Hold On, Or Let Go?

This evening I went to a wake for an old childhood friend but before I left home I had a blow up with my son over his school work, or lack there of. On my way home from the wake, still thinking about our row, I realized that no matter how old your children are, they are still your child and you will still want to parent them. Unfortunately the older they get, the more you lose control. When they were little you could control who they played with, what they ate, what they did, etc., But now with my baby growing up, he is getting beyond my control and I don't like it.

I wish I could make him understand my fears. Make him see my reasons for nagging and punishing and threatening him, but I know I can't, he has to learn for himself. But I also wish I had a crystal ball that would show me the future. Will he turn out all right? Will it be ok? Should I let him fail and find his own way, or should I push harder?

I'm sure most of you who know me are thinking oh Michelle, he will turn out great, its just a phase, but honestly folks I don't know. Our parental egos like to tell us that we are the ultimate control in how our kids turn out, but the older I get the more I see too many people who came from great loving homes who turned out to be royal fuck ups at life. Anything from failure to launch, to addiction and death. Honestly, it scares the daylights out of me.

At the same time I think about my late friends parents and how they are probably asking themselves, what could we have done different, could we have changed things? I think about my own parents who lost my brother at age 12, who dealt with me being pregnant at 16 and all the fun stuff my sister and I have put them through over the years... yep, karma is a bitch I tell you. My only solace in all of this is the idea that my kids too will have kids of their own someday.....and I hope their kids are just as bad as their parents were

I. Hate. November. Warning! Depressing blog post ahead!

November always gets me down.  It is such a grey month.  Seriously, I haven't seen the actual sun for a week now.  Every day the sky is grey. Yes, I know it isn't raining, or even worse snowing, but every day is the same gloomy grey and it's dark... Dark at 4:30 in the afternoon.  All anyone wants to do is sleep.

  I know I complain about Christmas creep and growl about people putting up Christmas decorations a month and a half before Christmas, but at the same time I can kind of understand why people are looking for a little cheer, because a lot of days in November it seems like there is absolutely nothing to be cheerful about.

  Now for those of you who don't live in Canada I will give a little clarification here.  In Canada we have approximately 8 months of winter and 4 months of rough sledding.  In Atlantic Canada it only gets hot for about 3 weeks of the year around the end of July and the first of August and if you are a sun worshiping beach bum like me, that simply isnt enough!  From about the end of May till mid July it is what we call comfortable.  It is a bit chilly at night and in the morning, but by noon time it has usually warmed up to the high teens and you can go out side with out a sweater.  Fall isn't so bad either, ( fall being from the end of August to the end of October).  Again, it's chilly, and the days are getting shorter, but the leaves are pretty and the bugs are gone so you can really enjoy tromping around in the woods, but then comes November.  

In November all the leaves have fallen, all the busy fall preparations are done and it gets cold and there is nothing left to do but wait. For. Winter.  ......It's coming, any day. That long darks cold snowy winter. The days are so short in November that some times it seems like the sun is never out.  You know snow is imminent, it is like waiting for a terminally I'll person to die.. You know that it is coming and you dread it, but some times you just wish it would happen so the dreadful anticipation will be over.  Any day now you are going to wake up to a foot of the white stuff and that will be it, winter will be here for another cold 6 months.  I guess it is the anticipation that I don't like, the knowledge that I am as far away from the warmth of summer as I can be. The days will get shorter for the next month and it is too soon to look forward to Christmas.  All there is to look forward to is months of shoveling snow, frozen hands, and wet toes, and icy drives, and getting up to a cold house and keeping the wood stove going and wondering if I will make it home form work or get stuck  in a snow bank because it's storming again...... Sigh!  

I am sure part of the reason I hate November is because my brother died in November.  Even after 25 years there is a hint of sadness at the mere mention of November, but I think that all this grey gloom really increases it.  

And as if November wasn't bad enough with all of the stuff I have just described a recent addition has been the advent of Movember! Now don't get me wrong! I support finding a cure for prostate cancer, and I can see how men felt the need to draw awareness to a previously over looked cancer, but for the love of god, couldn't you find a better way than making every man out there look like a greasy 70's porn star? Really? Why not a blue ribbon or something?

If I ever win the lottery I am buying a house someplace warm and sunny where there is no winter and I will go there in October, so I don't have to face November at all!  ARRG,I just saw a snowflake float past my window.. I'm going to check my lottery numbers right now... If you don't hear from me for a while, you'll know where I am, on a beach some where drinking a piña colada and sticking my tongue out at November.

Facing The Empty Nest....

For the last 21 years I have dedicated myself to being the best parent I can be. Becoming a parent at 17 wasn't something I had planned on doing, but it happened and once I made the decision that I could do it, I determined that I was going to be the very best parent I could be. Anyone who knows me knows that once I decide to do something I'm gonna do it and do it well, come hell or high water!

Now I find myself faced with the prospect that very soon, being a parent won't be my first concern in life. I know I'll always be a parent to my children, no matter how old they are, but in three years time it won't be a full time job anymore! In fact some days it seems like it is working into part time casual right now! With my second having left the nest last month and my baby in high school I find myself with increasing amounts of time on my hands. I find myself borrowing other people's kids to take to the beach because mine are too busy, tired,or cool to come with me! I guess it's a good thing I enjoy my own company! 

This is making me wonder, what shall I do as an empty nester? Most of my friends still have small kids, so I find I have few people to socialize with on my more frequent times alone. One of my friends who has kids the same age as mine just had another baby! She said she couldn't face being an empty nester yet, she'd go crazy she said, me, I'm willing to take that risk! 

Being an empty nester is something I have been fantasizing about for the last 10 years! Don't get me wrong, I love my kids and I miss them when they're not around, but I also realize, I am almost 40 years old and I have never been an adult without someone else depending on me. I have never had the opportunity to just put myself first, or decide what I want to do, based on just what I want to do. I find myself fantasizing about what I should do with my life when that fateful day comes? Maybe go to law school, or go out west and work for big money? Maybe go to Korea and teach English? Or get a job on a cruise ship and see the world... I guess I still have a few years to figure it out, but in the mean time, I'm open to suggestions!

