought that's what I'd read, and that's good enough for me. I suspect the "unicorn baby" substitution will make the far-right newsletters MUCH more entertaining reading.

2010-12-13T13:11:00.004-05:00

Snow day!
Or, more accurately, butt-numbingly cold blowing and drifting day!

Meghan came off of a 12-hour shift last night and has another tonight, and their dad has the kind of job where if you don't work you don't get paid, so I took an unplanned vacation day to hang with the shorties.

This morning, they watched a movie (Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland again) while I got some work done. The Boy Child played Wii while The Girl Child and I wrapped gifts for Meghan and their grandparents from them, then made lunch.

They're upstairs now for their quiet time--I hear legos being sorted and nothing at all from the other room. When they're done, we'll read two Lemony Snicket books from their grandmother, the one about the lump of coal and the one about the screaming latke. I think we'll bundle up and go outside for a bit, maybe have hot chocolate after.

Given how little any of us enjoys a change of schedule, it's been a really lovely day.

2010-12-12T20:52:00.002-05:00

Plans, squelched
The weekend just past, the kids were with their dad. We're in a part of the country that's getting blasted by a winter storm and I suspect there's a decent chance that school will be canceled for tomorrow. Meghan called the kids' father this afternoon to see if he is working tomorrow (his schedule varies) and, if not, if he wanted to keep the kids overnight and be with them tomorrow, or bring them home tonight and one of us could drop them off tomorrow in the event that the schools are closed, so I won't have to take a vacation day.

He's working, and as he was relaying this to Meghan, she heard The Boy Child in the background, chattering about how important it was that he come home TONIGHT he had to come home TONIGHT. Frankly, that's not out of the ordinary. The kid is ALL about structure and rules and if he's supposed to switch back to our place on Sunday evening at 7, then by God that is what he is going to do.

So Meghan skidded off to work and I received the kids when arrived. After his dad had gone and his sister was upstairs getting ready for her bath, The Boy Child said to me very seriously, "You know, it's perfect, if we have a snow day tomorrow, because you won't even need to stay here with us! Mommy will be here! You can just go to work!"

"Wait. What?"

"You can go to work--Mommy will be home."

"Yeah, but she'll be asleep. She works overnight tonight and again tomorrow night, so she'll be crashed out. There's no way I'm going to leave you and your four-year old sister alone for the day with an adult who's sound asleep."

"Oh, MAN! I bet it would be just fine. We could just play the Wii and..."

Mystery solved. Snow day + anticipated lack of adult oversight = WE MUST GO HOME THIS EVENING SO WE CAN BE HOME WHERE THE WII IS WHEN SCHOOL IS CANCELED.

2010-12-11T16:48:00.002-05:00

Do you hear what I hear?
Last evening, The Boy Child had an end-of-the-year dinner party with a group of his at a local buffet restaurant. We take the kids out for meals regularly--going out to a restaurant is a complicated thing for any kid, and we figure it can't hurt for ours to practice, particularly The Boy Child. We've been to sit-down restaurants but never to a buffet, so we spent a fair amount of time this week prepping him for the experience.

M dropped him off and she and The Girl Child picked me up from work. They'd spent the day together, so when I got in the car I asked her what she and mommy had done that day.

"I don't know."

"Did you do anything really fun?"

"I don't know."

"Did you bake cookies?"

"Yes! We baked chocolate chip cookies! And then, Terri, THEN we took (The Boy Child) to the buffette."

"Oh," M said. "She had me spell BUFFET for her earlier. She's been pronouncing the T ever since."

2010-12-03T09:28:00.002-05:00

Lego Wars
The Boy Child is 8 and he's just on the cusp of no longer believing in Santa. Not being quite ready for him to stop, we've done a few things to encourage his belief for one more Christmas, the most effective being a personal video message from Santa (which is free, and you can do one here). He was SHOCKED that Santa knew those things about him and has jumped back in with both feet.

This is good, I think, to foster his belief in magic for just a bit longer, but it's coming with an unanticipated glitch: The Boy Child figures that if Santa is magic, he can get him ANYTHING that he wants for Christmas. And he's got his heart set on the $500 Lego Death Star.

So the Boy Child is going to be disappointed with Santa's gift for him, which is still pretty damn cool and which his mother and I never could have afforded. His grandmother bought it for Santa to give to him.

I've been talking with him about how important it is to share our blessings with people--we have plenty, so it's our responsibility to help those who do not have enough, and I think I can probably swing that around to include Santa as a good steward. Honestly, though, I feel badly that I encouraged him to believe and now he's going to be let down.

Part of life, I know, but it's not something I want for him at Christmas.

2010-11-28T23:18:00.004-05:00

Decorated and cookied, as overseen by Mason

2010-11-27T22:26:00.002-05:00

Just a typical evening
The Girl Child is asleep in the guest room in a fort she and I built earlier today--it's pretty much a blanket slung over back to back chairs. Her head's under the blanket, the rest of her body is sticking out in my bright orange sleeping bag.

She started asking to go to bed tonight before six--not a chance, man. This kid was up and running around like a crazy person this morning at 5:30. The only win there is that Meghan and I had a great time speculating about how "the ass crack of dawn" would go over at daycare.

She turned in around 7, and The Boy Child and I watched GForce. At the end of the movie, there's wild music over the credits and he just couldn't control himself. There was break-dancing, some of which may have involved the Christmas tree just a bit, then over-corrected into the rocking chair.

Quiet house, now. Lit tree, House on the television, cats asleep on and near me, and Meghan should be getting home from work around midnight, so I'm staying up to see her.

2010-11-25T18:44:00.002-05:00

Happy Thanksgiving!
I hope you're all having a day like the one underway here. The dining room is clean, the dishes are mostly done and there's broth simmering on the stove. The Girl Child is standing in a laundry basket keeping time to Motown songs by beating a plastic hairbrush on it. The Boy Child is in the shower after a day full of glowering at me because it's BORING that Greg Hefley's in the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade and OH MY GOD where is that LEGO what did you DO with it.

Soon, they'll be tucked in for the night and Meghan (who's asked me to use her real name here rather than a sushi piece with a Friends reference that makes me laugh and laugh) and I will settle in for some random thing on Netflix or another. She'll knit, I'll write, we'll chat on the phone to our various people.

Enjoy the holiday and be sure to tell the people you're thankful for that it is so.

2010-11-24T07:32:00.000-05:00

Thanksgiving
I've been wandering through the frogblog archives in the last few days and I've been struck by just how much Thanksgiving has played a role here over the years. The gay pilgrims, the trips to a Village family of origin for the holiday, profound worship and music, and memories of 11 a.m. dinners with my family of origin pepper my posts.

It seems appropriate, then, that I'd decide now that I'm ready to jump back into blogging. The past several months have been intense and wonderful and I really didn't have the psychic space to write the way I have in the past, but it's strange not to have those small memories from the year written in this space.

I started this blog when my Small Friend L was 21 months. I had just split with my first long-time girlfriend, who I'd been with for more than 11 years. I was on my own for the first time in my adult life, really. I had these two teeny kittens and a small house and a faith that was growing into something that would become part of everything for me.

Small Friend L is in third grade, now. I sold that small house to my parents, and they continue to own and rent it out because the market tanked so badly. I bought a bigger house in the next town over because I wanted to be a foster parent. I lived there with turtle and I put the brakes on that plan when she relapsed. I lived through The Kidney Stone Saga, but that combined with the relapse combined with the fact that we were badly matched and there was some level of dishonesty killed the relationship with turtle which, in retrospect, never was a relationship so much as a landing place for a brief time for both of us for different reasons.

I'm renting the bigger house, now, to a family that loves it and hopes to buy it someday. Unagi and I live with the kids in the house she bought when she moved to town. We've (mostly she...) transformed the front yard into gardens. We have the kids much of the time, and they stay with their dad every other weekend, half of the holidays, and other times that it works for everyone's schedule. He has a girlfriend who also has kids, so the scheduling has taken on a whole new level of complication, but we seem to have settled into a decent pattern with all of it. The kids do better with fewer changes between the houses (before, they were with their dad half of every weekend). The Boy Child loves his school (most of the time) and being in the third grade, and is currently obsessed with Star Wars Lego--on the Wii, with the bricks, in conversation. The Girl Child is four and every time she complets a task that's challenging, she wistfully remembers the days when she was three and never would have been able to do it.

