Double O Nothing

I would make a bad spy.  First, I am not tall enough to wear those slinky dresses they wear when out at casinos or yachts or horseraces.  Sure, I would be dressed up and look great but I would not be tall enough, even in heels, to attract the eye of the bad guy I was sent to seduce/torture/kill.  Second, I would only pay half-attention at bomb diffusing class and I know if faced with diffusing an actual bomb I would just start cutting wires and hope for the best.  Third, I would not be able to drive 80mph in reverse and not hit anything.  It is a wonder I get out of my driveway each day unscathed.  Fourth, I do not like martinis.  However, the one thing that will really keep me from ever being a spy is that I am not great with secrets. Sure, I can keep one for you if you tell me “don’t say anything!” but keeping my own secrets makes me feel wiggly inside.

McMahon. Rebecca McMahon.

When I feel wiggly inside, I tend to turn that discomfort into sarcasm.  This is fun for other people for about ten minutes, tops, or so Bill tells me. I think it is fun the entire time.   I have also been known to turn that discomfort into grouchiness. This is not fun for anyone, ever. Ask the kids.  I grouched my way out the house yesterday morning and then had to apologize when I got home.  Double not fun. 

We have a lot going on lately that makes me feel wiggly inside.  (No, I am not pregnant.)  I can’t write about it because it deals with sensitive topics. This leads to a back-up of words in my brain and this exacerbates the wiggles I have inside.  I hate having wiggles inside.

We are looking at a lot of change going on in our house, and we all know how I feel about change.  What has been nice is that the man who spent four hours each day in the car driving to a caustic workplace is no longer making that drive.  Nice.  He has been home to make breakfast, dinner and see how it truly does take the boy 10-12 minutes to put shoes and socks on in the morning.  See?  Not exaggerating.  It has also given him more time at home in the past week than he has had in the last month.  Bored Bill becomes Project Bill.  (New projects only, no continuation of projects already in play)  We now have a vegetable garden and an enormous mound of dirt in our driveway.  He is excited.  I am cautiously happy as I remember that all we ever end up growing successfully is basil.  He is off to get plants and I am certain that our garden will rival any around us by 5pm today.

Project or Purgatory?  You decide.

Maybe I need a hobby or a project.  Maybe I should take up sewing or knitting or woodworking. HAHAHAHAHA! Ha. Whew, let’s stop and catch our breath and wipe our eyes here, because yes, that is hysterical to think of me cutting patterns, or clacking needles together or God help everyone, using power tools to make things out of wood.  Really, that all just sounds like more work to me anyway.  I could read but I find I am impatient with books lately.  I could start a new Netflix series; kids at school gave me a list of shows to start watching.  However, I am not sure how ready I am to be seriously offended or more than likely, have to act I am offended when they ask me about them.  Decisions, decisions.

I guess more than anything I should sit down and talk about and listen to the changes that are going on.  Saying “Let’s talk tomorrow” or making fake gagging noises really hasn’t gone well.  I could be adult and face the changes coming at me head on and then be ready when they happen.  I could save my sarcasm for well-placed and timed comebacks instead of using it as a full-frontal assault.  I could remember that I am so damn blessed and stop relying on grouchiness as a shield.  I could acknowledge the wiggles and deal with them effectively.  Ugh.  None of that sounds like any fun, that bomb diffusing is looking better and better.

A Room With a Door

We have finally given SG something every twelve year old girl desires.  Something that when cracked beckons us in and something when shut tight says "stay out".  Yes, we have given her a door to her room.   It doesn't matter anymore that she has lived the past two years with only three full walls and an operable door only half the time.  That is forgotten now with this white rectangle of power.  If she tires of her brother, she can escape to her room AND close the door!  Before she would try to escape him and he would just stick his head through either the hole meant for a door or through the studs that were never drywalled to get her attention.  This door represents her way of saying "I HATE YOU LEAVE ME ALONE!" when slammed with the wrath of teenage angst.  All this we have given her with just one door.  We are excellent parents; this door cements our superiority in the parent ranking.

Power.  Absolute power.

Why just now is she getting a door?  Well, in another excellent parenting move, we have moved the 16 year old to a bedroom on the first floor.  What was once a cozy respite for guests is now a first floor escape hatch for any teen looking to sneak out.  Or in.  The teen being on the first floor liberated SG from the three-walled-no-doored-toyroom/now-it's-a-bedroom bedroom.  We have painted it an eye-popping alien green at her choosing but it is that simple white door that gets attention.  Click, open.  Click, close.  Open, shut, open, shut.  She loves this door more than the room itself.  It is like the toddler who plays with packaging surrounding the toy rather than the toy.  

