Floating up.

I feel like I am drowning...it's like a rope is tied around my ankle and it is attached to the bottom of a rough sea and yet I am just buoyant enough to keep afloat. A big wave will pass over me and submerge me entirely but I am just buoyant enough to pop up on the other side of the wave. Right now, I am fighting this frustrating sickness, on antibiotics, AND weaning. Oh geesh. Today, the wave caught me yet again (no doubt an effect of the sickness and weaning hormonal rollercoasters) and my kids reached down and pulled me back up. They held me up long enough to catch my breath once again. The mom in me will NOT let my kids have anything but a PERFECT childhood to the BEST of my ability NO MATTER WHAT and that is what drives me on a moment to moment basis. It's my overall arch that I have trouble with.

Today, in my despair about what I have been reduced to and what I have given up, I felt so hopeless. I find solace in the complete sacrifice that perfect parenting is yet I know that this will not ultimately keep me afloat. I will need to begin again from scratch, re-inventing myself yet again. Starting over again. And, I will have to be alone. No matter how I look at it, I will be alone. I will do it, alone. How can I be alone when I love to be in a crowd and crowds are easy to find? How can I be alone when I find comfort in fellow humans no matter who that might be. I am still feeling the effects of a warm hug from a spanish lady at a playground in Boston that me and the kids found ourselves at. Her cell number and offer of friendship saved in my cell phone. I feel the embrace of the nanny at the playground in CT that hugged me through my tears that wouldn't stay put and carry her number scrawled on a piece of paper in my wallet like an emergency contact to put on the many health forms I fill out. The cell phone number of yet another person at a random playground that offered friendship in a fleeting moment at the car window as I drove away. The business card of a beginner hairdresser with the promise of wet weather playdates at her house. None of these lifelines are what I need or what I seek, yet there they are, keeping me company. How can I fear being lonely? How can I be here, with the constant company of my parents and feel so lonely? How can I cuddle me two little loveys and be lonely for them? Feeling like I am not present enough for them?

I am reading Eat, Pray, Love and although I find it frustrating to "hear" this woman whining when she has unlimited financial resources, talent, and can flit around where she pleases having these experiences without having to drag her two children along or wonder how they will be affected while also wondering if love will ever find her while she mothers, smothers among the closed in walls of her home, I will admit that it gives me things to ponder on. She says that all you need to do is ask for your guru and they will appear. What I think about this is, I am not ready to hear what my guru has to say. Second, she points straight to me and says, "I, too, am trying to control my world to keep time from moving, to stay as far away from dying as possible, and can therefore not be present. Even as I control, it only proves how this world is beyond our control." Although I am paraphrasing, this is the lesson that I need to learn yet every ounce of my being will not allow this to be true. I CANNOT live from day to day. I CANNOT let the past die, CANNOT let the future present itself. I am NOT ok with my current predicament and constantly think I will, at any moment, wake from this dream and find myself no longer in this predicament. Pinch me.

Yet, here I am, making myself a cup of hot cocoa. Thinking how maybe winter is what I need. Maybe I will find comfort in winter. In the quiet of a snowfall, glowing fire's embrace, cradled by a home, let the wind whistle outside. Here I am, popping back up after the wave has passed, catching a breath. I cannot help but hope, it is the human condition. It also seems to relate to the seasons. Being back in the land of seasons, I remember the feeling of perpetually being driven forward, towards the next season. Thinking that something better is just around the corner.

Comments

I just got the most interesting comment on my blog saying that I helped someone! I helped! ME! The person that only gets help from others, lives purely by the grace of others' good deeds, and has no life or direction whatsoever HELPED SOMEONE ELSE! They were an anonymous commenter and if only they know how good it feels to have helped even just ONE person to give back a little! I can't help anyone in my own life because I can barely keep it together in my own life, have no money to help with, have no home to welcome them into, and no grounded feeling to offer as support. I'm so glad that I could virtually help someone. I'm glad to hear that someone is helped by me just saying, "Hey, my life is a mess. Things suck. Welcome to my world." Hahahaha. Anyways, here's what up with me...as if things couldn't get any worse...I got really sick. This illness really messed with me but luckily I'm on antibiotics and things are going to get better again. I don't know WHAT I did to deserve this year but there ya have it. The hits just keep on comin'. Thanks to all for the support that you gave to me via facebook...I couldn't even reach out to people because I was just to sick I didn't have the energy to reach out. I'm feeling better and my parents took good care of me so don't worry about me! Just a nasty infection...I think I have THE worst immune system EVER, AND it doesn't help that I'm up every two hours with the baby and up for good at 5:30AM most nights with the occasional panic attack/stress out in the middle of the night where I can't sleep! Argh! So, now that I'm going to be feeling better, just wondering if I could get a sign. Any sign. Just something small from the universe telling me what the next step is for me. I thought that I would get a sign sometime during this summer helping me to figure out what to do next but the summer is halfway through and no sign has materialized. What am I going to do? I have to get a life of my own sometime! Where do I turn? Where do I look? What search do I google? (Believe me, I've tried many random google searches for an answer...if it was out there, I would have found it.) Does anyone have an answer for me? A magical offer of just the life I would like to live? Sometimes, the best thing to do is send your needs out into the universe. Here goes.
Here are my skills:
Marketing
Graphic Design
Customer Service
Managing
Hospitality Revenue Management
Hospitality (all departments)
Teaching
Singing, Dancing, Acting
Working with children
Extreme Patience
Fundraising
Non-profit misc. work
Interior decorating
Multi-tasking

Here's what I would like in my life:
Friends
A nice little home within walking distance to Something
Neighbors
People stopping over a lot
A community with great families and kids that is near enough my parents that I can get help when I get really sick which seems to happen to me WAY to often!
A good preschool
An ocean nearby enough
A mountain to climb nearby enough
Interesting things to drive to with the kids
A job from home
A nice babysitter for once in a while help
Friends
Friends
Friends
I guess I should also expand to friends who can play even on weekends or evenings when most families are having family time or a family that doesn't mind a third wheel with two kids.
Dates with nice friendly normal guys. Not the love of my life...just an occasion to get dressed up and feel pretty and have a nice date with fun adult conversation and laughter.