My Poor Abandoned Blog

My poor abandoned blog.  I came back to you!  I'm sorry, but for those of you who thought maybe I had simply lost interest and like many other projects that I have started and failed to finish this blog was destined to gather dust in some unseen corner of the ether net, let me explain.

I started this blog as a kind of personal catharsis.  My goal was not to write to please others, but to please myself.  I wanted to say what I felt needed to be said, even if I wasn't sure if anybody wanted to hear it. But then I found  that I had a bunch of things that I felt like saying but I was pretty sure I shouldn't say them.  You see I was really really angry with a lot of people, members of my community, authority figures, friends and more.  I knew that if I spewed all of this into my blog that it would just breed more anger, within myself, and my community, so I let it rest.

I also had a whole lot of pain going on in my family which I wanted to share, but the pain wasn't mine alone and while I have no problem airing my own dirty laundry I didn't feel comfortable with the idea of robbing my family members of their dignity.  No matter how upset I am with them, I still love them.

All of this crap in my life gave me diarroea of the gut and constipation of the soul.  I had no creativity to give and I was too wounded in my inner being to share my pearls of wisdom... who am I kidding, there was no wisdom there!

After being urged repeatedly by doctors, chiropractors, and friends, I decided to give yoga and meditation a try.  Happily God saw me struggling and brought out the sun. (by the way if you enjoyed the long hot summer, it was all for me, so you are most welcome!) And so I stretched and I Oooammed, I silent retreated and I prayed, I swam in the ocean and let my tears mingle with the sea and now, maybe now, I feel like I have something more to give.

A Domestic Goddess I Ain't

Consider this post an epilogue or a postscript to my previous post about my trip in a time machine. 

You see I have been taking considerable ribbing from my family about the fact that I found a 13 year old box of Kraft dinner in my cupboard while searching for a long lost fondue pot.  I think my brother In law put it best when he said, "Well sir that’s saying you clean your cupboards lots too!” (Read with a laughing voice in a Tignish accent).  I guess I am not a cleaner.  Don’t get me wrong, my house isn’t filthy.  It isn’t one of those place we’ve all been in one at one time or another where you walk in and the smell hits you first thing and you are scared to sit down so you just look for any excuse to get out the first chance you can. No I’m not that bad.  My house usually smells pretty clean and looks definitely livable.  I’ve seen lots worse, but I really don’t enjoy cleaning.  It is a chore and one that annoys me. Mostly because I kind of think, “I don’t live here all by myself, so why should I be the only one that cleans it?” now I can hear my family saying, “That’s not fair! We clean all the time!” and I can hear my kids, “mom makes us clean like slaves!!”  But really it is almost as much work to get them to clean as it is to do it myself!  You have to nag and cajole, and then even when they do it you have to go back when they say they are done and point out all the stuff they missed and make them do it over again and everyone gets cranky… like I said, not fun!  I could think of a million things I would rather be doing than cleaning and usually those other things win the battle.  My husband and I will tidy up now and then, and that is what I am good at, tidying! But that deep down nitty gritty cleaning… it doesn’t get done around here very often. 

I was watching a show about gypsies the other night and the gypsy women and girls are raised to be house wives, they aren’t supposed to work outside the home after age 16 and their days are spent keeping an immaculate home.  This one girl was washing down the baseboards in her home as she was interviewed and the base boards were clean! The water she was rinsing the cloth in was perfectly clear! And all I could think was, what a colossal waste of time!!! Why wash the baseboards everday, or week? Why not wait and do it when they are dirty, like once a year?? If I was washing my baseboards that water would have been nice and brown and you wouldn’t have any trouble telling where I had cleaned and not cleaned… well maybe not, because  over the years  I have chosen the décor for my home with  colors, textures and fabrics that hide dirt!   Yes it is true, I have specifically chosen  rough, sandy, dirt colored tile for all my floors, no need for shine here because it has a nice matt finish… there have even been times when I was scrubbing one dirty looking spot and realized that It wasn’t dirt, it was just part of the pattern on the floor!  That being said, I can go weeks, dare I say even months without scrubbing it! I have lots of natural wood wainscoting, again hides dirt well, and dark colours and patterns! 

Now if, like my family, you read my previous blog post and thought, “Oh My God! She hasn’t cleaned her food cupboards in 13 years???!!!” no that’s not true; I try and clean my food cupboards at least once every 2 or 3 years at least.  Most recently it was this winter and I threw out anything that had solidified and wasn’t supposed to be solid, or anything that was expired, or that I could remember having bought, etc.  but getting back to the KD, I was baffled as to how it got up there in the first place! I had never, to my best recollection used that cupboard to store food! It was just too impractical! In order to get at the space where the KD was I had to stand ON the counter and stick my arm in up to my shoulder!  So while I thought it was funny that it was there, it was kind of a mystery! What had I been thinking? If it were older, say 20 years old, I would have said it must have been left by the previous occupants, but the date was on it clear, and there were coupons on the box that expired in Dec. 1999, so I knew it must have been placed there sometime in 1999, and somehow, all the other junk up there that was older had been moved to make way for it! The wedding presents from 1993 were in front! It just didn’t make any sense!  Then last night, as my brother in-law was making fun of me for not having cleaned my cupboards since 1999 it dawned on me like a bolt of lightning! I literally threw my hands up and said, “I remember how it got there!!  Y2K!!!”

