Golf Dreams

Today, a very sad thing happened. We got a letter from the IRS saying there was a problem with our Illinois tax return. We have been waiting for our jackpot refund to drop in our checking account for months. This letter said there had been an error on our filed papers and that rather than scoring a goldmine, we would be owing Illinois $23.09. This is not good news. The result of this revelation will be a golfless summer for Mark and Lily Clinton. We had planned to buy a golf season pass with the refund money. Oh this is a very dark day. My clubs will sit in the hall closet next to my guitar and vacuum, feeling very neglected...

Woe is me.

Zoo Days

As per your request (Candace), here is a quick video of the child who's cuter than everyone else's.

Nasty

Once when I was younger, our neighbor beckoned me to the fence to talk to me. This was the first and last conversation I have ever had with her in the 23 years we have been in that house. She was giving me a plant for my grandma. While we were talking, my giant dog came up and peed on my leg like I was a tree or a fire hydrant. I acted like nothing was going on (this was hard to do). When we were done I ran inside and washed my leg for about 10 minutes. I was wearing green flip-flops so the pee had run down my legs and between my toes.

Nasty.

Will No-Power

I might have a lack of will power. I have been trying to diet for 10 years. So far, I have gained rather than lost weight. I have quit drinking pop at least about 15 times (I have a diet Coke on my desk right now). I have quit swearing too many times to count, dammit. Only recently have I dared to quit drinking (at home), but only to lose weight, not for any real moral reasons (I suck). So far, I have met that challenge with success - just because we ran out of money to replenish my stock. I make goals to exercise every day, but that only holds on for that day. Then I foolishly believe that I can get fit by doing push-ups and sit-ups but no cardio and with no change to my diet. But, I only do push-ups and sit-ups for 2 days straight.

Dang! I want to like to run, but every time I try, all I can think about is how much I want to stop. Maybe I need to hire someone like Mariah Carey has who will follow me around and tell me not to eat crap all day and physically make my legs move to exercise. I will have to start saving my money to hire such a person. If he needs to move in with me, then he will have to sleep on my couch or in Eli's room. I hope that doesn't cost me extra.

Also on my list of things to do - become a nicer person. This might be easier if I didn't bait myself all the time with trashy TV shows. Take the Bachelor for instance. I watch this show and all I do is laugh and make fun of the women on it. This is not nice. I should stop watching the show, so I am not tempted to be catty. Mark is a lot nicer than me. He tries to keep me in line but I think after 7 or 8 years of hearing it, he's given up. Also, when he tells me to be nice to him, I just make fun of him...

On a totally unrelated note, I once lost my jean jacket at Cub Foods when I took it off to take a picture with Tony the Tiger (I'm not saying how old I was). That coat was irreplaceable. But I still have the picture so I can mourn the loss of my jacket.

Funny funny funny?

There are things you teach your 2-year-old that seem incredibly funny at the time but then you start to think, how funny will this be if he's still doing this at 5 or 6? Take for instance, Mr. Copycat. Eli likes to copy the things I'm doing and it never fails to make me laugh. When I laugh, he does it more. I used to wear a lot of headbands in my hair. Eli would always pull them out of my hair and put them in his own. Then he would laugh and run around. He wouldn't want to take it off when I asked for it back because he looked like Mommy. I laughed at this for a really long time. I stopped wearing headbands anyway so this problem has mostly taken care of itself.

Mark accuses me of dressing Eli in bad clothes just so I can laugh. This is mostly not true. Only once did I let him run around in our living room (and just outside our front door) with his camouflage shirt, diaper (no pants) and his aunt's white sandals (she is also 2 years old). He insisted on putting on the shoes and once he did, I couldn't stop laughing for 5 minutes straight. That's about the time when my sister (this one is 28 years old) came to visit and got a good laugh too.

The biggest cause for concern, but one that offers the most laughs, is the "Booty". We taught Eli to call the butt, "booty". He would fall down and say, "Fall booty". This made me laugh because it was coming out of his little 2-year-old mouth. Then we transitioned. I started pinching his diaper and saying, "booty booty booty" and he would roll on the ground laughing. Now, he runs up to people and tries to pinch their butts, yelling "booty booty booty". He sometimes is polite enough to ask , "Daddy Booties?" I can't get enough of this now, but what if he is still doing this in 3 or 4 years. What if I get a call from his Kindergarten teacher saying he is pinching fellow classmates' butts and yelling, "booty booty booty"?

