Schmuckie’s Mind

I keep RUMINATING.  It’s my new word.  I keep running in circles the same info round and round in my head.  And it hurts my heart.  It makes me cry.  It makes me angry.  It is the same thing over and over.  I can’t seem to let go.  Or, maybe I have, but the pain and hurt still lingers.  I cry for the loss of my dreams and my happily ever after that never arrived.

I’m sorry that I can’t seem to function today.  I’m sorry that I shut down.  There’s nothing left for me to do but to pour it out here and hope for a complete healing this time.  Maybe.  I am hopeful.

You’re child is not grown.  You need to teach your child that he/she is not grown!  Better watch your mouth and your language.  Because cussing at an adult that calls you out on the carpet for your actions and the crap that spews from it is not going to fly with me!

You want to be a giant ass and say something stupid to my kid while I’m sitting right there?!!  I don’t think so.  I am more than happy to tell you about yourself.  And if you don’t like it, better call your mama and have her come kick my ass!  Yes, the school officials will be called into take your ass to the office and have your mother called because you chose to pick a battle you can’t win.  You chose to say crap to a student who’s parent happened to be there.

And then said parent called you on the carpet for it.  Yes, sit your ass on the bench in front of the principal’s office while your parents are called.  If you don’t like it, shut your mouth then!

I’ll be telling my kid the same thing.  I’ll be calling my own kid on the carpet for the stupid crap that spewed out of her mouth too.

People are so quick to say, it takes a village to raise a child, yet, for some stupid reason, when the village tries to tell you about your kid and hold your child accountable, you get offended.

WAKE UP PEOPLE!!! Either muzzle your kid, teach them what’s right and wrong and explain to them that what they do and say, they will be made accountable for it.  They will be responsible for their actions and words.

I’m sorry that I had to tell you on your day that a friend had passed.  I’m sorry that I wasn’t there to celebrate your day with you.  I’m sorry that we’ve drifted so far apart.  I’m sorry that you’re not happy the way you deserve to be.  I’m sorry I don’t get to see your smile everyday.

That maybe I’ve misplaced a good portion of my memory somewhere.  I got a MySpace Bulletin letting me know when the funeral for an old classmate of mine would be held.  I’m 34.  I’ve mentioned that before, haven’t I?  We grew up together.  K - 12.  Well, in my case, 11th.  I then transferred schools, one town over.  But the same circle of friends would overlap.

When I first heard, I was shocked.  We’re 34ish.  How, why, when?  No answer.  Not until yesterday.  Cancer.  I also can’t help but question if I should go or not.  It’s been either 17 or 6 years.  why the big gap?  Well, I had spoken to her about 6 years ago the night before my wedding at a club/bar in my old local town.  Prior to that, not since high school.  But riddle me this people, how can I NOT GO?  She was a part of my childhood from K-6 and then my teen years as part of the girls I didn’t click with but she was still that girl I knew and she was still nice to me, sure a bit snobby at times thanks to her new found cool friends, High school was more distant.  Some of the same classes at the same times, some just passing in and out.

I can’t NOT GO!?  I’m going to go.  I may not want to see some of those people.  and I’m paranoid that they will wonder WHAT THE H IS SHEEEE DOING HERE?   But, childhood was a lifetime ago, and I need to say goodbye to that life I remember with her.  In that life, she was a friend of mine.

We walked home together.  According to mapquest, we lived .70 miles away from each other.  We had some of the same friends.  We played at the same park.  We rode bikes around the same streets.  Jump rope, chinese jump rope, red rover, soccer, baseball, etc etc etc.  The girl I new and laughed with deserves that and more.  So what if as we got older we found different interests and different friends.  That doesn’t negate the simple joys of childhood that were found in tag in the field or the playground.  It doesn’t erase the dislike for the same teacher.  yada yada yada.  I know.

I’m 34.  Lots of those around me are falling thanks to car accidents, suicide, the war and cancer.  Many before me died while we were in school.  I said good bye to them, and I will also say goodbye to her.  Time doesn’t allow for excuses when one of us has fallen.