Now for those of you who don’t remember Y2K I’ll offer a bit of back ground here.  Apparently when early computer technology began to become part of our everyday infrastructure back in the late 70’s and early 80’s, those great computer geniuses out there gave a lot of things digital calendars that would change automatically every year on Jan 1, unfortunately for some reason most of them forgot to give these computers the ability to make the first number of the year, i.e. 1999, be a 2, it could only be a 1.  This meant that when the clock turned over on Jan. 1, 2000, millions of computers all over the world would crash including those that ran our electrical grids, our cars, our nuclear missiles… etc. you get the picture! Millennial Melt Down!!  Now this glitch was discovered  in the early 1990’s thankfully, and pretty much corrected,  but not before a few apocalyptic, right wing, survivalists got a hold of the idea and ran with it!  There were whole books written about it and what kind of disaster it was going to be for our society, (I have one by the way, called the millennium melt down, it makes for pretty humorous reading now if anyone cares to borrow it) there were survival guides and the internet, in its infancy, was the perfect place to spread this terror across the globe! 

So here is where I have to admit something… I am a closet survivalist.  I am not very good at actually doing things to prepare for the apocalypse other than reading up on what to do, but I do think about it a lot.  I really like TV shows like Jericho where basically the world gets have destroyed and the human race has to start all over again.  And I like to think that watching shows and movies like Deep Impact, or reading Stephen King novels will give me an added edge when the day comes that we have to forage and live off the land.  My husband on the other hand thinks my confidence is misplaced and that I will go down in some sort of a crazed rampage after a week without a shower... which is honestly more likely to be true, but hey, my intentions are good! And so when rumours of the impending Y2K crisis reached me in early 1999 I thought, “maybe I should try to prepare for this?” 

Now to give myself a little credit I was under the influence of some very good friends who also happened to be very big survivalists.  The husband of this couple was a real hippy who had lived off the land and had some clue about how to prepare, and they were convinced, 100% that it was going to happen and were stock piling like no tomorrow.  Now my husband was, as usual, the voice of reason.  He said, “Why do we need to stock pile food? Are all the cows, pigs and potatoes on PEI computer generated? Are they all going to evaporate on Jan. 1? What about all the wood in the forest around our house? Are there computer chips in those trees? They’ll still be there, we’ll have heat.  What about our well? Is that water date sensitive??” any way, needless to say he was against stock piling, so if I was going to do it I had to do it … SECRETLY!  So every week I would hoard away a few things from my groceries, up in this hidey hole cupboard that I had, some soap, some Maxi Pads, (those things that you can’t get at your local farm that a man would never think about needing!), a few cans of fruit, a few boxes of Kraft Dinner… until I had a nice little stock pile! And then… Trent found it.  I got a bit of a lecture and he did talk some sense into me, but I think my little stock pile stayed until after Jan. 1, 2000.  Then I gradually used it all up and forgot about it... until the other night when way at the back, I found that 13 year old box of Kraft Dinner!

So to finish what I started talking about, I am not terribly neurotic about cleaning or surviving for that matter.  I realized my aspirations at housewife mastery were never going to happen about 10 years ago when I was cleaning my oven and my then 7 yr. old said, “WHAT are you doing?? “ I replied, “Cleaning the oven!” and she asked if she could look.  I showed her proudly and she said, “WHOA! Our oven is really Grey on the inside!! WOW! Sam you have to see this, did you know our oven was Grey on the inside??”  Shortly after that I hung a framed picture in my porch that said, “A Clean House is a sign of a wasted life” and decided to let the dust bunnies procreate where they chose.  Now and then, when I feel like It, I will give something a good scrub, especially when it really needs it and at least we all get some good entertainment value out of the mess in the meantime.  So just remember in the event of some sort of apocalyptic disaster, there will be Kraft dinner at my house and possibly fondue,  it will probably be expired, but I am sure is still fit to eat... After all beggars can’t be choosers right???

An Unexpected Trip in a Time Machine

So I went for a trip in a time machine last night!

Now I know what you're thinking, " you don't have a time machine!" well I actuality I guess it isn't so much a time machine per say as much as a very awkward cupboard.  You see, I don't know who actually designed my kitchen cupboards, but they for sure didn't do it with any kind of short people in mind! I honestly think they didn't do it with any kind of people in mind at all! They look really nice from the outside, but the inside shelving doesn't match up very well with the outside doors and so on the top shelf and in the corners you have these tiny little openings  with a whole lots of space inside, but they are completely impractical for everyday use!

Back in the early days of our marriage and life in this house I  realized that these cupboards were impractical for storing food or dishes, so I figured I would use this space for storing things like old income tax returns, old bills, momentos, and all of that flotsam and jetsome of life that you figure you'd better store because you will probably need it again in a few months.. As I mentioned before, there was really a lot of space up there and I kept stuffing, and stuffing  till about the year 2000 when we bought a nice large filing cabinet which was much easier to organize. I know my sister won't believe this, but I usually clean the filing cabinet once every year or so, but these top cupboards, well they just kept getting put off for another day and the stuff up in there from those early days of our marriage got forgotten about... Until last night.  Last night I got invited to go to a fondue party and I started thinking..I'm pretty sure I have a fondue pot up there.... Somewhere.... And I started pulling things out and I fell.  Into the time machine.

 There were a bunch of old plastic cups in the front, the ones you get at the movies in a kids pack, and then in behind them, a sippy cup.  My baby is 15 and I still had his sippy cup! (lump in my throat). Then of course there was tons of junk, like the bags and boxes for my princess house starter kit, back when I had aspirations of being a princess house millionaire .. That kit has long since taken up residence in my everyday dish collection.  There were big envelopes full of old tax returns, bank statements, and bills.  I found the outfit that my 15 year old baby wore home from the hospital, and gulp,( more tears) two little hand prints made in dried red clay with the names Emily and Sam on them!  I found a few boxes with cards on them, wedding presents!!! For me!! With crystal dishes that I have obviously never used, There were a few old puzzles which Sam was happy to put together, and some old model cars which Trent had never put together, my old clippers which I used to use to cut Sam's hair before he got old enough to know better and lots and lots of junk. Just when I thought the cupboards were empty and had started wiping them down, my hand bumped something way at the back... It was a 13 year old box of Kraft dinner!!! ( for an explanation of why it was there please read the post entitled, A Domestic Goddess I Ain't)