Tali the Cute is three, now, and The Girl Child and she became fast friends over the summer. They send drawings back and forth and if my brother ever hooks up his damn webcam, we'll skype with them. I miss her and her mom terribly, and her father even more than that.

The relationship with and marriage to Unagi has fostered an amazing transformation in my parents. They are thrilled to have more grandchildren and after their first visit with us, my dad hugged Unagi when saying good-bye and said, "Thank you for making her happy." It's about as over-the-top verbose as he gets, and thinking about it still makes me weepy. My mom's started sending her (in)famous care packages to our entire household, the most recent one including vintage table linens from Leona (who's doing well, though can't hear worth a damn anymore), faux needlepointed gingerbread wall hangings (these are available in exchange for a donation in your name to your charity of choice--just let me know and I'll drop them in the mail to you, first commenter who wants them and completes the donation wins), postage stamps, and my old cheerleading uniform, as well as a letter asking whether the girl child "would enjoy an 8-inch fiber optic angel."

You see how it is.

I'm at more than an arm's length from my faith community. I rejoined choir this fall, but couldn't make it stick between my work schedule and wanting to be home with the family. I'll try again when the kids are older and Unagi and I are no longer working opposite shifts. I go to church rarely, because I'm still very tender around the Village issue and I haven't convinced myself that attending and seeing them is better than not attending at all. Maybe someday. I still pray, and I sing. We're "doing Advent" with the kids and talking with them about what faith is, and what we each believe.

The teeny kittens are starting to slow down, though Mason's still as owly as he's ever been and Kissa remains a total affection slut. And there's Tamarind, the fluffy little mancat who's their little brother, by rights. Mason, in particular, has surprised me over the last year. I thought for sure that he'd hide for the rest of his days because of the kids, but he loves them, particularly the Boy Child. Mason's become a cat I never thought he would be.

And that's really it--my life has become something I could never hope it would be, and I'm a person I never thought I'd be. The kids are a joy and a challenge. Being loved well by Unagi is amazing, though I still struggle with believing that it's not going to come crashing down around me and that she actually is who she is--there's no addiction looming, no festering mental illness that I don't know about.

So there will be blogging, and for that I am thankful.

2010-11-23T14:52:00.001-05:00

Just because it's sort of a tradition, I bring you the relish tray list

What can be on a relish tray?
Olives, black and/or green
Small or sliced pickles, dill and/or sweet
Other pickled things (onions, watermelon rind)
Pickled beets
Herring (but apparently only in my family, so you might skip this…)
Raw vegetables (carrots, celery, broccoli, etc.), with or without dip

Happy Thanksgiving! I hope that you and those you love are happy and well.

2010-11-14T00:23:00.001-05:00

Hey there
Still alive, still ridiculously happy.

The Boy Child's been dropping news here and there that I've reached "mom" status, most fabulously the other night in the car when he was talking about Star Wars, then dropped in a Harry Potter character's name.

"Oh, he's not Star Wars. He's Harry Potter."

"Yep, I knew that."

"What? HOW did you know THAT?"

"Well, I..."

"Because my mom, the mom I came from I mean, SHE is into Harry Potter. YOU are into Star Wars."

He's cool. I'm having a blast.

2010-09-24T22:17:00.002-04:00

And now for a musical interlude

I don't think you ever learned a thing from me but I'm sure that you want me to learn from you. You've drawn heavy-handed lines around morality about yourself but I don't share your point of view. It's been time to let you go a thousand times, you'll never know. It hurts to be that one that you'll regret. I have to say that I am proud to know you and I'll never be the same because we met. You might not miss this, but I will.

2010-09-12T23:08:00.000-04:00

On the wideness of God's mercy

More than a decade ago, I found this church. I'd been playing with the idea of returning to church after the common decade-long hiatus during and just after college. I was in a town where I didn't have people, living with a partner who I just didn't connect with the way that is necessary for me to be happy (though I wouldn't realize that for another handful of years). I'd lost a good job and was working something less fulfilling and I got this email from a long-time friend announcing the birth of their son. Chris and I had known each other since kindergarten and I count him among the people who impacted me profoundly. On the distribution list for that email was another kindergarten friend, Kristin, and she and I got to talking over email and, for reasons I still don't understand, I told her that I was longing for connection and community. She'd grown up to be a church musician--amazing organist, choir director, music director, the whole thing--and she suggested that I consider Episcopal churches. She thought that the liturgy and music would speak to me, while not being exactly what I'd done my entire life.

She was right, and I stumbled into this place of worship with no stained glass and no hymnals or Bibles and I thought, "Well, on first glance, this is weird enough that it just might work for me." It wasn't until later that I understood that the "weird" is part of the mission of the community, in which we communally own the sanctuary and offices with a Reform Jewish Temple. I sat in the back row at that first service, which happened to be the day that the kids' choirs were performing their musical, in lieu of a sermon (and let me just say, "in lieu of a sermon" was a whole new idea for me). I watched the choir director interact with the kids who she clearly adored and the feeling was obviously mutual. I sat there and cried through the entire thing because there was such JOY in those children and the congregation was paying close attention, adults learning from the small ones. At the close of the musical, the congregation stood up and applauded and hooted and I'd never seen anything like that in a church. I was completely overwhelmed by the safety and love in that room and I didn't return for several months. It just freaked me out, that kind of public display of love and acceptance.

When I gathered courage and showed up again, I joined the choir and even more than the congregation, I found sanctuary in the music. Breathe on Me Breath of God, The Wideness of God's Mercy*, they are both songs that held me in a way the church of my youth never really did. The music I grew up singing was incredible (really, who gets to grow up with a choir director who accompanies rehearsals on his solo violin?), but it wasn't like this or I wasn't like this or, more likely, both were true.

Over the past few years, I've moved away from the congregation where I found my spiritual and personal home all those years ago. Things that were clear and stable a few years ago had burst into pieces--in retrospect, I saw it coming, but in the moment, it seemed wholly unexpected and I lost my place in that congregation and couldn't find my way through to sing again. Every so often, I tried to find it again. I stayed in touch with many of the friends I'd made through choir and church, and every so often I'd attend on my own or with Meghan and the kids.

Last Sunday, I went to church and sat with two women I'd sung with over the years. The three of us shared a small bench at the back of the church and harmonized on the hymns, prayed together and quietly caught up during the peace. They both talked about missing me at choir and hoping that I'd sing with them again.

So last night, that's what I did. While there was nothing particularly profound about the rehearsal itself, I know that that's where I was supposed to be, that I've found my place again within the choir, if not yet within the congregation. The final hymn that we sang was There's a Wideness in God's Mercy, and there was text I'd never sung before:

We make His love too narrow

By false limits of our own;

And we magnify His strictness

With a zeal He will not own.

There is grace enough for thousands

Of new worlds as great as this;

There is room for fresh creations

In that upper home of bliss.

There is room for all of me there, not just the parts that people choose to approve or the parts I choose to share. There is room, there will always be room.

*I have in mind the Calvin Hampton version, but I can't find a sound file online.

2010-08-12T09:44:00.004-04:00

Since I'm here...
A few updates seem to be in order.

The Village is a thing of the past. Some of the Village adults were very unhappy with my relationship with Unagi, which began before her divorce was final, and invited me to a major event with explicit instructions that they would love to see me, but Unagi was not welcome. I thought some about that and decided that that simply didn't work for me. That was a year ago and I haven't seen Bat Girl since that phone conversation, nor have I spoken with her other than one brief gmail chat in February. I no longer see the Small Friends, except when I run into them at church or around town. I miss the hell out of them.
Unagi and I married in Iowa.

2010-08-12T09:24:00.003-04:00

IT LIVES!
I'm still around, just blogging elsewhere as my real and actual self. If we know each other and you'd like to follow, or if you're a long-time reader and we "know" each other, please send me an email at frogblogger at gmail dot com. For the moment, the new blog is private, which may or may not change as time goes by.

I hope you are all happy and well--I am!

2009-12-02T09:13:00.001-05:00

Vindication
Meredith Baxter has come out as a lesbian.

Years ago, I got my ass nailed to the wall for including her on my list of women to whom I'm attracted because she's MARRIED (or was at the time...or something?). I can't even find the post anymore, and maybe no one remembers that but me, but I couldn't resist.

2009-10-09T07:39:00.000-04:00

The ABCs
More often than not, I take the Girl Child to daycare in the morning, as it's on my way to work, I have a car, and I never have anyone in labor to whom I must attend. We've been doing this for several weeks, now, and we've got our routine down pretty well.