Ok. So, that's it. Is my Utopia out there? Does anyone have the key to the sign from the universe that is meant from me? If this post is missing words or doesn't make any sense...that just because I JUST started taking my antibiotics and they haven't really kicked in yet. Next post I'm sure I'll be back to my boring make-sense self.

It's official!

Odin is officially 3 years old and potty trained! When we would ask him, "When will you start using the potty and wearing big boy underpants?" He would say, "On 4th of July!" Not sure why he picked that day, but he meant it and on the 4th, we started the process. There were lots of accidents along the way but he kept plugging along and working at it and now he's 100% potty trained! I'm so proud of him. He's getting so grown up, it's hard to believe that he's only just 3! I can't imagine how grown up he'll seem at 4 or 5! He's my best friend and such a pleasure to be with. Zephyr is getting ANOTHER two teeth...definitely bothering him...but he's too much fun and the boys are really cute together. Their bond is something to behold! Zephyr is still walking holding onto things and doesn't seem to have much interest in walking on his own so we'll see what happens with that in the next two months. Hard to believe he's almost 1! This past year has been such a blur...I look forward to the day when I can put all the trauma of the year behind me and stop having all these holes in my memory where stress and sadness took over, leaving no room in my brain for anything else. Every time I think that the hard part of divorce is over, it drags on. I'm beginning to look at the "one year of hell" that everything I read said I had to get through before things got better as more of a "5 years or more." I always wanted kids, my whole life, and it is just unbearable that the experience is being soured by this whole situation. I just want to raise my boys and be happy and whole...enjoying every moment...but the circumstances I find myself in make it more like trying desperately to enjoy every minute despite the walls that continue to crumble around me. The sky is falling and I smile on.

Ahoy me hearties...

Odin's Pirate Birthday Party was a success :) Here are some pix of the buccaneers!
















Odin got a castle for his birthday but of course, his little brother had to terrorize the villagers ;) Isn't that what little brothers are for? Zephyr is practicing his best pirate face learned at the birthday party!

4th of July

Odin was SO excited to decorate his bicycle...we hunted high and low for decorations while in CT and brought them with us to Nantucket. He waited and waited for today...at the crack of dawn he was decorating his bike, rode it all the way downtown, waited and waited for the judging, and WON THIRD PLACE! YAY!!!!! Zephyr drove his car down and was so proud of his big brother!

Floating...

I'm not sure who I'm really writing this blog for anymore...those of you that read it are close enough to see for yourselves...those that are too far away now probably don't even know about it...I'm not sure how the people that read it feel about me...I'm so tired of writing about my lack of a life, my exhaustion, my anger, my frustration, my disbelief, and I'm too busy focusing on enjoying and appreciating ever single minute with my kids to try to keep up on writing about them. I don't know how long I'll be able to realistically stay home with them so it seems like I hold onto our time together more and more desperately. The only thing I can focus on in my mind is how much I miss having my own home, my own life, my friends and family in CA, my dog, my cat, but how that is no longer possible since I am now doing it all on my own with a finite amount of financial resources to draw from and two little boys growing at an alarming rate towards what will be much more expensive years. I don't really have a plan for the future to focus on, I'm still stuck with all the things from the past that I am trying to move on from. I would write about my pathetic attempt at dating as I'm sure you'd all find it entertaining but it's just plain sad in my eyes. The wonderful guy who dumped me because he couldn't handle the kids, the firefighter that was just plain overbearing, the young son of a single mom who was just way too short, the surfer that I informed via email that I had moved cross country overnight, the lawyer that assessed and dismissed me within 40 minutes, the old friend that wanted to commiserate about divorce, the 20 something cougar bait that drunken texted me, the boring tax assessor with the 7 year old daughter and bad teeth. It's really hard looking into the future knowing that I will probably be alone for a very very long time. That I will raise my boys alone. That is not ever what I dreamed of when I thought of my future when I was a little girl. I have always looked forward to the partnership of marriage and raising a family together. Why didn't I understand how making a stupid choice about who I did it with would haunt and ruin my world for the rest of my life? I will be dealing with this forever. My children will be dealing with this forever. If I ever find someone that deserves my kids and will accept them as his own, he will also have to deal with my bad decisions forever. When will my life begin again? When will I ever feel normal again? When will I stop regretting what has become of my life? When will I be able to just enjoy my children without feeling the loss of what I always pictured their life would be instead of just feeling good about what is? Anyways, I'm finding it hard to keep this blog going when I question the people that read it and have lost my idea of what the point of it all is. My first blog was a way to convince myself that life was grand and perfect even though I knew it wasn't...this one was a way to start fresh and puzzle it out...but it seems to just continue to be the same questions and ponderings over and over in a pathetic monotonous diatribe. Sorry y'all.

Love *almost* three year olds...

Here's the image...Odin running through the mall with his Buzz Lightyear calling, "To infiniti and beyond!"

Odin baking a cake with Grandpa and "reading" the directions.

Odin "doing" crossword puzzles in bed at night with Grammie.

Odin telling me how the world works..."Mommy, when it starts raining, you'll put your windshield wipers on!"
"Here's a lesson Mommy, the cars go on the road, the people go on the sidewalk."

I just love three year olds...you just have to watch what they hear because they're awfully honest about all of your bodily functions and private matters!!!!!