 I threw away a whole garbage bag full of just pure junk, burned another whole bag full of old tax returns and bank statements, but kept out a couple of plastic grocery bags which appeared to have cards and momentos in them.  I went through these at the end  after I had washed down the cupboards and put back the tiny hand prints and other keepers. These bags were the real treasure in the trove! I have a habit of saving old cards, but once in a while I will find a stack of 4 year old cards and throw them away thinking.. Oh who needs these, but I am so glad I never gave my self the opportunity to throw these away.  Most of them were cards that I got for my wedding! 19 years ago.  While most didn't have any special meaning, that lump in my throat got way bigger when I opened a tiny little card that said, "all my Love, Nanny Kenny" .  My Nanny has been gone for 6 years this May, and it was like a little message from heaven from her (pauses to blow nose and wipe tears). Then I came across one, " all our love and best wishes from , Grammy and Grampy" .  Grampy has been gone for 17 years and Grammy for 7.  There was another from my dear neighbour Lois Pridham who was like a second mother to us, and one, " with love from Auntie Della" who was so special to Trent as well as to me.  There were also lots of funny ones, like the one from Lisa Gallant with a huge letter written all over the inside apologizing for not staying for the reception and all of the ones from Trent's old friends calling him a gooner blab and a dummy honk, and of course the one signed Sir James MacKay the 4th... and Melanie.

 And then at the end of the pile of wedding cards was a small pile of...(gulp) unmailed thank you cards... (guilt guilt) so I guess there is no better time to say officially:
 Angela and Cory Rocheford,
 Carol Rayner
 Aunt Alice and Uncle Dick Ellsworth,
Uncle Terry and Aunt Gladys Kenny,
Aunt Barbara and UncleStewart McRae,
 Uncle Wendell and the late Aunt Josie Harper
 Uncle Bobby and Aunt Penny Harper,
Uncle Joe and Aunt Patsy Harper,
 I am very sorry I never sent you thank you cards after my wedding! Thank You, Thank You, Thank You!  I loved your gifts and appreciated having you as my guests.  Please forgive me!

 After the wedding cards there were a variety of cards, including a collection of 'congratulations on the arrival of your new baby girl' cards received at the birth of Emily, now aged 17 and off to university in the fall...( more tears) 'congratulations on the birth of your new baby boy ' cards, for Sam age 15. And awhile bunch of various birthday, valentines, anniversary cards to all of us, which made us all laugh and cry a bit.

   There were some momentos for Elora too, her 5 year grade one readiness assessment in which we found that Elora had very good verbal and writing skills, but had trouble with thinks like tying her shoes and doing up her zipper.  Her teachers final comment was, " Elora is a very happy and easy going little girl, she shows great enthusiasm and typically skips around the classroom beautifully singing and humming.... She has a very soft personality and her feelings are easily hurt.... Keep up the super work Elora!  ...". There was also a few homemade cards from her in there and a lovely self portrait of her at age 6!! ;).  There were photos of her from kindergarten, and birthday cards and invitations, and I tiny plaster of paris broken hand print too!

 My time machine/cupboard exploration lasted about 4 hours and was probably the most fun I have had cleaning in my life!   There are so many more memories that I found that I had forgotten about that I could go on for pages and pages, but I will keep them to myself for now.  I also got some insight into why I enjoy the show hoarders so much, probably because I can kind of understand how easy it is to let stuff pile up and how many wonderful treasures can be stored in a pile of junk.. Maybe I have a little hoarder in me??  Likely so, since I put that 13 year old box of Kraft dinner back in the cupboard for another 13 years,  just for fun.. Since I couldn't convince anyone to eat it if I cooked it! oh and I did find the fondue pot! Now I had better go and make that chocolate fondue!!

Uganda Isn't the Only Country With Child Soldiers.

A couple of events in the media over the last few days have got me thinking about a forgotten boy.  A former child soldier who daily lives with the loss of his childhood and the guilt for the things that he did while serving as a child soldier in an army that he didn’t fully understand.   I bet you are all thinking I am talking about a Ugandan boy who was kidnapped and forced to serve under warlord Joseph Kony right? After all, thanks to a viral video people all over Canada are enraged at the way Kony has abused and murdered Ugandan children.  North Americans  are trying to do whatever little thing they can do to try and stop Kony and to save those countless child soldiers, but I am not talking about a Ugandan boy.  I am talking about a Canadian boy,  a boy who spent part of his childhood living in Toronto and who remains to this day, as far as I know, a Canadian citizen.  That boy’s name is Omar Khadr. 

Omar Khadr’s family spent part of his childhood living in Canada, but his father held extremist Muslim views and took the family back to live in Pakistan where he became involved in Al-Qaeda.  Omar spent his early teen years being homeschooled and spending increasing amounts of time with the men his father associated with, until, at age 15 he became involved in the fighting.  During a battle he threw a firebomb that killed an American soldier.  He was arrested and was sent to Guantanamo Bay, at age 15.

In the years since his arrest Canada has done nothing to defend or help Omar Khadr, despite the fact that the UN, Amnesty international, Unicef and many other prominent organizations have deemed him to be a Child combatant and urged Canada to seek his repatriation.  Despite the fact that the supreme court of Canada has ruled that Omar’s rights as a Canadian citizen, as a Canadian child, have been severely violated. 

 

Omar Khadr is now 26 years old.  He has spent 11 of those years in an American prison.  He was found guilty by a US military court after awaiting trial for 7 years.  He received a further 8 year sentence.  By the time he is released at age 30 he will have spent half of his life in prison.  This is what the governments of Canada and the United States think is acceptable treatment for Child Soldiers.  And people wonder why our governments won’t intervene in the case of Joseph Kony?