Most days, she colors some and we talk about what she's going to do that day, or what she did the day before, or the dreams she's had recently. She asks for the driving song (Indigo Girls' Driver Education) and we dance and sing--I sing the words, she sings whatever words are on her mind.

Once we're at school and out of the car, we sing the ABCs while we walk, often stopping to jump in puddles or balance on curbs. Yesterday morning, the waning but close to full moon was in the sky. We were singing and she hollered, "Stop!" So we did, no more walking and no more singing, and she proposed that we sing our song to the moon.

And that is what we did.

2009-10-03T20:40:00.002-04:00

Why I've been a lousy blogger

2009-09-18T07:38:00.001-04:00

As big as the world
It's Tali's birthday today--she's TWO!

On the way to drop Grrl Child off at her school, she wanted to hold the gift I have to send to Tali, which is jungle animal magnets. We talked about Tali being younger than Grrl Child, and I told her that this weekend I'm going to put together a box of things for Tali.

"I will draw a picture for her. It will be Tali and Me and Max playing. Pink for Tali and red for me and blue for Max. Grandma sent a storybook for Tali."

"Oh, that's so nice of her! We'll put it in the box."

"She will have to come to get the box from me. There is no mail here!"

"She lives too far away, so we'll send it. What else should we put in the box?"

"Another storybook. A VERY BIG storybook. Ter, can YOU carry a very big storybook?"

"I think that I could, but it depends on how big it is."

"It's a storybook as big as the world. You maybe couldn't carry it by yourself, but we could carry it together."

2009-09-09T12:51:00.000-04:00

Scenes from Labor Day weekend

2009-09-03T07:44:00.001-04:00

How many licks DOES it take?
The other day, Unagi and I took the boychild out for lunch to our favorite sushi place--they bring dumdum lollipops with the check. He chose cherry and that was that.

Later that day, the two of them picked me up from work and we all went to pick up the grrlchild from her first day at daycare. We were pulling out of the parking lot when boychild whips out the lollipop. Grrlchild loses her shit, boychild gives in and shares it with her so she can "have a taste," and grrlchild refuses to return it.

Boychild is VERY unhappy with this. Grrlchild refuses to give in. Boychild tells her he'll do ANYTHING for that lollipop. She says NO. Since we are en route to the vet so I can buy catfood, I tell grrlchild that she should give the lollipop back when we arrive at the vet's office, because she cannot play with the cats with sticky hands. She agrees.

We pull into the parking lot at the vet's I tell her we have arrived and it's time to give the lollipop back to boychild. I hear an enthusiastic "Okay!" And then I hear an equally enthusiastic CRUNCH as she bites the whole pop off and hands her brother the naked stick.

2009-08-26T16:12:00.000-04:00

Funny

2009-08-19T11:55:00.003-04:00

The eagle has landed
And he brought his much-loved boy companion and his sister with him for the duration. Unagi's kids arrived yesterday morning, fresh off the red-eye from Seattle. I saw them briefly on the ride to work, during which I amazed The Grrl with my rendition of the first verse of The Rubber Ducky Song and horrified Unagi by entertaining The Miniman with a long conversation about dragons and hemmorhoids.

For lunch, we went to Zingerman's with their grandmother (they'd been at Camp Grandma for the past few weeks). Everyone ate something, there were no meltdowns, nothing was broken and there was no vomit. I don't know that I'd have kept my shit in a pile as well as they did given new town, new state, new time zone, overnight flight, and seeing mama for the first time in several weeks.

They are staying with me until Unagi closes on her house early next week, so last night was the first overnight. Alas, there WAS vomit, as well as nightmares, musical beds, singing, screeching, and really annoyed felines, but this morning we all managed to arrive at our destinations bathed and clothed. It's a win!

2009-08-10T10:48:00.002-04:00

In which frog makes a scene at her high school reunion
Unagi and I went to my high school reunion this weekend and it was mostly fabulous. I loved reconnecting with old friends, some of whom who've known me since kindergarten, and getting to know some people who I didn't know in high school but with whom I have much in common. Most notably, the Big Lesbianness has drawn some of us together.

I attended a medium-sized high school in a small agricultural city. There were enough out lesbians at the reunion that we had our own table--and there are a handful of others who didn't come to the reunion. I'm sure there are gay men and bisexual people, but I don't know for sure who they are. The woman I thought was out and bi is actually neither. That was a thrilling conversation. Heh.

Anyway, as is the case at these events, there were prizes for various things, including furthest traveled, most kids, most pets, and longest married, which was awarded to a guy who married the day after he graduated from college, so for 16 years.

I walked to the front of the group and let the award-giver know that that wasn't right, that my friends Libby and Pez have been together for EIGHTEEN years and they should get the prize. The award-giver basically ignored me.

But what REALLY pissed me off is that one of the reunion organizers, who herself is an out lesbian, said, "Yeah, but when did they MARRY LEGALLY?"

Really? REALLY?

2009-08-04T22:06:00.002-04:00

Michigan
I've introduced Unagi to the wonder that is Calder's chocolate milk. Next up: Michigan lefts.

2009-08-02T00:53:00.003-04:00

Light
Tonight, Unagi and I went to a party to celebrate a friend's birthday. The friends hosting (and, indeed, the birthday grrl herself) live a bit out of town. One of them is an amazing gardener and their yard is just spectacular. At some point, some of the kids were outside and one bent down to pick up a small frog, which promptly hopped into her sleeve and up her arm. It was just that sort of gathering, where you expect the unexpected and all of it feels lovely and safe.

As we were leaving, we looked out over the hollow where the garden is and Unagi gasped. "They light up! THEY REALLY LIGHT UP!" She had never seen fireflies before, as they apparently aren't in Seattle. I had no idea--fireflies were just part of the landscape of my childhood. I have no memory of the first time that I saw them, they've just always been there. At an early family reunion on my dad's side, I remember catching them in the ditch along the road that intersects with the one named for my family, carefully keeping them in jars with holes poked in the lids until the end of the evening, when we let them go again.

Our hosts noticed us hanging out there, Unagi totally grooving on the fireflies, and told us that a few years ago, their daughter caught about 40 in a jar and was so sad to discover that they need space and freedom to create the energy that they need to light up.

I suspect that holds true for most of us.

2009-07-31T11:45:00.002-04:00

Maybe this is the problem

2009-07-28T12:02:00.000-04:00

I puffy heart love my extended family
The Saturday night portion of our family reunion featured jello shots AND glow necklaces.

2009-07-23T07:34:00.000-04:00

Huh
Why is it that I woke up with Eye of the Tiger on endless loop in my brain? It's a mystery.

2009-07-18T11:01:00.000-04:00

Thank you
Thanks to all of you who have sent in funds for Cute Grrl Who Loves Sushi--I've gathered just over $150 and it's still coming in--she asked that I send you all her profound gratitude.

2009-07-18T07:23:00.001-04:00

The good, the really really good
A week from tomorrow, Unagi arrives for good. She has had an offer accepted on a fabulous house and we'll have a few weeks together before she starts her job and the rest of her family arrives.

Yay!

2009-07-03T13:38:00.004-04:00

And then there were kids
It's no secret to anyone who knows me even a little bit that I enjoy (most) kids. For a long time, I thought it was just toddlers, but then Small Friend O wasn't a toddler any longer and I still loved the hell out of her and she continued to think I'm quite excellent, so I had to broaden my category.

Small Friend O--she's done that a lot for me, really. Meeting and loving that child was the first time as an adult that I really considered the possibility that I might parent one day. It wasn't just that I love her so much, she'd flat-out ask me when I was going to be a mama, and on one memorable lunch outing, she sat across the table from me, all of five years old or something, and said, "Aunt Terri, have you ever thought about adopting a toddler? I was adopted as a toddler and it's worked out quite well for me."

Just before I met turtle, I'd started charting and I was up front with her about the fact that I was on the road to single parenthood. She could choose to stop seeing me, she could choose to date me and have nothing to do with whatever kid(s) appeared for me, or we could explore the possibility of having a family together. We went with option three, then crashed and burned in a most spectacular fashion. I didn't get pregnant. She changed her mind. She changed it back. I still didn't get pregnant. I spent a lot of money on Swim Teams. She spent a lot of money on other stuff. I didn't get pregnant some more. She fell out of love with me. I wanted to make it work. It didn't work, none of it worked, and we called it quits last fall.

