Productive Member of Society or Soccer Mom?

I am seriously wondering what my purpose on this earth is. I think if there was ever a need for a neurotic procrastinating complainer then that would be it. Since no one needs one of those, then what is left for me? They always say, go with your strengths. What if your strengths just annoy people? I have many positive qualities, I'm sure, but without the means to access them in a way as to be a productive member of society, what hope do I have? I am perfectly capable of making lots of cool things. I can cook and paint and fix pretty much anything. I can have fun and laugh and be silly with my kids. I can write and draw and garden. I have so much knowledge up in my brain it is sickening. So, why do I feel like I am not contributing to society? Would it be because I am not using any of that so called "knowledge" to better myself and my situation? How do I go from potential to promise? How can I take my strengths and turn them into productive chunks of actual life changing time? I don't know. I keep saying if I had less negativity around me, I'd be able to do it. I don't know if that is true. I'm sure it would help, but that in and of itself will not be enough. I need to be able to make progress in the situation that I am in. I need to go forward and show myself and anyone else who cares, that I can be productive and self sufficient. Maybe those words "you aren't contributing" bothered me so much because I half believed them myself. What if I am completely dependant on others to survive? What if I went to try to make a go of it and I failed? I have been having so much bad luck lately it's beginning to worry me. I know I have the raw materials, but do I have what it takes to build something with them? My life is like my house, too much crap and not enough organization. I need to focus on what I really want to do and make that my passion. I need to get rid of all of the other crap that is cluttering up my life and then I will be able to focus on a path that will make sense. But, what to throw and what to keep? Another one of my problems. I am a major pack rat even though I realize that if I would just start tossing the effect would be immediate. I would feel like a weight had been lifted and I would be able to breathe again. For some reason it is a very daunting task for me. I will have to just work on it one box at a time and one bad habit at a time and one bad influence at a time until I am rid of all of my baggage. This is going to take a while. Oh well, it's a good thing I am so dependent and don't have to worry about having to support myself anytime soon...at least that's what I've been told!



It was sooooo cold for Max's game last night. I, of course, didn't believe that it was going to be that bad. I did, however, bring a jacket and umbrella, just in case. The field they were playing on looked deceivingly like grass but it was, in fact, a swamp. Every step you took you could hear the water squishing under your shoes. Before the game even started the boys were covered in mud and freezing cold. Every time one of them fell it sounded like a belly flop smacking on the surface of a pool. They would go to kick the crap out of the ball and it would go about a foot and then stick in the mud. They were flying past the balls thinking that the balls were going to go further. It was a fun, but painful, game to watch. I was freezing on the sidelines, I can't even imagine being soaking wet and then having to run through the puddles while everyone on the sidelines keeps shouting at you, "It's just a little water. You'll be fine!" on top of it. Eddie, of course, begged to come along because at Max's games the park is right there so she can play the entire time. She was doing just fine until she came over to talk to us once and the chair she was sitting in tipped forward. She put her hand on the ground to help herself up which, in turn, got her sweatshirt sleeve all wet. She started crying because she doesn't like to be wet and proceeded to take off her sweatshirt. Everyone told her she should put it back on because it was too cold, but you know Ed, she left it there and went off to play. That was about halfway through the game. I don't know if she was just a glutton for punishment or if, for her, being wet is really that much worse than being cold, but she never came back to get warm and she never complained about being cold. This from a girl who cries at the thought of a strong wind blowing on her because she will "freeze". Kids are so interesting. Maybe they think the same about us and that's why they keep doing the things they know will bother us. Maybe we are all each others big science experiment. And, like scientists, we will just keep trying to get reactions until we understand the process. Sadly, we are experimenting on each other, so the variables keep changing and we will never be able to figure out what makes each other tick. At least it keeps it interesting until we finally give up and just let each other live our own lives... eventually! After the game we went to Los to warm up. That was fun until Eddie decided that the entire restaurant needed to hear her rendition of "Sun, Sun, Mister Golden Sun, Please Shine Down On Me". It was time to go. Eddie may think she has the best singing voice on the planet but those people were there for dinner, not dinner and a show, which she failed to understand. After a small scuffle at the mint dispenser, we headed home to warm up and dry off. Another soccer game in the books. Only another thirty-some to go! Yay!

