Moving

Lately a lot has changed in my life. Things feel different for me here, and I feel less able to be completely honest on this blog because of certain people who know where it is and might be reading, and because there are just something you can't say in a public forum like this. So I've been thinkig about how to deal with that for a while now and there are a few options.

One, I could spell it all out here and just say to hell with the consequences. Two, I can keep this blog going out of a desire to "finish" what I started, and hate the fact that it isn't completely real because I am always having to be "careful" what I say. Or three, I can stop posting here and start a new blog that reflects who I am after this recent period of change. It will be a place that is inherently mine, and because of the certain people who know where this blog is, I will not link to the new blog here.

However, if you have been reading here for any period of time and would like to come visit the new place and look around, please be sure to email me at the address on me profile and ask for a link to the new place.

*Now, I will sadly take one last sentimental look at this place that I have loved for so long, and there will be the sound of skin in my imagination, the scrape of a hand across the last page of a book that means something to its reader ... And finally the quiet swish of pages as another chapter is finished and closed.*

Android, I Love You

Perhaps my heart is fickle. I have recently found that I can be swayed easily. Not so long ago, I swore my affection for iPhone. But then Google came along and whispered softly in my ear ... "There are free apps". "The system is open source." "Create your own apps if you wanna."

And I found myself dissillusioned. I found my heart betraying its love for iPhone and turning to Android. Now, the process is complete. I have packed my bags and said goodbye to iPhone. i have taken up residence with Android.

I got the Samsung Vibrant last week.

The Randomness That Is Me

Today my facebook status has said;

• Today's Word of Advice? "Never PRETEND to be what you don't INTEND to be. And when you get caught PRETENDING, don't be surprised when no one is impressed."

• A Conundrum. Why is it that people will tell you all day long how much they care about you and how important you are or always have been to them ... but when you wanna talk about it to fix the wiring and spackle the cracks, then all they want is to talk meaningless small talk about kids/weather/work? "If you loved me at all, you'd care enough to want to talk about it."

• And A Note To My Children: "When you were born and I first held you, my heart tripped over itself as I fell in love. I took a vow that day to love you in spite of everything, to cherish you as you grow into womanhood, and to teach you values of life, love, and a God who gives you both unconditionally. I promised to put you first in my life and that I would give anything and make any sacrifice for your well-being. Someday you will be all grown up and you will see those sacrifices glaring out of the past as we transform from mother-daughter to friend-friend. And I hope that by then I have done my job as your mother so that you will want me for your friend."

I Wonder

Sometimes I wonder what I'm really doing with my life. I think about my childhood and the big dreams that I had. I remember that little girl so vividly, with reddish-brown hair and blue eyes.

That girl was a dreamer.

She wanted to be a lawyer. She wanted to shout "Objection!" in the courtroom, argue eloquently and intelligently, and then go out and celebrate the big win. She wanted to figure it out the way Matlock always did. And she wanted to take a glass of wine into a candlelit bubble bath the way the girls on Matlock did.  Later, that girl wanted to be a singer. She wanted to sing in front of crowds who loved her songs. She wanted to sign autographs for people who followed her tours to see her perform. She wanted people to be interested in her talents and in what she had to say.  But really, I wonder if it was really the career that I wanted. Was the dream attached to the gavel, the jury and the judge? Or was it more about the respect that comes from winning the argument? I know that there was an attraction to justice and perhaps a desire to feel powerful after having a violent and somewhat abusive childhood.

I know that when the little girl I used to be dreamed of being a star, it had nothing to do with being stalked or chased around by paparrazzi. I had no desire to receive death threats after a song made a former fan lose their sanity. But I did want to be known. I did want to be heard. I wanted people to love me enough to actually seek me out.

I am not a little girl anymore. I don't have the same big lofty dreams.

Or do I?  I still have a fundamental human need to be loved and respected. I still have a desire for someone in my life who will care enough about me to seek me out. I still have dreams.

My daughters. They look to me for guidance and advice. They seek me out first thing each morning for cuddles and love. They desire my company and they occasionally obey my commands. I usually have respect and obedience. I dreamed a lot of big things as a little girl, and all it takes is two little blue eyed girls to remind that it's the little things in life that mean the most.

Maybe in being a frazzled and frustrated mother of two, I have also become the powerful and well-loved star that I have always wanted to be. Maybe I have achieved the dream after all, just maybe not the way I expected.