As long-time readers know, in March I had a horrible bout of depression, one that included lots of suicidal ideation and during that week I came to grips with the fact that I couldn't parent. It simply wouldn't be fair to bring a child into a home where their only parent struggles so much at times with depression. There was a tremendous amount of grief and prayer for me during the process of realizing that there wasn't going to be a child in my home, much less children.

A few months ago, Unagi showed up. She'd been at the edges for a long time, but she was a friend. She had a husband. She had kids. She lived on the other side of the country from me. Eventually, I noticed, though no gift of my own because I am SUCH a bonehead about that stuff, that she was interested in me. I found out she was relocating after she finished her masters degree. I found out that she was divorcing.

You see where this is going.

In about six weeks, Unagi will have arrived in my town for good, her ex-husband (the Large Primate) will have arrived in my town for good, and the kids (the Small Primates) will have arrived in my town for good. Initially, the four of them will live in the house she's buying in my neighborhood. Ultimately, she will move in with me and the kids will be with us part of the time and with the Large Primate part of the time.

Yesterday, the very best part of my day was thrifting for some fall clothes for the kids. I found fabulous stuff for great prices, and Unagi loved what I chose. Today, I'm washing the clothes, putting them on the kid-sized hangers I had in the attic, and hanging them in what will be their room.

I can't parent alone. I think I can parent with two other adults who already love the kids about to join my family.

2009-06-23T07:20:00.000-04:00

Soon
I'm heading off in a while here to visit Unagi, who lives in Seattle. The last time I was in Seattle, I was 15 years old and visiting my dad's first cousin with my family. I slept on the floor in a sleeping bag in said cousin's home office. Even at that age, I was a world-class insomniac and there was a bookshelf and it didn't take me long to find the stash of Playboy magazines.

It was in that city, in that home office, where I realized in a profound way that my issue wasn't that I was broken, but that I'm a lesbian. My friends were all pairing up with boys and making out at parties and I just didn't understand what the draw was. I flipped through those magazines and a switch went off in my brain. I finally understood why my friends wanted to be with these boys and why I didn't.

My feminist politics are such that I'm not thrilled that porn is the way I figured all of this out, but it is what it is, and there's some sort of beautiful design to the fact that I'm going to reclaim Seattle as a fully formed adult, who will be traveling to see the woman with whom I am falling in love.

2009-06-15T12:44:00.003-04:00

Testifying about the past
I spent my morning in court, testifying before a judge to try to convince her that a loved one needs psychiatric care that she is unable to secure for herself. This person believes people are trying to poison her via food (so eats only packaged items and is ingesting around 800 calories on a high-intake day) and her laundry detergent and water. She thinks that a famous man is stealing her work and passing it off as his own. She cannot hold a job--she lost one not that long ago because she wouldn't sign the electronic device indicating that she'd received a package because she was concerned about being watched. She periodically thinks that parts of her body are melting off, sometimes because of the laundry detergent poison, sometimes for other reasons. She is scared and small and vulnerable.

The judge did not grant our petition, based on her right to liberty. And, you know, I understand that, but I also believe that this is a death sentence for her.

Part of me feels as though I betrayed her profoundly when I stated my name for the record and talked to that judge. I know that I didn't, that we did the right thing, that she needs help and cannot see her way out of this on her own.

I doubt I will have more news of her at any point--the ties are too distant and she hasn't trusted me for a very long time. It's a loss I'm not sure how to process, but I know that I will, with time.

2009-06-14T12:58:00.001-04:00

As seen on the campus bookstore marquee
I Like Used Books and I Cannot Lie

2009-06-13T21:41:00.003-04:00

An update of sorts
Things are going well for me, overall. I'm happy in my job. Unagi is amazing--funny and sharp and kind and celebrated her new degree with fresh ink and an eyebrow piercing and at least once a day, I wonder where the hell she came from and how I got so lucky.

The cats--I have five, again, as turtle's living situation changed or something and her dad brought Sam, Lorenzo and Tamarind back to me--are doing all right, though the endless establishment of the pecking order gets on my last naked nerve. Lorenzo has a big scab on his chest and Kissa is just a damn maniac, stalking him around the house and yowling. I'm hoping to rehome Sam and Lorenzo, I'm just looking for the right place.

Last week I returned from my visit with Tali the Cute to find a stray cat with a badly injured back leg on my deck. I talked to him, he warmed up and I stuffed him in a crate and surrendered him to the vet. They told me that I could call the following day and check up on him, but I didn't need to--they called me about 90 minutes after I dropped him off to say that he'd tested positive for FIV and between that and his leg injury, they'd have to euthanize him.

Please keep your cats indoors--better for them, better for the environment, better for the songbirds, better for my heart.

2009-06-09T16:56:00.000-04:00

What I did on my second summer vacation, by frog

2009-06-01T22:39:00.002-04:00

I suppose it's a good thing when the most complicated part requiring the most input from others is choosing her screen name
I'm sorry for the long radio silence, here, but I have a Very Good Explanation. There's a new woman in my life--we're going to call her Unagi, in honor of that Friends episode that cracks my shit up and her love of that particular kind of sushi.

She's lovely. Curly red hair, freckles, a killer smile and gorgeous eyes (I'm a sucker for beautiful eyes, I'll admit). She loves her work, which is catching babies (she's a midwife). She loves her kids, who are seven and almost three.

We met online a year and a half or two years ago at a gigantic message board. I didn't really know here there, but it turns out that she followed the ttc saga. We connected for real at a smaller spin-off board.

After hours of phone calls, hundreds of emails and even more texts, we met for the first time last week.

I will call this state of being Cautiously Optimistic.

She's really wonderful--my friends who have met her think she's lovely and she likes them. The Small Friends who love turtle are uncertain, which is to be expected. People who have seen me when we're together, without exception, immediately comment on how happy and well I look.

But the real clincher? Mason loves her.

2009-05-15T12:55:00.000-04:00

A win for the lesbionic Facebook contingent
A few weeks back, I reconnected with a woman from my hometown--she now lives about 45 minutes from me and is also a lesbian. I played ball with her sister for years--S was our pitcher and I played first base--and W was bumped up into our league for a year while I was still there because she was too good.

Anyway, she met up with some friends and me for drinks last weekend and yesterday she sent me a message on FB, asking for my dad's contact information because her parents want to do business with him. BECAUSE THEIR DAUGHTER AND I ARE BOTH BIG LESBIANS.

You bet your ass I called my folks to tell them that their fears about losing business because their daughter is a lesbian? Nah. Instead, LOOKY HERE.

I MAY be gloating. And possibly strutting and grinning. These things may or may not be related. Stay tuned.

2009-05-14T12:25:00.002-04:00

Phone transcript
The participants: frog, frog's mom

fm: So Ron is going to do a mass at the lake during the family reunion in honor of the family members who have died.

frog: A mass? Ron's Episcopalian.

fm: Epicopalians call it mass, too.

frog: I know, but most of our family? Catholic.

fm: So what? They know what mass is.

frog: I know they know what mass is, but they won't take the Eucharist from Ron.

fm: You don't know that.

frog: Yes, I do. They are Catholic. They will only take mass from a Catholic priest. If you tell them it's mass, you'd better have a "real" priest there.

fm: It'll be fine. Ron is family. And Episcopalians call it mass!

frog: I KNOW! But Ron and I are the only people in the family who ARE Episcopalian. Everyone else? Catholic. Plus? Ron's gay.

fm: People don't know Ron is gay.

frog: What?

fm: They don't know he's gay.

frog: Mom, are we REALLY going to have this conversation again?

fm: Yes. They don't know he's gay.

frog: So, your stance is that they don't know that the guy who grew up Catholic, dropped out of seminary, went on to become an Episcopal priest, has lived with the same man for THIRTY YEARS and with whom he has three children. They don't know he's gay.

frog leaves to smoke.

2009-05-05T07:40:00.000-04:00

How to charm me
After some highly successful flirting, send me an email message with a question about hotdish, among other things, then sign off like this:

There's no non-awkward way to close this, so let me be all nihilistic and postmodern, and just sign an initial.

2009-05-03T17:15:00.001-04:00

Today's yard discovery
A fair amount of my front lawn? Chives.

2009-05-02T11:09:00.001-04:00

This is for you, the one reading through the archives

2009-05-01T07:45:00.001-04:00

Legacy
When I was about 11, I met a woman who ended up having a profound impact on my life, Barbara. I've talked about her here before. She was 20 years older than me, she saved my life once and my ass so many more times than that. I loved her with all my heart. She died in 1995, either suicide or homicide, probably the latter (IMO) and at the hands of her husband, who after her death burned all of her things, and killed himself a year later.