What kind of mother am I? One that likes to laugh...

These critical eyes

When I think about the people I love, a lot of things pop into my head. They are the things I would miss most if they were gone. Interestingly enough, the things I cherish the most are not the big things but the little things. For instance, when I think about my grandma, my favorite thing about her appearance is her hands. If I had a thousand pairs of hands to look at, I could pick hers out with no problem. They are wonderful. They are 87 years old and have weathered years of cooking, hard work, and intricate knitting patterns. The skin is dark and smooth and the nails are always trim. There is no sign of arthritis or dark veins sticking out. They are very small and truly beautiful, wonderful hands. You would have to see them to really appreciate them. I will remember what they look like for the rest of my life.

Another thing etched in my mind is the sound of my mom's cough. When I'm in a crowded room, I can always hear it. It is more of a cough-throat clear combination. I love that sound.

I spend the most time with Mark, my husband, so I have been able to observe his sounds, smells and rituals for years. I love his feet. He always wears socks, even to bed (but strangely the socks wander off his feet and get stuck in the sheets by the morning). As a result, he has the softest feet I've ever felt. They are not nasty and cracked like my flip-flop abusing ones are. I also like the sound he makes when he is lifting something heavy. It is the same sound the body builders make when they are dead-lifting 500 pounds - this puff of forced air. Every time I hear it, it makes me smile.

My sister and my brother have crooked pinkies for absolutely no reason. It looks like their fingers were closed in car doors and broken. I managed to dodge this genetic bullet. But I love it!

These are the things that makes these people I love into individuals; it makes them original. These are the things I would miss most if they were suddenly gone.

My eyes typically notice everything and my mind processes detail quickly. Put these together and you have a critical eye and someone who can point out faults at the drop of a hat (I'm not proud of this). Someone once suggested that I could be a home assessor because I could find all the faults of a home by just walking into the room. The flip side of this is that I love to find the details in things and people that I can really appreciate. These small things give me great pleasure.

So people, yes, sometimes I am judging you, but many more times I am appreciating you!

Warning.

If you think you can let your leg hair grow for months and then one day put Veet on it and poof, it's all gone, you might be wrong. What you might get instead is very smelly, red blotchy legs with hair that is just a little shorter than before. You will not get the 40 minutes back you spent trying to wash the slime off your legs. Or get that smell out of your bathroom (on top of the pee smell that is already there).

This is all hypothetical...

Dang It

Today I pampered myself. I groomed my feet and took about 10 minutes of massaging lotion into them. They felt good and looked as good as hobbit-feet could look. Then I walked into the bathroom and stepped on a pile of cat litter I had swept up earlier, but forgot to pick up and throw away. I lifted my well-groomed foot and saw the cat litter lining the entire bottom like a slipper. Since it was all "lotiony", the litter stuck right to it like glue. Gross.

Decisions, Decisions

I'm very deliberate in my decision making when faced with the common, everyday choices. Take for instance a public bathroom. When I walk into a public bathroom, there are many factors that I take into account when choosing a stall. The first is: stall occupancy. If there is a stall occupied, I will never go into the adjacent stall. It is quite awkward to sit down next to someone and know that you are about a foot or two away from someone else, sitting on a hole, with her pants down, especially if she is doing "the business". I will often experience a form of shy bladder when put in this situation. If the bathroom is empty, I almost always choose "the deluxe" (handicap stall). I like the taller toilet, the spacious mobility the larger stall offers, and I believe it to be the less often used toilet - thus less germs. Many years ago, my co-worker was in the deluxe stall of our work (retail store, public bathroom) when someone with a walker came in and had no place to go. The woman started to shout at my co-worker and continued until she left the stall (I actually think my co-worker was throwing up her lunch, again). After that, it took me a few years to start using the deluxe again. Now I figure, if I hear a walker or a cane come in, I close up shop and run (maybe stopping to rinse my hands)...

Another decision that requires some deliberation is what grocery store lane to check out in. A rule of thumb, if you are following me at the grocery store (or in a toll lane for that matter), never go to the same lane I go to. I always choose wrong - no matter what. There is always some calamity happening; no price tag, an underage trying to buy booze, someone paying with pennies, or a middle-ager trying to use self-checkout.