Blast From The Past - Part II

In my last post I talked about some of the better memories from one of my oldest and most important relationships. I talked about how things were between Jon and I ... And I talked about how he was pretty much my first everything for a long time. My first kiss, my first real date, my first lover, my first proposal ...

My first act of domestic violence.

He worked at a car shop down the road from where we lived, and we stayed up late watching a movie on the living room floor one night. We fell asleep, and I woke up late with barely enough time to wake him and run him out the door so he wouldn't be late to work. I knew he'd be upset with me if I was up and didn't wake him, because then he'd be late to work and get in trouble. So I shook his shoulder ...

"Jon, wake up," I said. "You're gonna be late, Jonny, get up."

He didn't move. For some reason I always seem to get involved with think-headed men who sleep like the dead and yet expect me to be their volunteer alarm system. Then they get mad when I try to wake them as they've asked me to.

"Jon. GET UP." By that point I was annoyed, but keeping it to myself, knowing that when his blue eyes opened and his arms wrapped around me, all would be well again.

But he still wasn't getting up. So I went for his wulnerability. He was ticklish, just a little in the ribs. So I went for the tickle spot, lightly at first. I hoped it would rouse him enough that he'd finally get up. But it didn't.

It did wake him enough, however, for him to say sleepily, "If you don't quit that I'm gonna smack you."

Well, really. How often do people say that to each other? Just kidding around? Lots, in my crew back then, we were the kind of crowd that called each other "b*tch" and "hoe" affectionately. So I didn't think anything of it, and I went after him again, lightly, as before.

But he really did it.

He really slapped me. I remember it as vividly as if I were watching it fro outside myself, or like it's permanently recorded into the digital hard drive of my mind, always ready for instant playback. His long, lanky body was sprawled out on the floor, on his back with one arm under his head and the other laying on his stomach. I was sitting on my knees beside him, on his left side. He slapped my cheek, and it wasn't hard ... it didn't hurt or even sting. But I reeled back in shock, sat down hard next to him.

By the time I really realized what had happened, so had he, and he was apologizing almost before the moment was real. He pulled me into his chest because even though my face had not suffered from the slap, the emotional sting brought me instantly to tears. He knew about my past. He knew about my father who is an angry person (although he has never been unduly violent with me. I am told I was spanked but don't remember.). He knew about my mother's second marriage to a man who had tried to murder her and almost succeeded on several occasions. He knew! How could he do that to me?

Eventually, I made his excuses for him, excuses that he didn't make for himself. To his credit, he never made excuses, never placed the blame on me, and he never raised his hand to me in any way ever again even though our relationship lasted through other hurts. But I excused him.

"I shouldn't have tried so hard to wake him."
"I shouldn't have tickled him to wake him."
"I should have stopped when he told me to."
"I should have just let him be late."
"It's not like I should have been shocked ... he warned me."

Over time, it became almost like he had a right to slap me, almost like I asked for it, because he had said he would do it, but I persisted.

How silly is that? If he could wake up enough to speak to me, or hit me, why couldn't he just wake up and get ready for work? And why do I always pick guys who put me in the "wake-me-up-or-I'll-be-late-and-it'll-be-your-fault" position? Better yet ... why do I allow it?

But as I said in the last post, healing comes from the strangest places. Apparently, I left my own marks on him. We have been back in touch for a while now, and Jon has found a lot of comfort in us being able to talk about the past. He has apologized a lot, and has been happy to be forgiven. We have talked about his cheating, we have talked about a lot of things ... yesterday just before I posted, we talked about the slap.

And suddenly, I feel better. I feel better having confronted him with what he did to me. I feel better having talked about it. I feel better, having stood my ground. And I feel better because as much as it was wrong and awful ... I learned a lot from that experience. I learned to set boundaries. Maybe I didn't learn as well as I should have, because like I said, I still tend to end up begging some bonehead to get up for work and he doesn't do it until I threaten to leave him sleeping and let him get fired.

But I learned a physical boundary that will protect me from what my mother went through. I learned a physical boundary that will not allow any man to ever make me accept that kind of treatment. I learned a physical boundary that has allowed me to physically defend myself on several other occasions against different men who in one way or another just went too far.

So although the memories from my relationship with Jon are not all good, and the feelings are muddled and confused ... the lessons are precious. And because of the cleared airwaves, the friendship he wants is okay with me.

It's funny where wounds can find healing, isn't it?