Her son is my FB friend. He and his wife had a baby girl last week and they named her Esme Barbara. She's the spitting image of Barbara, who had the most beautiful eyes I'd ever seen.

2009-04-27T07:55:00.003-04:00

Mason and Kissa
The transition back to two cats is going fairly well--save for the part where Kissa now refuses to eat anything other than Mason's spendy prescription food (binkin, you're getting a BUNCH of nutro max for your babies when you come to visit, if you want it), and the part where Mason patrols the house all night long trilling to his babies.

This morning, he absolutely DEMANDED to be let into the guest room, I think on the assumption that he'd find Tamarind and Lychee in there. He didn't, of course, and he made his displeasure known, walking up to me, giving a big yowl and popping me twice, claws in, on the leg.

As for me, I was busy this weekend with finally going to the gym that I joined several weeks ago, cleaning out the garage, enjoying several fabulous meals with a beautiful woman and having long, lovely online chats with someone far away who's going to visit soon.

2009-04-25T15:41:00.001-04:00

Exhaling
The good: I think this morning brought things to a close with turtle--I have my stuff, she has her stuff.

The bad: Her stuff includes Tamarind and Lychee, who I heard howl all the way down the block as her dad drove away with them in their carrier.

It's just Mason, Kissa and me again, and I predict that it will be so for a long time to come.

2009-04-23T07:51:00.000-04:00

Yesterday: The good and the just plain weird
The Indigo Girls played here last night--alas, concert tickets are just not in my budget right now, but I wasn't TOO sad because I've seen them eleventy billion times and I know there will be other opportunities.

Imagine my delight when I found out they were also doing a free mini-set at a nearby bookstore. I had lunch plans with the (former?) Nueva Cantora blogger and her lovely husband, so we bagged those in favor of a little Amy and Emily love.

Imagine my shock and massive head shaking when TOAD showed up. Not turtle. Toad. The woman who hated the Indigo Girls so much when we were together that I went to their concerts alone.

Just weird.

2009-04-16T19:50:00.002-04:00

On the Small Friends
They're growing up. I mean, of course they are, but I'm amazed at how wonderful it is to watch them while they do so and I feel so honored to be part of it. They're now almost 14, 10, 8 and 7--I've known all of them for about 7 years, except for the 14 year old who I've known a bit longer.

Small Friend O is 10 and Small Friend H is 8 and they both have gmail accounts, and one of the best surprises for me is to be chatted by them. They're totally hilarious and love the emoticons most of all.

Small Friend H chatted me today while I was at work and she was at home enjoying some downtime during spring break. We were emoticon-ing back and forth when, sort of out of the blue, she said, "So, how's life?"

And I grooved and got just a little bit melancholy that this little girl who I used to feed off of the edge of my plate while she opened her mouth like a bird is now asking me such grown-up questions.

2009-04-14T12:50:00.000-04:00

Makin' plans
I'm working on scheduling a trip to see Tali soon. How geeked am I?

2009-04-12T12:18:00.002-04:00

On Easter

We praise you, O God, whom eternity cannot contain, for coming to earth and entering time in Jesus. We praise you for his life which informs our living, for his compassion which changes our hearts, for his clear speaking which contradicts our harmless generalities, for his disturbing presence, his innocent suffering, his fearless dying, his rising to life and breathing forgiveness and restoring us forever to you.

I had no idea how hard it would be to be so sad on Easter.

On the way home from church, I sang this, by Carrie Newcomer:

Here I am without a message
Here I stand with empty hands
Just a spirit tired of wandering like a stranger in this land
Walking wide-eyed through this world
Is the only way I've known
Wrapped in hope and good intention and
Bare to the bone

There is nothing I won't show you
There is nothing I can hide
I've risked it all and dreamt it all
And seldom questioned why
You took me in when I was hungry
When my spirit ached and groaned
Laid wide open and defenseless
And bare to the bone

When I rise, I rise in glory
If I do, I do by grace
Time will wash away our footprints
And we'll leave without a trace
Between here and now and forever
Is such precious little time
What we do in love and kindness
Is all we ever leave behind

When my eyes are slowly fading
When the light is softly waning
When the evening sun is setting
And the world is barely breathing
Then your voice will call me
And your hands will lead me home
Like a newborn awed and naked
And bare to the bone

When I rise, I rise in glory
If I do, I do by grace
Time will wash away our footprints
And we'll leave without a trace
Between here and now and forever
Is such precious little time
What we do in love and kindness
Is all we ever leave behind

Here I am without a message
Here I stand with empty hands
Just a spirit tired of wandering
Like a stranger in this land
Walking wide-eyed through this world
Is the only way I've known
Wrapped in hope and good intention and
Bare to the bone

2009-04-11T09:47:00.004-04:00

Yesterday was a very good day
It didn't start out that great--I had a rough night, filled with dreams in which I was trying to dial 911 and hearing a recording, "You must dial the area code before dialing this number," then doing that and getting the recording, "This number is no longer in service. Please try your call again."

I met the pronoia blogger and her fabulous partner for lunch as they were on their way from point B back to point A. She and I have been reading one another's blogs for who knows how long (neither of us, as we've had that conversation). We landed on an email list together and started chatting via gmail, which we do most days. We'd talked on the phone, once, when she read my cards around Yule.

I was ridiculously nervous and for no reason at all. It was like meeting old friends for the very first time. There was much laughing and wonderful food and with the possibility that in a few years we'll live closer to each other, I have no doubt we'll be seeing one another again.

I spent much of the afternoon sorting through the stuff from turtle that I'd chosen to keep, figuring out what needed laundering, what needed to be put away, and taking photos of the few things that I've got for sale. The room that was hers is nearly empty, now, and today I'm cleaning it and setting it up as a guest room.

Late in the afternoon, I went to the annual Extended Village Pysanky Egg Making Party where, as always, my eggs paled in comparison to those made by others (Small Friend H in particular is just ROCKIN' these eggs--she made one with flamingos on it that's totally cool), H asked me if I remembered the time I dropped and broke the egg she'd made (um, yep), and I reconnected with some people I don't seen all that often, as well as people I see regularly.

I didn't make it to church yesterday, which is a first for me in...well, certainly since I started attending regularly again, which is more than a decade. I found other ways to be with God, and that's enough.

2009-04-11T08:00:00.001-04:00

Groove of the day (so far)
One of my efriends named a new kitten after me. Frogger. :)

2009-04-08T12:20:00.000-04:00

The three-word prayers
God, be here.

God, help me.

2009-04-05T21:11:00.005-04:00

Wrung out but propped up
This weekend was weird and complicated and blessed and inspiring, all at once.

My therapist has been suggesting I go to Al-Anon for, oh, you know, like a decade. I saw her on Friday and when I told her that I planned to go on Saturday morning she, who has never so much as shaken my hand in all that time, jumped out of her chair and hugged me, then apologized profusely, though I assured her that it was fine. I'd been toying with the idea on and off for years and have been making concerted efforts for months but just could not do it. Once there, I was a damn mess. And later, too. But I'll go again and I think it will be good for me.

Saturday afternoon, I met my friend, J, at his house for lunch, to meet the lovely newish woman in his life, and to benefit dramatically from the fact that he's selling his house and moving to a condo. He gave me all kinds of yard-related stuff AND a gorgeous patio set with a huge glass table, many chairs and an umbrella. I'm renting a truck and picking it up next Saturday.

After that, I met ANOTHER friend J for a beverage and catching up. She's post break-up, too, and it was good to reconnect and touch base on everything.

But the really big thing is that this afternoon, my friend davi drove an hour each way to help me deal with bags and bins and boxes of crap that turtle left at my house last week. She's royally pissed at me and things are just bad--like, I don't even want to talk about them on the blog, they're so bad. In any case, she returned everything she'd bought while we were together, everything I made for her, everything I'd ever given to her. She returned things I didn't know she had (most notably and weirdly, love letters from a former girlfriend). I went through one bag of stuff on my own and totally lost my shit. davi offered to come for the afternoon and help me sort through everything and that's just what we did. The food (yes, she returned food) that I can use I've put away. What I wouldn't use but davi would went home with her. The rest of what I won't use is packed up to go to the food shelf. There are six huge garbage bags of trash at the curb. There were I don't know how many bags of stuff that davi took to the thrift store. There's a pile of stuff I'm keeping because I can use it. There's a closet full of stuff I'm offering for sale for cheap. davi took a huge bag of clothes home that her family can use, as well as several pairs of Keen and Columbia shoes in excellent condition (yes, she returned the shoes she bought when we were together). She took the sarongs that I'd given to turtle as gifts because she can use them at her baby-wearing group to demonstrate ways to make slings and wraps and because I just couldn't bear to keep them.