Last night’s top news story was that former Burmese political prisoner Aung San Suu Kyi was awarded Canadian citizen ship today by foreign affairs minister John Baird..  If I was Dr. Suu Kyi, I wouldn’t put much stock in that citizen ship, it doesn’t seem to count for much if you find yourself in a tight place, just ask Omar Khadr.

If you sprinkle when you tinkle, Sit The F**ck Down!!!

I have an ax to grind, a bone to pick, with men who pee standing up.  Yes you heard me, men who pee standing up! Now you are probably thinking, don’t most men pee standing up? Why yes yes they do! So, if you are a man, or male who pees standing up, I want you to read this blog post,

If you are a woman who has, or at some time in the future may have a male child whom you will have to toilet train, I want you to read this blog post,

If you are a woman who has ever sat in, or stepped in male urine, or who has ever had to clean a toilet/ urinal, join my cause!

What, you may ask is my cause? I am hereby starting a campaign to convince every civilized person to pee sitting down! Yes that’s right; I think every civilized person should pee sitting down.  Why? Because you are less likely to splash your urine all over the place for the next person to step in/ sit in/ cleanup/ smell!!!!

Now I can hear a lot of you saying, “ew, I don’t want to have to sit on those nasty dirty public toilets and catch other people’s ass germs” but I am asking you to show me one instance of a dreaded toilet disease that you know of.. Current, not from 100 years ago… I am sure you can’t tell me about 1!  And that is because the modern toilet is normally the cleanest surface in any home/ business.  It gets cleaned more often, with harsher chemicals than any other surface.  There are 100 times more germs on the average door handle or light switch than the average toilet.  In fact the average kitchen sink has 10 times more germs than the average public toilet. 

Now I am sure you are all thinking,” I have seen some nasty public toilets” and so have I, but they got that way because PEOPLE DIDN’T SIT DOWN TO PEE! And I have to say, I work in a place with public washrooms, the women have nothing on the men.  In the men’s rooms there is pee on the walls, on the floor, down the front of the urinals, down the front of the toilet! Everywhere!  Simply because men stand up to pee.   Now I am sure most of you (men) are wanting to say, “ not me, just because one person makes a mess, don’t blame everyone”  but sorry! I have to say if you take a hose and try to aim a thin stream of water into a bucket or whatever from a foot away, you are going to get some splashage. A few stray drops and that is fine….. if its water, but its not! Its urine!!!! Urine is dirty and smelly! When its dry it stinks!  Most women have more sensitive senses of smell than most men, even if you can’t smell it, WE CAN! And don’t get me started on sitting in someone else’s pee!!! Is there anything worse?? More disgusting? Than getting up in the middle of the night to go and pee, sitting down in the semi dark and feeling yourself slip… in someone else’s urine??? Even if that someone is a loved one, it is still unpleasant!

So here is my solution for this problem.  From this point on, every mother MUST train their sons to pee sitting down! Think of all the good you will be bringing into his future relationships, not to mention the misery you will be saving for countless public cleaning people! If every mother would just start taking this one small step think about how much nicer the world would be!  Now I’m sure you are thinking, my children are grown, what can do now? You can send them a link to this blog encouraging your grown sons to take up the cause and start peeing sitting down, for the betterment of humanity.  You can also forward this to any and every man you know, and beg them, for all that’s good and holy just pee sitting down! And to all of the men out there, please, on behalf of every women who you know and love, Sit The F**k Down!!

A non romantic story for all the cynical lovers out there

Last night my daughter, my husband and I were chatting over supper about someone's plan to propose to their girlfriend.  My husband Trent put in his two cents worth and Emily and I both laughed. I suggested maybe Trent should tell him the romantic story about how he proposed to me.... Then I said, "oh wait! You never proposed to me! So I guess you don't get to give advice in this matter... "

 Don't get me wrong, I'm not bitter!  I've always really thought it was a bit ridiculous that we live in a society where men and women are supposed to be equal, where marriage is supposed to be a partnership, but as women we still leave the decision about when and if to get married up to the man.  He is supposed to completely surprise us and honour us by asking him to marry us and if he doesn't... Well we just wait and pine?  I know couples who have lived together for years.  They own homes and have children togethr but when I have asked women why they never got married many have said, "he never asked me!" Seriously? You'd jump up and marry him if only he'd get down on one knee? But you are content to live with him and be his wife in every other way even though he doesn't think you are special enough to marry?

 So I suppose you are wondering? How did we manage to get married if Trent never proposed? Well we discussed the issue like consenting adults.  You see I had told Trent that I thought we should get married. We had a child, and I wanted us to be a family.  He thought we were too young (we were 17 and 19, he was probably right ) and he wasn't ready, and so we broke up! We were apart for a year and during that time I did get engaged to someone else! He was a very romantic guy and he got down on one knee in the snow and gave me a ring and I cried and said yes, but not long afterwards I realized I was in love with the romance, but not the man! There were too many ways that we were just incompatible.

 Meanwhile hearing I was engaged to someone else I guess gave Trent a little shock and he realized that he really did want to be with me.  at the same time I realized that I still wanted to be with him and maybe he was right about us being to young to get married.  When we got back together he knew that getting married was important to me.  While attending a friends wedding I asked him if he thought we should ever get married.  He said yes, of course! And I said when would you like to? And he said how about next July? And the rest was history! It wasn't romantic, I didn't get a ring, we did discuss the possibility of a ring, but I really wanted to put that money towards buying a house.  I kinda would have liked an inexpensive ring as a symbol to show everyone else, but in the end it was just as well that he didn't bother as I now have serious contact allergies and can't even wear  my wedding ring anymore.