Ok, let’s talk co-workers and staff members you love to hate on!  Because yesterday, instead of people going home at 6:30 pm, I came out and told them, at 6:00 put the dogs up and then go home.

Why?  Why did I do this?  because these people suck!  One turned in her two week notice yesterday and then decided to suffer from short timer’s syndrome and talk crap on the floor about why she did it, but didn’t have the courage to tell me why she was quitting.  Thankfully, it wasn’t a surprise.  She wasn’t cut out for the job and she felt the work was beneath her and not worth the piss ant amount of money.  Why’d she take the job then?

We showed her what it was like before hand.  We told her what was expected.  WHORE!!!

I sent them home because if I’m going to be paying someone overtime to do a specific job or two, then I want the job done right.  I don’t want to find out they’ve been taking short cuts and not doing a thorough job.  I took pictures.  I walked around the building and took pictures after they left and then myself, and two other people did the job and got paid for it.

I even sent my hubby home after he has having a fit about these other 2 not doing their jobs, and that he was done closing with them.  Fine.  GO HOME!  Take our kids, go get dinner and go home.

CAN I FIRE MOST EVERYBODY!!???  PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE!!   Did I mention the owner’s of the business are on vacation?  That’s another reason people feel like they can get away with sheeeit!  GURRR!

ok, one last thing about that ghost, because why?  because now I’m really pissed!

As the day has worn on, my brain keeps playing something over and over that was said.

I was talking about how I like the fact I was young and had my kids in my early 20’s.  I like the fact that when I’m 40 ish, I will be able to do more of the stuff I like to do.

So, I mentioned how my oldest daughter, after having multiple talks with her about her future, she said to me, mom, I love you, but I don’t want to have kids young.  I will be waiting until after I finish college before I have kids. 

I thought that was cool.  I felt, yes, my kid sees her future.  Of course, so had I.

But the ghost speaks up, GOOD — That’s the only way to break the cycle!

EXCUSE ME?!!!  What cycle?!  I was married AND out of high school and had been working in an office career BEFORE I GOT PREGNANT!

That’s where I get the feeling that I’m being looked down on by ghost, that my lifestyle was disapproved of.  I feel that I made the right decision for me when I made choices that changed what I had been planning for myself for ever so long.

I AM VERY BLESSED AND VERY LUCKY THAT I AM THE MOM OF TWO OF THE GREATEST GIRLS EVER!!!  They are polite, they are smart, they are funny, they are witty, they are PERSONALITY, they are beautiful, THEY ARE LOVE!!!

I got a text message last night/this morning.  It was a little after 12 a.m.  If I was still awake/or awake, call.  I did.  It was a ghost.  I thought I might hear from him.  He was one of my best friends growing up, 7th-11th grade.  Funny.  I was just writing about 17 years ago, right.  Well, it’s been since I saw him.   He still looked the same.  He’s been married for a about 6 years now.  That’s right, I kept thinking 10, but it’s been 6.  He’s got a 2 yr. old daughter and a graduating h.s. senior as a stepson and another stepson just a few years younger than that.

Here’s the thing about ghosts.  They always haunt you.  If you hadn’t have seen them, you would have just been thinking about them and the foot prints they made in your life and where you are now.  You can hear their words and laughter in everyday sounds and scenery.  And this morning, oh this morning, after an hour of chatter, I dragged myself out of the house (after advising my spouse where I was going) and I met up with him at a coffee shop.  Ghost-man was in town on business.  17 years.  Maybe 16.

Was it a good visit?  Yes.  But the ghost is haunting.  What’s lingering?  The conversation.  It is swirling in my head.  There are shadows to the conversation that seem almost as if I was snubbed for the decisions I made growing up.  That the choices I made and how I live my life are beneath him and the path that he choose.  Yes, he is successful.  Yes, he’s happy.  Yes, his wife is 10 years older than him and the only debt he has is his mortgage.  Yes, he travels where ever he chooses and whenever he chooses.