There's also stuff I'm not sure what to do with--I'm not going to pitch or donate her family photos, but I have those and other things I know are important to her, so I'm boxing them and putting them in the attic for now.

There's still more stuff I've made no decisions about. But it's a start and I'll take it.

2009-04-04T15:45:00.002-04:00

This post brought to you by grief and brandy
Scene: frog and friend at a local bar with a table full of friends and their friends and whoever. I'm sitting across from my friend and between two guys--one of them I'm talking to about who makes the best cocktails in town, the other I'm ignoring because he hasn't said anything at all, not even when I ask him direct questions. He's on my right.

Players: frog and The Guy To Her Right

TGTHR: So, when did you start to find me unattractive?

frog: Oh. Probably around the time you were born with a dick. Sorry.

Oops.

2009-04-03T12:20:00.000-04:00

Letting go
Today, my 19-year-old work-study student brought her ultrasound photo to show me her "baby." She's due in November and she's very excited about being pregnant, despite being very young, very much on meds that are not great for pregnant women (or their passengers), and very much in lust with the baby daddy, who's an unemployed drug addict (full-on, active drug addict, no recovery at this time, though he's been in and out of rehab).

Before last week, the last time I'd been suicidal I was 19 years old. I spent about 18 months doing little more than laying on my back in my dorm room, smoking cigarettes and drinking Mountain Dew (and, no, the parallels to my life now do not escape me) and looking at the ceiling and talking to Catherine and listening to Ann Reed. But I've done therapy, years of therapy. I've been on meds. I've been a functional member of society for a long time. I hadn't thought about killing myself in almost two decades.

And then I did. I thought about it. I thought about it a lot. I planned it out. I knew what I wanted to do and when. I gathered together what I needed to make it happen and made a list of what I needed to buy that I didn't already have in the house. I made a list of people I should send an email to, saying good-bye and apologizing for not being enough, for not having enough to put one foot in front of the other and keep on living this life, which had gotten so heavy and oppressive and sad that I couldn't conceive of the possibility of hope ever being in me again, must less joy.

When I didn't do it, when I called my doctor instead and asked for help, when I started talking about it online here and elsewhere, it was because I couldn't do this to Tali, to the Small Friends. I know what it's like to carry the legacy of suicide. I know the questions you ask yourself, the thoughts about whether if you'd done this or that, or not done this or that, if it would have mattered, if you could have saved him, if she could have just held on until she saw the hope again.

Last year at this time, I was at my cousin's funeral. My extended family had gathered together and I left before they said the rosary because all these years--14 of them--after William shot himself, I still can't say the rosary without totally losing my shit. And, while that's appropriate and fine in a funeral home, I just couldn't bring myself to do it. The following morning, my mom knocked on our hotel room door to tell me that my Uncle Frank had died, that the call had come in while they were praying for Missy.

Last night I talked to my cousin, the one who's a priest, the one who's also gay, the other one who's left from the Triumverate of Gay in our family. He presided at Uncle Frank's funeral and he's the one who held me when I cried for our uncle. He's the one who gave voice to the fact that Uncle Frank was a staunch Republican who loved the hell out of him and me, even though we were living a life he didn't totally understand. I told him about my grief, I told him how things had been going of late with turtle, I told him that last week it was all I could do not to give in to the dark and just quit all of it, forever.

Then I told him that I know that I cannot parent. I can't do it to myself, I can't do it to a child. I can and do and will love the hell out of the kids that I have in my life, but as long as I know there's even a chance that I'll balance on that line again, I cannot parent.

And while I'm indescribably sad, I know that I'm right.

2009-03-31T19:59:00.004-04:00

Lyrical self-destruction
Through liquid
Through metal
Through fire
Through blood

Through hope where nothing can be

Through memory where nothing ever was

Through the raw, vulnerable ache of the art, the want, the curve of your lips, the depth of your sad, the cracks in the facade that score your surface and break your heart.

The only chance to break down what isn't working, to be broken in a way that leaves space for something I can't even imagine to exist.

with credit to Jose Esteban Munoz for the title and inspiration

2009-03-28T17:05:00.003-04:00

How I define my beliefs as a Christian
A conversation on a board where I post spawned some reflection on my part and resulted in my current draft of what I guess is my belief system--or part of it, anyway. Seemed like decent blog fodder, so I'm pasting away.

Feel free to ask questions. Or not.

I believe in Jesus. I believe he was a holy man, I believe he walked the earth, I believe he was a radical peacemaker and on my good days, I would like to strive for that as well. I believe he had few qualms about reaching out to those different than him (though he struggled with that, which is in the Bible, though we rarely hear about it).

I believe in God. I believe in the Holy Spirit. I believe in eternal life, but I don't know what that means. I believe that life is too precious for it to last only decades and for that to be the end. Is there a heaven? Will I be reincarnated? I don't know, and it doesn't really matter to me.

I believe that the Bible is the Word of God as translated by fallible men. It is not the be-all end-all, but neither can I throw the entire thing out.

The most meaningful moment in the Bible, for me, is this, from John:

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was in the beginning with God. 3 All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being 4 in him was life, and the life was the light of all people. 5 The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it.

And that's how I try to live my life, with the idea that there is a light, that we are all that light, and that even in the darkest of times, it will not be overcome.

2009-03-27T13:22:00.001-04:00

Incremental progress is still progress
The sun is out, literally, which helps. The effexor seems to be kicking in, which helps. People, lovely people, have called and texted and written and all kinds of things, which humbles and amazes me, as well as a pack of other ridiculousness that I'm going to need to trot out one at a time and work through, clearly, because how can your friend who's the ONLY person who knew you the last time you were a suicidal maniac calling you and offering to get on a plane FROM ANOTHER TIME ZONE if that's what you need, how can that be painful? That's fucked up, man. Fucked. Up.

I've showered, which is huge. I ate something before two o'clock. I haven't screened any calls. I'm wearing real clothing. And I'm about to LEAVE THE HOUSE.

My point, here, is that I'm feeling some better. I still have the crazy, it's still kicking my ass and making me think that nothing is better than something, but something is making a good showing, now, and I can see hope, even if I can't yet claim it as my own.

And, for now, I'll take it, if for no other reason than: LOOK! WORDS!

2009-03-26T14:41:00.004-04:00

And the part of the day where Kissa the fabulous tabby lit her fur on fire on a candle is not even the low point
Things aren't good for me. They aren't good at all. I haven't felt this much like checking out for good in about 20 years. It scares the hell out of me.

I have good people in my life--people who are calling to check in with me from the road, people who are bringing sushi for dinner and an evening of hanging out with the cats, people who are texting and emailing and all manner of stuff.

I have only told two people IRL (the one calling from the road and the one bringing sushi, who is turtle) how bad things really are, and I suspect that turtle doesn't really know how bad things are, because I don't think I actually told her, now that I think about it. So I guess I've just told one.

And now, because I'm posting this, some other people IRL are going to know and that, too, scares me, because this thing that I have around my heart, around my neck, it's a huge source of shame for me, and I fear the power that it has to change my life when I least expect it.