After almost 19 years of marriage we are still very happy together.  He is still not a great romantic, but he does try, sometimes... He actually got me flowers one time this year for no reason at all, mind you he didn't get me anything at all for valentines day last year.  I wasn't really upset, it was snow storming that day.  He told me he intended to get me something, but all the stores were closed due to the storm.  I have come to realize after 21 years together, that expecting my husband to plan ahead is akin to expecting a person born with no legs to jump rope.. It's not going to happen naturally and if it does it will probably not end well.  I have come to believe that that portion of his brain that is supposed to plan in advance simply didn't grow, so instead of getting mad.. I just accept it the same as his blue eyes and crooked nose. A part of him that makes him who he is. And he accepts me for who I am with all my quirks, and annoying habits.   I guess we are a prime example that romance isn't a necessary ingredient to a successful marriage! But communication and mutual respect is!  However, a word to the wise, if you are a man, this year for valentines day give your wife a card or something at least, just to show her that you appreciate, love and respect her...

You are a human being, not a human doing!

Have you ever been at a meeting or a course where you are doing those group introductions where you go around the room and everyone is supposed to introduce themselves and tell the group a bit about themselves?  Typically you’d tell your name, what you do for a living, how many children you have, etc.  I know that is my general response, but my current challenge for myself is to define myself internally, not according to my relationships, or my job. 

This navel gazing journey started for me about 9 years ago actually.  I think I was watching Oprah, or some other daytime talk show and they were talking about self-awareness.  Some guru posed the question, “Who are YOU? Not who’s mother are you, not who’s wife are you, not who’s child are you, not what is your job, but who are YOU separate from all those other things?”  I couldn’t answer that question.  I realized that I ran a motocross business and knew lots about motocross but it was my husband’s passion, not mine.  I was the president of the figure skating club, even though I didn’t skate, because my daughter did.  I baked and cooked all the time, not because I loved to, but because my family loved the results.  I was mommified!.. Now don’t get me wrong, I did all of these things of my own free will  and out of love for my family and with the intention of being the best parent I could be, but somewhere along the way I had completely lost track of who I was… and so began my quarter life crisis.

A very wise woman once told me, “You are a human being, not a human doing.   You are important because you ARE, not because of what you do”.  I know it may sound very trite to say life is a journey, yada yada, but really it is. I set out on this journey of self-discovery scared to death, thinking I could never afford it, I wasn’t strong enough, it would hurt others…. but you know what? None of that was true! I did afford it, it was totally worth it.  I am way stronger than I thought, and so are the people I love!

I am still on this journey of trying to figure out who Michelle is, not who’s mother, not who’s wife, not who’s employee or employer.   Yes, all those thing are very important to me, but I am trying every day to explore new areas, like writing this blog, like volunteering with the Red Cross, or going geocaching or snorkeling.  So who am I?  One of my close friends once told me I was a Drag Queen in a woman’s body. I love glitz, glam and dance music.  I love nature.   I am a lover of words.  I am a flamboyant extrovert, but I am learning to be a better listener.  I am bossy and funny and I enjoy my own company.  Family is very important to me but I realize that families are fluid and always changing.  So are friendships.  I can be very selfish and self-absorbed, I am not sure whether I want to embrace those qualities or try to change them.  

 I believe we are here on this earth for a very very short time and so I had better make that time worthwhile.  If you go on saying I will do that someday, when I can afford it, or later when I have time. I am here to tell you it is never going to happen.  You will never find the time.  If it is important to you, find a way to make it happen now!  If you think you can’t afford it, if it is important, make a way; sell something you have that is less important, you will always have bills. The last thing you do in life is make a bill!.  So after 9 years I know myself a lot better, but I still haven’t got the courage to introduce myself as a bossy flamboyant self-absorbed creative extrovert snorkeling  writer,  But I might try it someday, just to see peoples reaction.

The Carpenters Apprentice : An Allegory About the Differences Between Jesus and Religion

So I have been doing a lot of thinking about religion lately.  You have probably seen a few of these Fb viral videos on the go, one called, "Why I don’t need religion” and one called, "Why I do need religion”.  I guess these have gotten me ruminating on these topics quite a lot and as you may have guessed, where there is rumination, there is blogging

Last night when I was lying in bed trying to sleep I got thinking about religion and people and human nature and I had a fantastic visual image going on.  I wish I was a graphic artist like my very talented niece Aidan so I could draw out a graphic display like I saw in my head, my alas my medium is with words so I will try and sketch it out for you here as best I can.

The following is an allegory about my beliefs about religion:

 Human nature is very much like the roots of a tree, each one with a label.  Fear, emptiness, need to control, envious, greedy, needing to belong.  These roots grew into a tree called religion, but then along came Jesus who we hung on the tree.   Out of him grew branches of love, miracles, acceptance, grace, salvation and forgiveness.  The tree was wild and beautiful and out of control, people were swinging from these branches with joy because they were finally released from the darkness underground, but then some people thought,
 " Hey this tree is getting out of control! What if someone falls off of one of these branches and gets hurt? What if one of these branches grows over the fence and gets tangled up with some other tree? Where is Jesus? You know sometimes it is hard to hear his voice with all the noisy people chattering away and all those branches rattling away, lets chop a few off and we will keep them down here on the ground where no one will fall and get hurt.  Which ones? Well let’s cut them all off to be fair, but we won’t throw them away, we’ll just mill them down into boards.. It’s is still the same wood! Wood is wood right? Sure it won’t be alive anymore, but it will be a lot easier to get at, more accessible and we won’t have to worry about people going out on thin limbs and doing things like being friends with people from other religions, loving someone from another tree, praying for a miracle, or offering forgiveness when it isn’t warranted or even worse, jumping off and trusting God to help them fly.  What’s that you say?”

 “Didn’t Jesus come to bring us all of these things? Didn’t Jesus tell us to love our neighbours the same as we love ourselves? Didn’t he say that he came so that we could have abundant life? Didn’t he say that he had come to build a bridge between God and man??”