Inanimate Object Versus Animate Object

I don't know if I should be left in charge of children. I don't think someone with my intelligence level is capable of taking care of living, breathing things. Get this, guess what I lost today? My nose ring. How the F do you lose a nose ring?!? Actually it is pretty easy. Any time you wipe your nose your ring is in danger. It is in a very precocious spot during nose blowing or wiping. I have, on more than one occasion, found said ring teetering on a tissue ready to be thrown away forever. That ring and I have been on a bumpy ride together. I am very surprised it lasted this long. I got my nose pierced in 2002 for Mother's Day. I had always wanted one and I figured at age thirty-one I could do whatever I damn well pleased! I never regretted it, even now when every little sixteen year old who walks by has one. I like the way it looks. And this way, when my kids are rebelling, they won't get a nose ring because it is too uncool - their mom has one! Pretty smart, eh? Yeah, I know, my kids will be one of the few people on earth who won't do the opposite of what their parents did and they will all come home with piercings of one kind or another just so I can be proven wrong. Anyway, my nose ring and I were getting along just fine until I went to my friend Jon's funeral in 2003. I was mourning at his casket saying my final good-byes when I blew my nose into a tissue. Pretty normal stuff for a funeral, right? Suddenly I realized the ring was gone. I looked at Jon and could almost see him smirking at me. I swore if my ring were in his casket I would die of embarrassment. If Jon had the ability, he would have been laughing his ass off. I tried to be as inconspicuous as possible as I looked around for it. After what felt like an eternity, I finally found it lying on the floor under the casket. I reached down and grabbed it. I have no idea what people thought I was doing, but no one ever asked me, so hopefully they didn't notice me scrounging around under there or they were just too polite to say anything. Then, a couple of years later, I was just sitting around the house and I absentmindedly blew my nose and went about whatever I was doing at the time. Awhile later I realized it was gone and I started freaking out - like my mom when she loses her contact lens. I was like "Okay, I'm not moving, look around me on the floor. It's gotta be around here somewhere". And it was... in my bra. It must have fallen in and just sat there until I found it - kinda like my mom's contact lens! The third time was more recently, a few months ago I was at a bar and all of a sudden I was like, "shit"! I think I sat there for about thirty minutes, saying to myself, "If I don't' move too far, I will find it". And I did!!! It was just sitting there on the floor waiting to be found. I took it home and sanitized the shit out of it. It was good as new - smile and nod. But this time I'm afraid I won't be seeing my old friend again. I did what I swore I would never do, I blew my nose and never even thought about my nose ring. I was on my walk this afternoon when I noticed it was gone. At least a half an hour and a few trips through the house to get various things I needed for my walk had gone by. I don't think I am lucky enough to find it in my bra this time. Oh well, it was a good ring. I will miss her and all of the good times we spent together. Point being, if I can't take care of all of the inanimate objects in my life like rings and car keys and my tiny little hair clips that I keep losing, what hope is there for my kids? Is it just a matter of time before I misplace one of them too? I have always had that fear. I've had dreams where I'd leave the house with the baby belted into her car seat but she was on top of the car. Or I would be shopping and I would come home with the car filled with tons of packages and bags but when the it was unloaded, one of the kids was missing. To this day I have to count my kids about a thousand times a day and if I don't get to five I panic, if only for a second, until I figure out where the hell they all are. Maybe all of the time I spend worrying about losing my kids uses up all of my inanimate object keeping track of ability. I guess the children would be the better choice of what to put my obviously limited mental capacity towards. This story wouldn't be nearly as amusing if I were talking about how Eddie had fallen out of my nose and we would miss her because I had thrown her out with the trash...or maybe it would!

It's 45 Degrees...Let's Go To Bay Beach!!!