2009-03-25T12:02:00.000-04:00

Still nothing from me, but something from Sarah McLachlan for the time being
I will be the answer
At the end of the line
I will be there for you
While you take the time
In the burning of uncertainty
I will be your solid ground
I will hold the balance
If you can't look down

If it takes my whole life
I won't break, I won't bend
It will all be worth it
Worth it in the end
Cause I can only tell you what I know
That I need you in my life
When the stars have all gone out
You'll still be burning so bright

Cast me gently
Into morning
For the night has been unkind
Take me to a
Place so holy
That I can wash this from my mind
The memory of choosing not to fight

If it takes my whole life
I won't break, I won't bend
It will all be worth it
Worth it in the end
'Cause I can only tell you what I know
That I need you in my life
When the stars have all burned out
You'll still be burning so bright

Cast me gently
Into morning
For the night has been unkind

2009-03-20T10:38:00.000-04:00

It's Ani's turn
You give me that look that's like laughing
With liquid in your mouth
Like you're choosing between choking
And spitting it all out
Like you're trying to fight gravity
On a planet that insists
That love is like falling
And falling is like this

Feels like reckless driving when we're talking
It's fun while it lasts, and it's faster than walking
But no one's going to sympathize when we crash
They'll say "you hit what you head for, you get what you ask"
And we'll say we didn't know, we didn't even try
One minute there was road beneath us, the next just sky

I'm sorry I can't help you, I cannot keep you safe
I'm sorry I can't help myself, so don't look at me that way
We can't fight gravity on a planet that insists
That love is like falling

2009-03-15T11:46:00.002-04:00

Blinking while the sun hits my face
Yesterday I went for a long walk, longer than anything so far this year, what with my foot in a cast and all. I went with a woman I've sort of been seeing--that is, I feel like I'm seeing her, she's less certain. We have similar amounts of baggage, though the quality and timing of it varies, of course. She has dogs and we took one of them with us and just sort of wandered around this series of paved trails (it was big with the mud yesterday and Baby Grrl had just had a bath and was all fluffy and good-smelling and wonderful...at the beginning; by the end, of course, she had a muzzle full of mud and a back full of grass where she'd rolled and wiggled with the sun on her belly).

While we walked, there was lots of conversation and probably an equal amount of silence. I try not to say EVERY fucking thing that comes into my brain because, you know, I have the crazy, but I do tend to over-think and before I know it it's been many minutes since I've said anything at all and I have to sort of shake myself a bit to recalibrate and remember where I am, where my feet fall, where it is that my skin is feeling the sun and the breeze on this particular day.

I've been thinking a lot about touch--how we touch, how we are touched, how we ask, how we demand, how we react, how we respond, how we crave, how we deny, how we ignore, how we practice the not wanting to deal more easily with the not having. Physical touch, psychic touch, heart touch, it's all wrapped up in this body of mine that's walking through the tall grasses, stopping to see the small woodpecker perched on a stem, pecking and looking confused as the breeze comes up and the grass bends.

2009-03-08T15:48:00.001-04:00

Radio silence
Sorry, y'all. I'm hibernating a little bit. When the words come, I'll post them.

frog

2009-02-27T07:33:00.000-05:00

On endless loop in the car this morning (Emily Saliers wrote it)
Fly away little bird
Any place in this open mouthed world
Begs to be fed like a bed that beckons you, but you won't rest
Everyone's got a need to go
Most of us stick with our row to hoe
But not you, you're the black crow
With a straight line, and no time
For the birds of prey who wreck your nest
Twice your size steal your best
They set you on this course of your collision

I am a stop along your way
I am the words you'll never say
I crossed the great beyond of fear
I opened my eyes and saw us there, what a view
You went there too

Fly away little bird
Find the song in you that no one's heard
Strenghthen your wings as you sing your solo flight
Through this short life
Everyone's got a deep regret
We try to ground ourselves to forget
But your race to the end is neck and neck
You love them, you love them not
The birds of prey who wreck your nest,
Twice your size steal your best
They set you on this course of your collision

I am a stop along your way
I am the words you'll never say
I crossed the great beyond of fear
Opened my eyes and saw us there, what a view
And you went there too

But all along your chosen path are
Window panes and sheets of glass
That you won't see
You fly too fast
One day it will be over

Fly away little bird
The saddest song I ever heard
Was the one that I wrote you in my heart
That never made it to the world

2009-02-27T07:14:00.000-05:00

Not much to say
I'm tired, my ankle hurts and the cute grrl is away for several days and staying with her ex, which does not thrill me, but is what it is, you know?

On the upside, I'm seeing my good friend N for drinks tonight and I have dinner plans with the Daddyzines on Wednesday.

2009-02-23T12:19:00.000-05:00

Conversational
When you called yesterday, when I answered, when I held the phone up against my forehead, not needing to hear the words because I've heard them so many times before, you've said them so many times before, I lost a little piece of myself. I lost that part that believed that living my truth makes a damn bit of difference. I lost that part that believed in love, that believed in anything at all, that believed that by sheer want I could will something, anything into existence.

When you called yesterday, when I answered, when I held the phone up against my heart to try to hear something new, I heard nothing at all and why doesn't that dissuade me? Why can I not just let this be? Why do I worry it, pulling at the edges of it, unraveling, knitting up again, pulling and pushing and for what? To build something out of nothing? To build nothing out of something? To build and set this thing on wheels, on water, on air to disappear down the highway? Hope is a thing with feathers.

When you called yesterday, when I answered, when I held the phone up against my forehead, I heard you telling me that you worry that you'll die before this could happen, and I had to tell you that, yes, you will, because so will I, for reasons that I cannot explain to you. I know that you think this cannot be. I know that I think that it can but my definitions are not part of your lexicon.

It will never be.

Do you hear me? It will NEVER be.

2009-02-20T13:05:00.002-05:00

Today's doc appt
This morning's follow-up xrays revealed a second broken bone, this one on the inside of my ankle. It explains why I still have more pain than I think I should, as well as explaining the massive bruising on the inside of my ankle.

Functionally, this means at least another four weeks in the boot and on crutches, as well as a prescription for pain pills I can take at night.

Maybe all or nothing is not such a sustainable model, really. turtle pointed out that this might be a very, very good time to start learning to do some things in a more half-assed way.

2009-02-19T11:47:00.000-05:00

Today's soundtrack brought to you by Over the Rhine and the letter L

i radio heaven
i get mixed signals
i move the antenna
i switch the channels
i lie in this bed
my satellite dish
is there room in the universe
for one last wish
(i say)

do you read me
over
you wanna come
over

i guess i never told you
'bout this life i'm livin'
it's heaven versus hell
in a split decision
this secret religion is
the best that i've found
i radio heaven
when no one's around
(i say)
do you need me
over
you wanna come
over

this song is grinning
go on and undress it
it's just the beginning
go on and possess it
you're no longer a child now
don't let them molest it
the wound is deep
i'm just trying to confess it

the truth is i bleed you
when these frequencies cut me
i'm a slut with a mission
a singular vision
i radio heaven
i get mixed signals
i move the antenna
i switch the channels

i radio heaven
i get mixed signals
i move the antenna
i switch the channels
i lie in this bed
my satellite dish
is there room in the universe
for one last wish

2009-02-17T07:35:00.000-05:00

Vienna Teng nails it
The one who survives by making the lives
Of others worthwhile
She's coming apart
Tight before my eyes
The one who depends on the services she renders
To those who come knocking
She's seeing too clearly what she can't be
What understanding defies

She says I need not to need
Or else a love with intuition
Someone who reaches out to my weakness
And won't let go
I need not to need
I've always been the tower
But now I feel like I'm the flower trying to bloom in snow

She turns up the light
Anticipating night falling tenderly around her
Watches the dusk
The words won't come
She carries the act so convincingly
The fact is sometimes she believes it
She can be happy with the way things are
Be happy with the things she's done

And yet I need not to need
Or else a love with intuition
Someone who reaches out to my weakness
And won't let go
I need not to need
I've always been the tower
But now I feel like I'm the flower trying to bloom in snow

Reach out, hold back
Where is safety
Reach out and hold back
Where is the one who can change me
Where is the one
The one

Reach out, hold back
Where is safety
Reach out and hold back
Where is the one who can save me
Where is the one
The one

I need not to need
Or else a love with intuition
Someone who reaches out to my weakness
And won't let go
I need not to need
I've always been the tower
But now I feel like I'm the flower trying to bloom in snow

I feel like I'm the flower trying to bloom in the snow
The danger and the power
Friend and the foe

2009-02-16T12:14:00.000-05:00

What what what
A good friend emailed me this morning to tell me that she'd hoped to call me this week to tell me that she's 12 weeks pregnant, but instead she was writing to tell me that she miscarried. She and I were trying to get pregnant around the same times and had long discussions about cervical fluid and temps and charting and whatnot. When she got pregnant with her now toddling son, I gave her a bin of my maternity clothes, which she promised she'd return to me when I needed them.

That's when it hit me--I should have a baby in my arms right now, or one making me ridiculously uncomfortable while I waited for his or her arrival. If I'd managed to get pregnant on that last try, my due date would have been yesterday.

It's been a year of great loss and grief for me--Missy, Uncle Frank, my dream of birthing a child, my relationship with turtle--and some days I just can't see through to what's next for me. Most days I put one foot in front of the other and I trust that there's a larger plan for me, one to which I'm not privy right now, and that things are working out the way that they are supposed to work out, at least in part because I just can't wrap my brain and heart around continuing to walk this planet if this is it for me.