Am I bitter?  No.  I am so proud of him.  I am so more than happy for him.  We fooled around once as kids and made out in the back seat of a car on the way to an amusement park, but we never took it farther than that.  So, I never felt like he was mine to hold back or to walk the future with.  I’ve never felt sad or bitter that ‘we’ never were an item other than best of friends.  So, when I see the smug look on his face, or what I once knew as his smug look, I can only help but wonder what he was being smug about.

Sure, I’m heavier than what I was growing up - thank god.  I look good with some of this weight on me.  Now I have boobs.  So, it couldn’t be that he’s thinking, wow, look at her thank god I didn’t get with her, she’s a cow now.  I know he doesn’t think that way.

So, I don’t understand why I feel this way.  I don’t get why I feel like when I mentioned that I WANT to wait to travel until after my youngest is graduating high school - why does he ask WHY?!  Why does he think that I’m wasting time.

I don’t find waiting a waste of time.  I find that knowing that I am here watching my kids grow up and hovering over their school work, a wonderful way to breathe and watch the day go by.  I don’t want them to be latch key kids.  His parents split up when we were seniors in high school.  Mine split up when I was 8.

So, maybe he doesn’t understand what it’s like to be a girl and growing up.  How much having parental guidance and nearness is an important part of that.  I know that he can’t.  He has a penis.  His parents were together all his childhood and mine.  And he was soooo angry afterwards.  I remember the way it warped his look on life.  Even if he didn’t admit it to me, until just this morning. 

But it was good to see him and know that he’s okay and at peace.  I had wondered for so long what had happened to him.  If it weren’t for him and another best buddy, I would never have survived adolescence as well as I did.  I still have some bumps, bruises and scars that they couldn’t protect or shield me from, and that’s a good thing.

I’d like to believe that I made a good impact in his life.  He never said.  But, if I didn’t, why would he too search me out and make the effort except to feel better about how I ended up, for good or bad.  The way I see it, I may struggle here and there with life, but it’s a good life that I have with my kids and husband.  It’s filled with love and arguements and vibrant color — just the way it should be.  If it were too easy, I’d take it for granted.

I lived as a ghost within the walls of my childhood home.  Without my parents noticing that I was in pain and that I was struggling.  Without my parents or brother realizing that I was drowning, or for that matter, that I even existed.  Maybe because of that, maybe that’s why I choose to be the way I am with my kids.

And when they get older, I will be ready to travel and they will ready to explore the world without me smothering them.  To hell with the ghost that haunts me…

I am so off the mark.  I didn’t even know it until just now.  Once I realized that, I HAD to write this.  I had to get it out of me.  Have I been this angry for so long just because I never learned about forgiveness?

I understand the concept.  I do.  But I don’t know HOW TO EXTEND THAT TO SOMEONE ELSE.  Not even for myself.

….And I thought of all the bad luck,
And the struggles we went through
And how I lost me and you lost you
…..

I’m learning to live without you now
But I miss you sometimes
The more I know, the less I understand
All the things I thought I knew, I’m learning again
I’ve been tryin’ to get down to the Heart of the Matter
But my will gets weak
And my thoughts seem to scatter
But I think it’s about forgiveness
Forgiveness
Even if, even if you don’t love me anymore

……

Thank you Don Henley.  Thank you Lucy Walsh for singing it.  Thank you MTV for replaying ROCK THE CRADLE tonight.  Thank you … Thank you for giving me something to think about and to make peace with. 

If I can breath today, I know that I will survive the day.  If I can make it home to my pillow, I know that I will be okay tonight.

So…if you’re out there.  And if you’re like me.  And you’re hurting.  Or you’ve been through it… I hate to ask, but PRAY FOR ME.  Maybe I’ll find the faith that’s been waiting for me all this time.  Maybe I’ll finally believe in something other than pain and betrayal.  If faith is real, if it exists, let it teach me forgiveness. 

Most times I just don’t put it out there.  I will hold it against myself forever.  But, maybe, maybe this day when the sun rises I will feel positive.  And when the sun sets, maybe I won’t hurt so much.  Maybe my heart won’t be so heavy.