We went to Bay Beach today. Eddie had a birthday party there. Lex had a birthday party at a friends house. I thought the invitations both said 11am so I asked Chip to bring Lex and I would take Eddie. The boys had a friend sleep over last night. I threw all of them in the car and went to Bay Beach thinking it would be a nice distraction for the boys and I could still be there in case I needed to watch Eddie. I wasn't sure how many kids would be there and if I needed to stay or not. We arrived at 11am and went to the playground to look for the party. I couldn't find any one I knew, so I looked at the invitation again. It said the party started at 1pm. So, now we are sitting at Bay Beach in the freezing cold with a little girl in a party dress and no sweater because her mother never takes the time to listen to the weather. I figured it was pointless to go home and wait until 1 for the party. I went the the gift shop and bought a little pink sweatshirt, for Eddie, not me, although I was tempted! The boys, by the way, were all in t-shirts and shorts, but they wouldn't admit they were cold, which was fine with me 'cause the sweatshirts were nineteen dollars a pop. I told the boys to go nuts on the rides. I, of course had fancy shoes on and after about ten minutes of sitting I couldn't feel my toes anymore. Eventually it was late enough to see if the party was going to be going on, so I went over to the park. They were there and I explained what had happened and she offered to take Eddie home for me so I could go get Lex from his party and thaw out my toes! Chip and the boys wanted to stay for awhile. I can't imagine why. They ended up getting Lex for me, which was nice. I went to my parents house to drop some stuff off. I don't think I have been able to go there without any kids in months. We talked for awhile. I fixed their TV. Someone keeps deleting all of their local channels and it freaks them out. Every time I said I was going to go, my mom said, "Oh no, your not leaving yet"! I think she knows I need a break. I should take full advantage of time without the kids when I have the chance, but you know me, I'm obviously a martyr and can't just relax. I had to see if the kids were okay even though I know full well that if they weren't my cell phone would be ringing non stop. I swear people are never happy. I keep saying I need some time alone and when I get it, I'm in such a hurry to get back to the chaos that is my life. Maybe I am destined to be miserable. Maybe this is as good as it is ever going to get and I just need to accept that fact and move on. I think the weather is talking for me. The next sunny day I will be so positive everyone will just want to smack me. Until then I think I will have to contemplate my lot in life and see if I truly am the root cause of my own unhappiness. Who knows? Everyone has faults, maybe mine are so faulty they are interfering with my perspective. I have been told more than once lately that I am being defensive and unreasonable. I will have to investigate this further and report back. In the meantime, I'm going to enjoy the few minutes of kid free time I have left. Never mind, time's up!

Fun? At a Soccer Game?!?

Okie dokie, life sucks the big one, but since I am not allowed to voice my true feelings, I am going to just swallow all of my anger and keep it buried deep inside until I literally explode in a few years. If I cared enough, then that would be my fate, but I choose when I am going to be made to feel bad about myself, not anyone else. It does not matter what anyone says to me, I don't have to let it get to me. In order for their words to hurt, I have to respect their opinions. If you are a follower why would I want to follow you? Leaders are to be followed not cowardly echoers who couldn't have an original thought to save their lives. Wow, I bet that would be pretty close to my true feelings. I guess I'll just sit here and wait for the lightening to strike me down. Oh, and by the way, I was informed that I am not contributing. Until I can show a paycheck I am not to spend time doing anything except what is needed for the family. Yeah, right...I'll take that under advisement.

I had a blast at Lex's soccer game today! I didn't really watch the game. I'm not even sure how Lex even did, other than he was goalie for the other teams lone goal. That's my boy! Knowing Lex, he probably thought that score was the best part of the game. He is really not very competitive. I shaved his head this afternoon and I can't tell him apart from the rest of the team. I swear at least half of them have blond hair and they are all wearing yellow and they keep running around. I got confused. It was a beautiful day. Eddie was actually very cordial to Aunt Jackie and Uncle Dave. She was talking up a storm which has not been her M.O. lately... obviously. I have a feeling it was because they had their dog Augie along. She loves dogs. The rest of the time she was occupied playing with two other little girls. Yay! She is adorable but she never stops talking. It was nice to get a tiny respite. I was able to have some adult conversation. One of the other fathers and I talked for most of the game. It's funny how little things can make me happy. People say, "Look, there's Andie, she'll be your friend forever if you just talk to her for a few minutes! She's so tired of playing house and commenting on doll hairstyles and coloring 'just a few more' pretty pictures". Pretty sad, eh? Oh well, I'll take what I can get and run with it. At least I'm not the crazy lady across the field bitching about the refs and screaming at her kid to hustle. I may not have watched a whole lot of the game, but I was there and that's what counts, right? Oh, just smile and nod, we don't want to set off my mom guilt again, do we?

Will Work for Food...Curious???

Curiosity killed the cat. Is that a fair statement? Curiosity in and of itself is a good thing. We cannot learn anything without it. It's what we do with our curiosity that matters. So, say the cat wanted to know why the other cats didn't like her. Sitting around wondering wasn't getting her anywhere. So, out of curiosity, she leaves the safety of her home and tries to find other cats to play with. She discovers that there are other cats out there that really like her and she has lots of fun with these other cats. She was positively affected by her curiosity. I don't know about you, but I think curiosity is the cat's salvation. So eventually the cat dies from a curiosity related incident but the cat had nine lives worth of fun before the dreaded curiosity finally got her.