What if this is it? What if my legacy is some pixels on a screen, some words on a page? What if all that I am is what I've done and how I've loved? What if that's all? And what if it's just not enough?

2009-02-12T18:34:00.002-05:00

And people say the internet doesn't lead to anything "real"
Today while I was picking Mason up at the vet, a tech took me aside and told me that two of the people who I got to know online and have since become friends had called and paid three hundred dollars of Mason's bill.

I'm stunned and humbled and amazed. I sat in the exam room with Mason and cried. I still can't even believe it.

I'd thank them by name, but I'm not sure whether my amazingly generous benefactors want that, so I won't, unless I hear from them that it's okay.

My heartfelt thanks to both of you. I still can't quite believe your generosity. From the bottom of my currently hurting heart, thank you. Thank you so much.

ETA: The money that was called into the vet was from Brooke and Emily of Name That Mama. And I posted this before finding out that another friend I made online has sent me a check which more than covers the balance.

There is more crying happening here, while I'm having a big love-fest with Mason. Thank you to all three of you, so, so much.

2009-02-12T12:03:00.002-05:00

Update from here
Ankle's sore, but I think it's healing? Still looks awful and when I'm not wearing the cast, I definitely know that I'm injured.

Mason's ready to come home today after one o'clock and a four hundred dollar payment. This is the "less expensive" version of the bill. I am so totally fucked, I can't even tell you.

2009-02-11T10:47:00.000-05:00

An open letter to the Universe
Dear Universe,

Fuck. You.

You are going to break me if you keep this shit up. The new grrl probably moving out of state, the broken ankle, the ongoing stress of splitting up a household and now MY BABY MANCAT MASON HAS A URINARY BLOCKAGE that will require sedation, a three-night stay at the vet and hundreds of dollars to solve, which is money I do not have, so I have to ask my parents, again, for money. And if the catheter won't go? Surgery. And if his kidney function is poor? Euthanization.

I don't know what you want from me but please, please tell me and I will do it. I will give it.

frog

2009-02-09T20:29:00.000-05:00

More on the ankle
Hurts like crazy--it's POSSIBLE that hanging out sort of quietly Friday night, going on a fabulous date Saturday, going to church on Sunday, having a lovely mid-day date on Sunday and going to a Village dinner the same day was a bit too much.

Maybe.

2009-02-08T07:34:00.003-05:00

Ankle update!
Thrilling, right?

The doc visit went better than anticipated--no cast, but a removable boot that I can take off to shower AND that allows me to walk. It's a whole new me!

My choir section (go altos!) organized some meals for me, the first of which arrived yesterday afternoon. I'm SO blessed, it's amazing.

I'm feeling so much better I can hardly believe it. I had a lovely evening with Gretchen last night--she's coming over this afternoon and we're going to watch a movie and, later, she's coming to a dinner gathering with me.

There's a lot of smiling, and very little of it can be attributed to Vicodin!

The downsides: Ankle does still hurt and makes getting around more complicated than I'd like. turtle's move is taking a really long time--she's out, but lots of her stuff is still here, in part because she's spent some time helping me with stuff because of my injury. We decided she should take three cats rather than two, so Lorenzo, Sevyn, and SamSaki are in their new digs as of yesterday. It's weird.

2009-02-06T08:34:00.001-05:00

Pain 2, frog nothin'
Gretchen took me out for a lovely dinner last night--I made it all of 20 minutes before I had to go outside because the pain was too much. By the time I got home, I was good and sick. And completely irritated.

Had to cancel my Village plans this evening--there's just no way I can sit long enough right now to do what we were going to do.

G will be here in a little while to take me to the doc--I'll update after that.

2009-02-05T08:41:00.002-05:00

Update from Vicodin Valley
I'm hanging in there--I'm not in top form, for sure, but I'm getting around the house okay and am mostly able to do what I need to do. Thank Maude turtle's been stopping by with groceries and helping by doing my laundry, since I can't really carry things from place to place that won't fit in my shoulder bag.

This evening, I'm venturing out for dinner for the first time since I fell. Gretchen's been coming over every day to hang out and suggested that tonight we go out for dinner, in part just to get me out of the house. And tomorrow night I'm going to a Small Friend O event with the Village.

Tomorrow morning, I see the ortho, who I hope will cast me, tell me I can drive (yeah, fat chance of that) and release me to work on Monday.

Thank you all for your kind comments and support. They mean SO MUCH to me!

2009-02-03T00:51:00.002-05:00

Par for the course, I suppose
turtle's first night out of the house was last night. Tonight, after a lovely impromptu sushi dinner with Gretchen, I wiped out in my driveway. On my stomach, resting my face on the snow so I wouldn't pass out, for 15 minutes. Finally got up and walked into the house.

G texted me to see that I'd made it home okay and I called her to tell her what had happened and she told me to take ibuprofen and ice it and encouraged me to go to the ER, which I did after 30 minutes or so. Drove myself.

The fucking thing is BROKEN. I'm in a splint and on crutches. Can't go back to work until I'm in a permanent cast, which will be late this week or early next.

Thank God, as always, for my Village. I called Mr. Bat to let him know what had happened. He called Banou, who then called me and asked me to call if I needed anything. They wouldn't let me drive home, so she came to pick me up, took me to the 24-hour pharmacy for pain pills, then drove me home and made sure I got into the house safely.

2009-01-30T12:33:00.000-05:00

Input sought
After a friend dies, how long is too long to keep her in my cellphone book? On my facebook page?

2009-01-29T12:14:00.001-05:00

The woman who I may be dating or am at least getting to know in hopes that we'll date further on down the line
She's decided that her screenname is Gretchen, for reasons I don't totally understand, but I'm tickled that she chose one so I can talk a little bit about her when the mood strikes.

And the mood does!

She's lovely. She's funny and smart and quirky and stubborn. She loves the hell out of her pets and they clearly feel the same way about her (major bonus points for this, btw). She has gorgeous, wise deep brown eyes that I could sit and look into indefinitely (but then she asks me what I'm thinking and then I have to tell her that I'm thinking about kissing her and then she blushes and we laugh and...well, yes).

She has some unfinished business with her ex, and she thinks that I have some unfinished business with turtle (which I guess I do, but not in terms of pining or anything, mostly in terms of logistics at this point--turtle's moving out this weekend), so we're taking it slowly. This is not my usual MO, but given how well my usual MO has worked thus far, I'm trying to relax and go with it.

I'm hopeful.

2009-01-29T08:48:00.001-05:00

I'm obsessed with this Imogen Heap song right now
where are we?
what the hell is going on?
the dust has only just begun to form
crop circles in the carpet
sinking feeling

spin me round again
and rub my eyes,
this can't be happening
when busy streets amass with people
would stop to hold their heads heavy

hide and seek
trains and sewing machines
all those years
they were here first

oily marks appear on walls
where pleasure moments hung before the takeover,
the sweeping insensitivity of this still life

hide and seek
trains and sewing machines (oh, you won't catch me around here)
blood and tears (hearts)
they were here first

Mmmm whatcha say,
Mmm that you only meant well?
well of course you did
Mmmm whatcha say,
Mmmm that it's all for the best?
Of course it is
Mmmm whatcha say?
Mmmm that it's just what we need
you decided this
whatcha say?
Mmmm what did she say?

ransom notes keep falling out your mouth
mid-sweet talk, newspaper word cut outs
speak no feeling no I don't believe you
you don't care a bit,
you don't care a bit

(hide and seek)
ransom notes keep falling out your mouth
mid-sweet talk, newspaper word cut outs

(hide and seek)
speak no feeling no I don't believe you
you don't care a bit,
you don't care a (you don't care a) bit

(hide and seek)
oh no, you don't care a bit
oh no, you don't care a bit

(hide and seek)
oh no, you don't care a bit
you don't care a bit
you don't care a bit

2009-01-28T20:14:00.000-05:00

Learning curve
This whole dating thing is wearing me right the hell out. I have no idea what I'm doing.

2009-01-27T07:18:00.000-05:00

Today's pondering
Can I date a woman who doesn't eat fried food? Discuss.

(Kidding, of course. I can and just might be. I'm simply amused.)

2009-01-24T12:39:00.000-05:00

Dating recap
I have a second date today with a lovely woman--our first date was Thursday, I asked her out again for Friday, February 7, and she countered with tonight, which charmed the hell out of me.