“Oh yes! Building! That is what we are going to do with this wood, build a bridge.  It will be kind of a long rectangular box of a bridge.  On one side we will make a frame and call it love, but you can only love the people who are in your box, the rest have germy ideologies…what is that wrong? Ok well you can love the rest of them In that, I will pray for you that god will show you how wrong you are, way but I am not going to touch you or talk to you because I might catch your demon cooties.   Now the next frame is for forgiveness:  What’s that you say?”

 "Didn’t Jesus offer us forgiveness from our sins isn’t that what he died for? Now we just confess our sins to God and…."

"Whoa whoa whoa, back up the bus now! You guys are taking things all out of context here! Confess your sins to god? He is a busy guy! What if he wasn’t listening when you confessed? Confess your sins to a man who will make sure god hears, and oh now, you’re not getting off that easy, maybe not just one man, maybe you had better drag your butt up to the railing in front of all your peers  (this railing here that I just built out of the forgiveness branch, you can choose between it or the mini wooden private box also made from the forgiveness branch) and then you had better do something’s to pay for your sins…"

" But I thought Jesus already paid for my sins??"

"Oh so you want to freeload off of Jesus now?? Haven’t you ever heard of those first month free trials?? At first Jesus washes away all your sins, but after that, you have to pay, now will that be credit or debit?"

"Oh by the way, since we are on the topic of money, Jesus told me that I should take all my possessions and sell them and give the money to the poor because it is pretty tough to love god and money so I’ll go do that and….."

 "Whoa whoa!! Wait! See this new section of the chur…bridge? It is made from that give to the poor branch, we are calling it offerings/ tithes/charity, but we have worked out a great deal with God see, you only have to put %10 down! A special member’s rate! No need to go giving it all away, then you’d be poor like the poor people and someone else would have to look after you and it would just be a big mess! If you want to give a bit more you can do it on Jesus’s birthday, like a special present to him, just make sure you spend the other %90 on yourself.  So just give us %`10 and we’ll see that those poor people who really deserve it get enough to keep them from starving to death until they pull themselves up by their bootstraps and get their lives right.  What about the rest of that money you’ll give us? Well we are poor too! Us church builders are poor carpenters like Jesus!  No one is paying us to build this thing, and besides look at all the time we spend explaining all of this to numbskulls like you! Isn’t that worth a few bucks?

Ah now the last wall, Salvation.  This was the thickest biggest branch of them all, so we have better give this one a complex pattern…"

"Hold it! Salvation isn’t complicated! Jesus came to give us this gift! That was his whole purpose.  It is freely given! Look at that thief on the cross, he just believed in Jesus and he received salvation…."

"Stop Right There! That was a special circumstance!!! Jesus was just giving out a last minute special deal for a good example, now really salvation is very complicated and if you don’t get it right you might miss the boat and end up…ahem..You know where! So now stick with me and I’ll show you how it’s done! The first step depends on which box..er…chur..er bridge you choose to take.  Hmm this one here you need to start at birth, follow all of our rules, jump through hoops and spit a few nickels and then at the end when you die we’ll show you what you missed and you can spend a few more hundred years getting ready and then if you’re lucky Jesus will let you into heaven.  Now on this next path you start out like the sinner on the cross you believe in Jesus, you accept him and then you don’t sin again ever… oh I hear you saying, but all men have sinned and fallen short…. Yes you will sin, but you have to keep praying and trying not to and hopefully you’ll get lucky and die in church on your way back from the railing with a clean heart and you’ll go to heaven. Oh and let’s not forget about baptism, it might have to happen at birth, or later on when you can choose of your own free will, but one way or another you’re not getting into heaven without it!...I know I know that thief on the cross wasn’t baptised, but like I said, special circumstances!

Ok now look at my beautiful box that I have made! It’s safe! It’s tight! It is neat and tidy! What a wonderful thing I have created!"

 " But what about Jesus?"

"Jesus? oh yes Jesus! He told me how to build it! Divine revelation!"

"Really? Because I didn’t hear him…."

"Oh no you wouldn’t have, Jesus only speaks to a chosen few you know.  Like the 12 apostles, special dedicated blessed people who could hear Jesus and really understand him, like Peter, remember how Jesus said you are a rock Peter and upon this rock I will build my church? I am like Peter and Jesus revealed to me how to build this church…."

"But where is Jesus? I can’t hear him anymore.  I could always here him up in the branches of the live tree! "

"Oh, Jesus is in the box."

" Jesus, God, is in a box?"

"Well, box is such a harsh word, let’s not call it a box, let’s call it a religion…there isn’t that a better word? Re lig ion has such a nice sound don’t you think?"

"But really how am I supposed to be with Jesus if he is in there?"

"Oh its simple, you just hop in too, come on, GET IN the BOX or you might Die and Go to hell!!!"

"But what about those other boxes that those guys made? Is Jesus in them too???"

"NO! Those boxes have the Devil in them! Stay away from them or he might reach out and grab you and you’ll never get away!!!"

"But didn’t they make them all out of wood from the same tree??"

"NO they were deceived! They stared out alright, but they didn’t understand that only I could hear from god now, because I had Jesus in my box.  They thought they were hearing from god, but the couldn’t have been, Obviously, because their boxes look different from mine.  They must have been hearing from the devil who was masquerading as Jesus, now hurry up and get into my box where you’ll be safe!"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1IAhDGYlpqY

I Love You, Let's EAT!

January is birthday season with my friends and family. There are tons of birthdays, mine included, during this month and after attending several birthday parties, I have noticed how much of our culture and socialization is wrapped up in food. 

The reason that I have been thinking about this is, over the last several years I have developed some really severe food allergies.  I never noticed how much our social structures revolve around food until I couldn’t eat it.  Today I got a smear of frosting on my finger off of my baby nephew, first impulse, lick it off… but if you have a food allergy, you know what I have learned to hard way, don’t!