Eddie and I were leaving Sam's (I know - shocking!!) today and as we drove past the corner there was a man standing with a sign on him that said 'will work for food'. I said to Eddie "Look, that man will work for food, maybe you should have given him your pizza instead of taking two bites and then refusing to eat anymore". "Why would he want my pizza"? she said. "Some people don't have enough money for food and they need to ask other people for help" I replied. She continued, "I'd give someone my pizza but it would have to be a girl". I smiled and said, "There are lots of girls who need food too". She asked, "Well ,why can't they just go to the bank and get money"? I explained to her that banks don't give people money, they hold people's money until they need it. You still have to work in order to make the money you would put in the bank. Some people have lost their jobs and can't make enough money to support their families. So, she says, "That guy on the corner, did he make up his own job"? "Well, if you can call standing on the street corner holding a sign that says 'will work for food' a job, then yes, I guess he did" I retorted. Quick as a whip she says, "Well, then he is his own boss and he should give himself a raise".

The Joys of Motherhood

Soccer season. I love it. I hate it. It is fun to watch, but getting all of the kids to the correct fields at the right times is a bit of a challenge. I'm at Eddie's game. After her first practice I wasn't sure how this was going to go. I was really worried after the melt down at the Time Sucking Black Hole that is Walmart about a half an hour ago. Her brother and she were both trying to load up a giant box of Gatorade into my cart and Lex knocked her down and then proceeded to step on her with his cleats. He didn't see anything wrong with his tactics. He was victorious in the now infamous battle of the Stronger Gatorade Lifter of 2009. We, of course had just finished checking out and Eddie parked herself and her fluffy pink dress right in the middle of the checkout aisle and refused to move. She was screaming her most convincing scream and kept looking at me to see if I was going to help her. I moved my cart out of the way, told Lex that he needed to chill out and bent down to pick her up as gracefully as I could manage with her in that gigantic pink dress which wasn't very graceful - believe it or not. The man behind us in line was not very impressed either. I was hoping I could finally be one of those mothers who could take her kids to the store and hold her head high while her children stood next to her well behaved and polite. They aren't going to be sending my membership card any time soon. Not with children as melodramatic as Eddie and Lex. They are their own Broadway show. I swear they could probably sell out the Met for one of their little performances. I heaved the ever-growing five year old into the over sized cart that she had insisted on riding in. I think she thought it looked like a carriage or something. All I cared about at the time was the fact that she wouldn't be running free through the store because that is never a good idea. We had a whole thirty minutes to get in and out of the store which, as I've said before, is just not possible at a place like Walmart. It took us fifty. I eventually got Lex to his game. He was ten minutes late for warm ups, but had plenty of time before his game actually started. I left him there after telling him I would try to be back in time for part of his game, but if I wasn't I'd be there soon. He ran off to join his team. Eddie and I went over to her park for her game. We pulled into the parking lot and she started complaining that she couldn't get her socks on. Then she said she had to go potty. I told her there was a porta potty. She saw her best friend out the window and said she wanted to go play with Rachel. I said, "I thought you had to go potty"? She said she wanted to go to the playground first. I said she had to go to the field because everyone else was there. She left the car and went straight to the park. No one else was there by then so she came over to the field. I asked her again if she had to go potty. She said she'd wait. When the game started, she went right in. She was on offense and having a great time. Close to the end of the first half, she scored a goal. She was very excited. The third quarter the coach sat her out and when the fourth quarter began the coach called her and when she started to go on the field all of the people on the sidelines started calling out her name. She got about half way started crying and ran back to me. She said she was scared because everyone was yelling at her. I tried to explain they weren't yelling at her, they were cheering her on, but she wasn't going for it. I tried to persuade her the entire quarter to go back out, but no such luck. I told her that if she wasn't going to play we were going to have to leave and she picked up her stuff and just started walking away. The game ended and her coach ran after her to tell her what a good job she did and when she saw him she started running to the car. The coach came back and said "You have quite a little soccer player there". I said, "Yeah if you can keep her on the field, that is"! I went to the car and she was ready to go. She said she didn't believe me that those people thought she was doing a good job. She said they were all yelling at her. Crap. I don't know why she finds this all so amusing. It's like she suddenly has an audience and she is going to perform every chance she gets. This is going to be a long season. Hopefully she will figure out that she is not the center of the universe before she sends her mother into the "My Child Has Embarrassed Me So Thoroughly I Can't Show My Face in This City Anymore" relocation program. If anyone can do it, I'm betting she can. Well, hopefully Eddie doesn't show up at the next game with her new guardian 'Olga' who is in no way shape or form any relation to her mom. Any similarities would be purely coincidental. Eventually she will have the confidence to play an entire game and when she does I will be very happy for her and relieved for me. It's funny how when it is your child acting up it seems so much worse than it should. I mean every one's kids have their moments. But when it's yours you feel like everyone is judging you and watching every decision you make. In reality they are probably much too busy dealing with their own children, or something else, to even notice. And even if they do, they are probably sympathizing with you and not judging. I choose to ignore most, if not all, of the looks and remarks. If I didn't I would probably be lying in the fetal position on the floor of my closet sucking my thumb babbling about pink rabbits. I have obviously given this some thought! At least she keeps me from worrying about less important things like needing to pick up her brother. After her display, I was so distraught, I started going home without Lex. Eventually I remembered him and even got to the field before he could possibly have known that I forgot. He doesn't need to know about that little detail, right? He has enough ammunition on me already. An hour after we got home Eddie started complaining that she had to go potty. She was upset that I didn't tell her to go when we got home. Oh, the joys of motherhood!