In our defense, although I know it is not needed, SG has been a terrible sleeper from day one.  It may or may not be my fault for waking her once to feed her when she was two weeks old.  Once.  I had to.  I really had to.  Or it could be that Bill traveled a lot when she was tiny and I was tired and I never Ferberized her or made her cry it out in her crib.  Mama was too tired and postpartum for that.  Once she could get out of her bed on her own, she did and made a beeline for ours and when she grew too big to share the bed, I would find her on the floor next to our bed.  So really, I figured she would be sleeping on our floor until she went to college and didn't see a lot of point in making sure she had a comfy bedroom.  I once spent $40 on a set of horse sheets because her three year old self promised me she would sleep every night in her own bed if she had horse sheets.  Liar, liar pants on fire SG.

Bill loves to start a project and when SG declared herself too old to share a room with the boy, he jumped up with hammer and wall studs in hand.  He quickly threw up a wall across the open toy room and we declared it her new bedroom.  He and I carried dry wall upstairs to wall if off and really, that is where the trouble came in.  I like to think I am strong until I try to move things with my husband.  Have you ever moved drywall?  It is really, really heavy!  And cumbersome!  And you cannot bend it or it breaks.  Plus, Bill likes to say things like "If I chromed it could you lift it?" or "I bet you could get it over your head if it had a kettlebell handle".  Ha ha Bill McMahon.  He gets frustrated with me and ends up carrying things on his head like a woman carrying water from a well.  This does not bode well for the herniated disks in his back.  So, those two pieces of drywall went up and that is how it stayed until he ripped the wall down last weekend.  Actually, he chain sawed through the wall while SG was on her bed listening to music.  Yes, her bed was against the same wall, but she is fine.  We had a good laugh together as excellent parents do with their offspring.  We were showing that humor and power tools really do mix.

Oh, don't poor SG me.  She was fine.  We didn't make her share a room with her sister.  That would have been horrific for all.  The teen would have ripped SG's heart out the first night in and held it aloft while yelling "MY ROOM! IT'S MY ROOM!". Or perhaps just wounded her tender heart with mean words and eye rolls.  You know how it is with sisters; you never really like them until you don't live with them anymore.  So, see?  We were protecting her.  Harboring her.  Shielding her tender heart and gentle spirit. 

 When she had friends sleep over in the pretend room, I could hear the laughter and conversation as it floated out and down the stairs.  Now I am going to have to actually walk up the stairs and press my ear against the door if I want to hear anything.  This is called active parenting and again, this door really does prove our great level of parenting. This door is like a fairy tale come true for all the McMahons.  Bill and I have tangible proof of our excellent parenting and SG has regained power...so now they will all live (mostly) happily ever after.

By Any Other Name

I have a foul mouth.  I have an offensive, vulgar, foul mouth. I drop swear words into conversation the way good bakers drop chocolate chips into cookies: liberally.

I come from a long line of swearing women.  This is not my defense; I am simply providing the backstory.  You know in “A Christmas Story” when Ralphie describes his father dabbling in cussing the way other artists dabble in paints?  That is my family.  My sister has been known to put a stream of words together that no living person has every thought of uttering.  While this can be shocking and intense, it also makes me giggle.  So I guess I am childish as well.

God, in His irony, has given me a beautiful daughter who, since starting middle school, grows fouler mouthed by the day.  “Pretty girl, ugly mouth” I hypocritically tell her.  Or “boys are not impressed with bad language” – which is a lie because I know they think it is cool at age 12.  Or “common language makes you sound common.”  She raises a well-arched eyebrow at me with a knowing look that says “Really, kettle?”

There have been two times in my life where I have listened to people who have commented on my salty tone and tried to tone it down.  The first was in high school when my BFF’s mom said she’d never heard someone so young with such a poor vocabulary.  I liked her and valued her opinion of me so I tried to clean up my act in front of her.  The second time was when Bill and I were dating and he commented on how much I swore.  It surprised me because I didn’t even realize it.  I have made a marked effort to clean it up because it really does offend his polite Canadian sensibilities.  Although, I will tell you, having some inside knowledge, they may be polite with their words, but look into an angry Canadian’s eyes.  You can hear what they are really thinking.  It goes something like this: “bloody beeping animal beep stupid beeped hockey beep beep jerk-faced beeping beepers of beep GOD SAVE THE QUEEN you beeping beep beep beeper!”  I swear this is true.

It was only a matter of time before I slipped at work and I have.  My use of a lesser grade swear word offended the ears of a student.  I thought it and I used it to describe a behavior and it was coming out of my mouth as my brain was screaming “Nooooooooo!”  There will be ramifications which I deserve because it was unprofessional.  This incident, while providing me great anxiety, has also shown me just how immune I am to vulgarity and in listening to conversations around me, I know that I am not alone.  Is there a way to re-sensitize one’s self to the shock value of a well-placed or timed cuss?  Or a way to think it but not say it?

I am no longer a practicing Catholic, but I still carry some of that good Catholic guilt around.  It is now Lent and people around me are giving up wine (!) or chocolate or things that make them happy and it makes me feel guilty like I should give joyful things up too.  Because it is a season of denial and atonement, perhaps I should give up swearing for Lent.  Forty days and nights of curse-free, Canadian-approved vocabulary.  Can it be done?  I have no idea.  If it can’t be done, can I least curb it?  I am most interested to see if not saying it aloud makes me stop thinking it in my brain. 