One thing I rarely choose wrong, is which stuffed animal to pick up in "the Claw" machines. I am obscenely good at winning worthless stuffed animals in "the Claw" machine at grocery stores and trashy restaurants. Just look at my collection if you don't believe me.

It's War Zone

I have now officially been a stay-at-home mom for over a year and a half. It has been a funny and somewhat trying year.

At the beginning, Eli was 6 months old and we were living in Mark's parent's unfinished basement. My duties were somewhat limited. I would roll on the carpet remnant and play with Eli until he took his nap. This included, trying to avoid being attacked by spiders dropping from the rafters and keeping my son from touching the space heater. Then, I would go upstairs when he would take a nap - which he had to be bundled up for. I would take my shower and eat some breakfast. Since it was not my house, there was not a lot deep cleaning to be done. Also, there was a cleaning lady that would come every other week to take care of what we missed. This was not a very difficult life. I rarely changed out of my sweats (lucky Mark) and put on make-up only once a week for church.

Then, we moved to Illinois and into our own "house"(or crap-hole). There were higher demands that came with living in our own house and a more active one-year-old. Eli was now walking and getting into trouble regularly. There were mealtimes in a high chair and trips to the park. And above all, there was always a mess.

Now a year later, Eli is two. We are still in a war against mess and we are running out of ammunition. I work part-time in the evenings, so that gives me a good reason to change out of my sweats at 3:30 pm.

As a stay-at-home mom, I live in a constant struggle: the Wants vs. the Shoulds.
I Should sweep the floor after every meal Eli eats, but I Want to not sweep it now, but wait until later so I don't have to do it three times a day.
I Should do the laundry, then fold it and put it away, but I Want to not do it, and definitely not put it away.
I Should mop the floor, but I Want to look on the internet instead.
I Should make dinner, but I Want to use up the rest of our money on take-out.
I Should clean the bathroom and take out the trash, but I Want to sit on the couch and eat.
I Should use Eli's entire nap time to get the house under control, but I Want to just sit and stare at the wall.

Nap time is a 2-3 hour window of semi-independence I have. During this time, I feel the battle of the Shoulds vs. the Wants raging. Typically the Shoulds gain the most territory, while the Wants just torture me.

Ah, the plight of the stay-at-home mom. If only cleaning and organization came naturally to me. Instead, projects and puzzles come naturally, and they are certainly not doing anything to help declutter my living room.

I Should end this dumb blog now.

Next season...

I've been thinking a lot about life lately. I think about the people I love and how much I appreciate them in my life. I don't often say many encouraging words to people (unfortunately) but I hope they never question my affection.

If someone told me today that I had 3 to 6 months to live, I wonder what I would do tomorrow. At this age, at this point in my life, I would be devastated. I don't have any doubt about my after-life whereabouts - I know I'll be in heaven, but I have a lot here on Earth that I want to hang on to. In thinking of such a short time to live, I would consider my husband, my son, my sisters and brother, my parents, family, friends, everyone. Three months to live is like living only to see the summer, or the fall. Would I be afraid to go? I think I would. I would want to tell Eli everything I would want him to know in his life - though I've hardly got that figured out yet for myself. I would want to see him at school, in competitive sports, with his first girlfriend, when he gets married. What a lot to miss. I would want to tell my husband that I'm sorry he has to raise Eli alone, and that maybe he should remarry - even though I would never really want him to be in love with anyone but me, but isn't that what you are supposed to say? I wonder if I would be able to find that "peace that passes all understanding" they talk about in the Bible. How is it that someone comes to grips with dying?

I wonder if I would feel differently if I was 87 and given 3 to 6 months to live. I would have already been a part of my kids growing up, and now their kids would be grown. I would have seen a lot, traveled, made mistakes and had great successes. But would all that make me ready to leave this world? Would I be afraid of the physical act of dying? Afraid of leaving my loved ones behind? I can't imagine going to bed every night and thinking that this could be it; I could die in my sleep. I would be thinking about if I had said everything that I wanted to say to people first. I guess it follows that I should be saying those things to people every day anyway and as the songs and movies say, "live like I was dying". But how many people really do that? If I truly lived like I was dying, I would have no money in the bank, I'd weigh 400 pounds, and I'd be really clingy.

I don't think I can ever really wrap my mind around the idea of dying; that next season someone I dearly love may not be here. I'm sad that she is scared, but I don't fault her for it. I would be scared too. Even if you have complete assurance of your salvation, it is hard to let go of family and things on Earth.