Tell me how you forgave yourself.  Tell me how you forgave the great love of your life that killed you and your dreams.

Thank you.

17 years people.  17 years.  If I were a devote catholic and even more importantly a practicing catholic… I would have been married for 17 years today, or I would be a widow from my first marriage; however, the loop hole…he cheated.  he committed adultry.  at some point I did too.  we’re human.  I was stupid.  He’s an ass.

But, I’m 34.  half my life I have been married to the man, but we divorced in 2001.  I will always be a stupid woman, for I will always love that man.  Don’t get me wrong people, I love the man that stepped to the plate and took on me as his wife - his only wife.  He stepped to the plate and opened his life and love and home to two little girls and me and all of my baggage.

They say that if you were in love with someone for so many years (like 5) and were with them all that time it takes that many years plus half that many years to let it really go.  HOW UNLUCKY AM I!!   I was 8 when I feel in love with him.  16 when we officially started dated.  17 when we got married.  19 when we got pregnant. 20 when we welcomed our 1st child into the world.  21 when we got pregnant again.  22 when our 2nd was born. 

I think I’ll be on my death bed when I can finally let go and not feel a loss where he and our relationship had been.  I’m 34 and we split in 1999 and divorced 2001.  Someone do the math for me, because today was my wedding day in 1991.  And waking up today, it confirmed, I woke up with someone else that I had married in 2002.

and today, i say good bye to smoochi.  for I have to put you to rest.  I have to say goodbye to who we were and what we were and I have to hope that next year on this day I won’t remember.  That next year it will be over.  That it won’t hurt.  That I won’t feel disappointment with myself or you.  That I won’t hurt for our kids and that they aren’t suffering.

How do you bury love?  How do you bury hate?  How do you leave behind all  your hopes and dreams that you had for yourself and your future?  I refuse to put those same dreams and hopes on someone else.  Those were for you and me.  For us.  Now I just hold onto the new reality and the future it may have.  That the love I now share with someone else is so different from that childhood passion and connection.

Welcome to the new day.  When the sun sets, it will set with the knowledge that I shared the day with you.  With your memory.  With our memory.  It will set with the knowledge that when I go to bed tonight, it will be with the person that was strong enough and loving enough to hold my hand even when we’re mad.  To hold me even when I cry over the loss of someone I once was involved with.  I will be with the person that I am meant to grow old with and be at peace with.

I love.  Always.

Okay, so here’s the finished product.  Yea, it’s still raw.  and for some reason it’s missing a corner triangle.  They gave me no explanation for that, but whatever!

I need more therapy.  The bosses are leaving tomorrow.  They’re going on vacation.  And it stresses me out for a bit because, well, because.  I’m also a bit tweaked over the radio again.  More reports on teens and sex.  Today’s was about a school that did a survey and found that some kids wrote that by drinking mountain dew you can’t get pregnant.  Huh?!!!  They said it was a middle school that did that.  HUMMM??!!!  Think the kids might be screwing with ya?  maybe.  maybe not.  But I’m gonna go with yes.

Let’s see, I remember those test sheets that you fill in the appropriate bubble.  At one point we were asked how many years have you been at that high school.  The bubbles for the questions gave you the options, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 ……  For fun several students yelled out, SEVEN!!!  they marked it too.  see.  it’s possible for kids to screw with ya on a survey because they can.

Then they had callers call in with RUMORS they had heard growing up about sex and std’s. grrrr.

Hey, I’ve got an STD…TWO EVEN.  They’re children!!!   Obviously they were Sexually Transmitted right!  And a disease because of how horrible it was to be pregnant!!!  sick for 7 months each I was.  On top of that, they still your food when your really don’t want to share it with them as they get older… that milkshake is no longer all yours!!!  neither is the choc. chip cookie dough ice cream!  Sometimes they go away.  Most times not.  and you’ll be spending money on them alot just to keep it all in check.  hehehehehehehee.

I know, it’s crazy.  I’m exhausted today.  I won’t be writing for a few days.  But remember, DEAL OR NO DEAL AUDITIONS ARE THIS SATURDAY!!!  I will be there!