Keeper Pile

I'm in the car on my way back to Wautoma. My sisters and I are going to lunch with our aunts and mom. I don't know why we don't do this more often. Life is too short to not spend time with your family. I know we all have lots of things going on in our lives, but we always will. Whatever is important at any given time will consume us if we let it. Time has to be made for family. When I was little we were always visiting one relative or another. I didn't know any different. At the time it was fun and I cherish all of the weekends I spent with my grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins. I remember my mom never wanting to go because we were always running around to one person's house or another. She didn't work and pretty much just had to show up for social functions and family functions. The social ones she lived for, the family ones, not so much. I don't know how my parents did all the stuff they did while I was growing up because they are not any more organized than I am. I think they just went with the flow and did things because that is what was expected of you. My husband's family avoids each other at all costs. It is really easy to fall into the rut of not going anywhere when you have been told for fifteen years that spending time with family is too much of a hassle and your children are too much trouble when taken outside of the house. I don't know why I even care what anyone else thinks because I am the one who is responsible for all of it. If I want my kids to have any memory of their family outside of the walls of our house then I just need to do what I know is best and show up for every family function whether I want to or not and let the memories make themselves. I am sure that all of my fond memories as a child were not necessarily good memories at the time. Time seems to mend memories. That trip where all your family did was bicker the entire time becomes one of your favorite vacation memories because of one small thing that happened and made everything up to that point seem insignificant. Those are the times when you know you are a family and you are stuck with each other whether you like it or not - so you better just make the most of it! I'm going to cut myself some slack because, to be fair, my childhood memories are from a time in my parents lives when their kids were all older than mine are now. I am going to strive to make sure that, now that I don't have little tiny kids, we are going to take every opportunity we can to make memories. Hopefully by the time my kids are parents even the "so-so" memories will have made it into the "keeper" pile.

Lunch was wonderful. We had great food and even better conversation. I forgot how fun my family can be. They rarely get upset with each other and are genuinely interested in each others well being. I know that sounds like a too obvious statement, but I know families where they are only interested in trying to upset each other's well being by ridiculing and belittling every little thing that is said by anyone. I have no patience for people who feel the need to put others down just so they can feel superior. Anyway, like I was saying, my family isn't like that. After lunch we went flower shopping. That was a blast. We found all kinds of stuff we "needed". They had to pack us into the car along with our flowers! Then we went back to my aunts house to say our good-byes. It's funny, all the times I go to my side of the families functions I rarely hear the same story twice. I don't know if they remember all the stories they have told and are careful not to repeat themselves, or maybe they just have so much more going on in their lives that they don't feel the need to rehash the same old stories over and over again. Anyway, I heard new stories and we had lots of time to make new memories. We were all talking about how we will have to get together again soon - maybe in Florida. I hope that will happen. I'd like to think that positive thoughts will get us a few more great times together. We'll just have to wait and see. Meanwhile, I'm glad I can add one more wonderful memory to my "keeper" pile!