Tonight will be a hard as there will be beer with coworkers after work.  Some people like beer and pretzels, some like beer and a bummed cigarette.  I like a nice amber ale and cuss words.  I really do.  It will be a real test because I am craving an f-bomb in the same way an ex-smoker looks for their morning cigarette.  

Denial: A Useful Tool

Ahh, denial.  It can be such a useful tool.  It prevents us from accepting reality, from fully engaging in the present or dealing with things looming over us.  For example, everyone is so excited because it is March and March means spring.  In reality, March means a good three more weeks of winter before it is officially spring, but we use denial about the winter portion and focus instead on the spring portion.  

Shh.  I can't hear you.

Prom season is looming at school and the use of denial is in full force.  He likes me but I don't like him but we can still have a good time at prom.  Ha!  Or, I like him but he won't ever like me so I will pretend I don't like him and then I won't get hurt.  Good luck with that one.  That has a night of weeping and writing bad poetry written all over it.  One of the fun parts of my job is that I regale my favorites with bad stories from my past.  They are funny to me now and they make them laugh and feel better about their current boy/dating/prom issues.  For example, don't ever go to prom with someone who breaks up with you two weeks before just because you bought a dress.  At the time, I thought he would see me all dressed up and beautiful and forget all about the breaking up part.  In reality, he spent the entire night flirting with the girl who was to be his next girlfriend while I pretended not to notice.  Denial keeping me frozen at the table with a sickened smile on my face.  

I used denial between high school and college to deal with gaining a lot of weight.  I wasn't packing the pounds on, my jeans were just tight from the dryer.  I used denial daily when with my ex by thinking marriage was like this, that you were supposed to hate your spouse with intensity of a thousand suns.  We thought from the start we should have kids right away.  Right, because nothing makes a bad marriage better than throwing some kids in the mix.  Luckily that did not happen, but denial definitely reigned supreme as a coping mechanism for me through those years.

As a parent, do you ever find that you use denial when dealing with your kids and the things they throw at us?  When W's eyes were crossed and his vision terrible and his development delayed , we always thought he would catch up, he would be "normal", he would get to where everyone else was.  It took some very precise and definitive words from his eye doctor for us to see she could make his eyes look pretty, but he was always going to be limited by them.  At the time, her words were like bullets, but I am so grateful to her for using them to pierce through our shields of denial.  I find sometimes that I am unable to effectively parent on something that has taken me by surprise and I use denial as a delay in dealing with it.  Sometimes it is effective because it gives me time to think about what I want to address, what the problem really is and what we can do to fix it.  Sometimes it is not effective because I forget all about it.

Right now I using denial is full force because my neighbor is moving.  Even though I have known for months she is going to move, I placed that thought on a shelf in my head and haven't taken it down.  We would talk about it, I would encourage her and then I would quickly not think about it again.  However, now that the FOR SALE sign is up on her lawn, it is very real.  She will be gone at the end of the month and I am just so sad.  Marijohn is one of the most wonderful people I know.  We have had countless cups of coffee and a few glasses of wine together and she always listens, she always hears me and she provides me a sense of comfort I will miss tremendously.  She checks in with me when Bill is gone for a long time and makes sure I am sane.  She watches out for my kids.  She has run to the store for me, she has picked up kids for me, she has helped me time and time again.  She is a beautiful, smart woman and we tease her that when she moves she should take up with a man half her age.  She says no more men, but we'll see.  Marijohn is a good sport; she joined our book club and sat through our yammerings on schools and kids until her eyes glazed over, but she kept coming and she kept teaching us something about life each time she did.  My favorite lesson was that woman over a certain age still say the "f" word.  

I think that you are very lucky in life when you can meet someone and make friends with someone who is not your age, who is not living the life you are living right now.  At first,  you find commonalities in other things, like books or being neighbors and as you slowly learn more about this person, a true friendship develops.  You might not be at the same stage of life, but there are similarities at each stage that you can appreciate and bond over.  

So Marijohn, because you are so amazing, because you have touched our lives in small and big ways, I will not use denial about your moving.  I will not hide in the house or pretend it is not happening.  I will help you pack. I will also help drink your wine because you do not want to pack that.  Most importantly though, I will also tell you straight up, thank you.  Thank you for being my friend.  Thank you for loving my kids.  Thank you for letting Bill help you with things you would rather do yourself.  Thank you for making me laugh and holding my hand when I had to cry.  Thank you for loving books the way I do.  Thank you modeling independence, strength and confidence in such a beautiful way.  I have always said that when I hit a certain age, I am giving up and going round.  However, I think that now when I hit that certain age, I will just think about you and try to be more like you instead.  (Bill thanks you for that.)  I do plan on being rude to whoever moves into your house simply because they are not you.  That is not denial, that is displacement, and I think it shows real growth.