Three to six months... that's no time at all.

Tears for these Fears

I have some abnormal (maybe irrational) fears that I think about quite often. You might think they are strange.

I'm terrified of someone throwing up on me or around me. It makes me sweat when I think that it could happen. I've been in this situation too many times to count (the potential to be, not the actual being thrown up on).

I'm afraid of clogging toilets (public or private) and what to do if it does happen.

When I really have to pee and I am in the bathroom, I always stop and check myself to make sure I'm really there, and not just day dreaming. I don't want to be at my desk at work or something. I think about this all the time.

I'm abnormally afraid of hitting animals in the road - even running over ones that are already dead. It gives me nightmares to think of dying animals.

I'm also really afraid of being abducted, but I think that is a pretty rational and standard fear.

I am not, however, afraid of getting in a physical altercation with someone, in fact, I kind of welcome it, just to see how I would do.

Unsolved Mysteries

The house we live in has a few mysteries that often baffle me. When we first moved in, there were hundreds of bugs and spiders everywhere. The mystery: where do they all come from and how are they marching right into my house? Another mystery, why would my dishwasher just suddenly start overflowing suds in the middle of a cycle? Why did two toilets in our house decide [on the same day] to run forever every time you flush? I don't know the answers to these questions.

The most current and possibly most disturbing mystery has been a very strong pee smell that is coming from our bathroom. At first I thought this was the work of a tired night urinater. So I complained about it for a day or two then I got down on my hands and knees and scrubbed the toilet and surrounding floor area. That should do it... or so I thought. More pee smells. I got out the big guns. I took Comet to the bathtub, the toilet (again) and the sink, then mopped the floor. More pee smells. I took out the rugs and washed them just in case the tired night urinater got that distracted. More pee smells! The last thing left was the shower curtains. I unhooked the 100s of holders and washed them too. At last, that seemed to have done it. Until next morning I woke up and smelled that foul odor again. I seriously thought I was going crazy, maybe I was having an extended stroke and the only symptom was a constant pee smell in the mind. I thought this for a day until my sister came over and commented on that nasty pee smell. After using the scientific method, I narrowed down a constant variable to this smell. It typically follows the use of the shower and lasts many hours after. So, with this in mind, I had two possible explanations. There is a ghost who inhabits my bathroom that pees all over the place when he hears the shower running (I hope he isn't looking at me when I bathe). Or the second, which is that instead of "fresh" water in the shower, there has been a cross in the sewer lines and we have really been washing ourselves with crappy piss water. This seems to be the only logical explanation. I better stop brushing my teeth in the shower and rinsing my mouth (:

I wonder if we have to put this on the seller disclaimers when we put our house on the market - "stinky pee smell upstairs".

We will now be taking requests for anyone who would like to stay with us and use our shower.

A Recent Gas Explosion

If you have a job where you are around other people, you have probably had an embarrassing experience with gas. Everyone has and emits gas from time to time. Some people have a more foul and odorous gas, while others have a noise situation to contend with.

In my many different jobs, I have had to come up with different "diversionary" tactics to cover-up any slips I might have just had. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. A sudden change in diet can wreak havoc on the body. Take for instance the time we started buying Grape Nuts from Costco. All that fiber... At the time, at my office, I had a desk that was away from the rest civilization, so I could really just "relax". But then there would be the times when someone would sneak up behind me and I was unprepared. Typically to cover any unpleasant odor, I would put on smelly hand lotion. When you are the only desk in an area and there is a bad smell coming from that area, it doesn't take a lot of work to pin the blame.

The other night, at my current job, I was alone in our big office. I had some intestinal woes that evening but hey, when you are by yourself, who cares? At one point, I had to go up to the central desk area and check for a ticket. While I was there, I heard the front door open. Oh NO! The woman who came in had forgotten her cell phone at the central desk! I had no hand lotion handy and her cell phone was directly in my wake. We had an awkward exchange before she quickly left. She might have thought there was a dead animal under her desk but chose not to comment on it. Maybe she had a cold and never even noticed. Maybe I was caught!

A day wouldn't be complete unless I have had at least one awkward moment in it. I've had two already today.

On a related note, Eli often hears any noise and says "Fart, Mommy". While it is usually the wind blowing or a car honking, I laugh every time, unless we are in public - then I shush him.