 Don’t get me wrong I’m not bitter.. (Well maybe just a little), but honestly I have gotten very used to not being able to take part in this ritual eating.  I stick to fruit, if it is available, and herbal teas.  Part of the food allergy has created a lot of damage to my digestive system so now in addition to being unable to eat dairy, I also can’t have anything high in sugar and anything really greasy, so that leaves my choices pretty low.  The funny thing is it seems other people are bothered by it more than I am! “What, you can’t eat? What about this, what about that? How about a drink..”  I try to explain that it is ok, I’m fine, I’m not upset, my feelings aren’t hurt, don’t be upset. You don’t have to make me anything special.  And no, I’d rather not  “try” something if I haven’t been able to read the packaging on it.  Also no, I’m not interested in just pigging out once in a while for a special occasion and just suffering through afterwards, it’s just completely not worth it!                                        

All of this has lead me to speculate as to why our socialized rituals are surrounded by food.  Don’t get me wrong, I love food, but why can’t we just enjoy each other’s company without food? Why can’t we just … talk? Laugh? sing??  Maybe it’s maternal? Our need to nurture? Our need to feed?  after all what is the first thing most new mothers do? Put their child to their breast immediately after birth, so basically we appear in this world and seconds later, Bam, someone is shoving food in your mouth! Although that makes me wonder, many people born in the 20th century were not breast fed and so maybe our need to eat has come from missing that initial birth feed?? Too Freudian?? I don’t know! If I was still in school and writing this as an assignment this would be where I would tie in a few peer reviewed journal articles  and give a reason, but meh.. not today. 

My goal in this blog is to create dialogue, and the best way to do that is by asking questions!  Every authority out there will tell you we are in the midst of an obesity epidemic and there are lots of studies out there that link our western obesity epidemic to chemicals in our food, or lack of exercise, or some other X factor.   Don’t get me wrong, I completely agree!  Now being a neurotic label reader I can’t believe what is in the food we eat every day, but I think our social rituals have a lot to do with it how fat we are getting too. Think about it, when someone is sick, we feed them. company ? Food. Need an excuse to invite someone over? Food.  Holidays…food food food! Special occasion? Food! Love? Definetely food! Remember the movie Elf? When Buddy the Elf’s younger brother explains to him what a date was he says, ”you take a girl to dinner to eat food”, so Buddy’s way of asking out the girl of his dreams, “ do you want to eat food with me?”.    

 I don’t know really why we express love and friendship through food, and I wouldn’t dare think that I could possibly alter that age old social ritual, but I can question it and I am completely aware of it now that I am excluded from it.  So please know, I love you even though I won’t eat your food.  Its not that I don’t like it,  you are a good friend, but I just can’t.  I enjoy your company, I am having a good time and it doesn’t bother me (much) to watch others eat and not eat my self, I just whisper to myself, “I’m getting thinner and they are getting fatter, hahaha"

Who's Aunt is that??

I had one of those moments tonight that I have always heard about on tv, but had never actually experienced. I happened to glance in the mirror and for a brief second I didn’t recognize myself. Now don’t panic, I’m not losing my mind or anything, I knew it was me looking back, but for just the briefest second it didn’t register. My face didn’t look like me! I had one of those, ” who is that middle aged woman in the mirror?” moments. She looked very familiar, like she could be my aunt or something. She looked enough like my mother that she could be a relation, but she definitely could not be me! and I thought , “do I really look that old to everyone else?? Is this what I look like?” It is strange that I could say that I don’t know what I look like, after all I spent time looking at myself every day! I am ashamed to say that I am very image conscious and I am terrified that I could be talking to someone and say, have a piece of food stuck in my teeth, or even worse, a booger on my nose, but I realized that I don’t actually spend much time just absorbing the look of my whole face. Instead I focus on little bits rather than the whole. You know what I mean, I get out the magnifying mirror and pluck out those damn little dark hairs that , as of late seem to sprout from my chin, lip, and .. dare I say, even my nose! While I’m at it I will dig out those bloody little pimples who haven’t yet gotten the message that they have overstayed their welcome by at least 20 years!! And then I examine my eyes when I am putting on my make up and try and decide, what do I need today? Preparation H to shrink the bags, or shelack to fill in the wrinkles that appear when the bags aren’t there? But the whole face? I guess I haven’t considered it in a long while, seeing how I didn’t’ even recognize it, even if only for a brief second. So now that I have gotten this external view of myself, be it ever so brief, I think I am going to try and see if I can do it a bit more often and ask a few more questions about that face that I see. Does that lady look like someone I would like to spend time with? Will she listen to me? Does she look pleasant? Angry? Stressed? Hard? Soft? Happy? Sad? Does she have the look of someone who is hopeful? Or the look of someone who has given up? Is she loved, does she love? Is she some one I can depend on? I hope so! I have a lot of wonderful Aunts who have given me great guidance, love and support over the years, but I could always use one more I suppose… wasn’t there a song about a guy who was his own grandpa? I guess that means I could be my own aunt, now I just have to sort out, am I the cool young fun aunt? Or the weird eccentric one with the crazy clothes who talks to her cat….

My Christmas Tree

When I look at my Christmas tree, I see a life time of memories. Some  people have fashionable trees, with the latest style, of big glass balls, flowers  and ribbons, but not me.  I know to many people my tree is tacky, gaudy even, but when I look at it I see my family growing up.  I see how far we've come.  Every year with my family it is a walk down memory lane as we put up the Christmas tree.

 Our first Christmas in our own home was back in 1993 We only had 2 ornaments to start out with,  My oldest daughters Baby’s First Christmas ornament and one she received for her second Christmas, a Santa in a hot air  balloon that rotated when it was plugged into the light set.  We had to start pretty much from scratch, so we bought a  big set of wooden soldiers.  There were about 100 of them in a whole bunch of different poses.  We also got an angel to go on top of the tree and a few red and gold balls.

 That first year my next door neighbour came over with a Christmas ornament for my oldest daughter.  She told me, “ I’ll give her one every year and then when she gets married she’ll have her own set to start out with.".  She did and carried on the tradition with my other two children as well.  I thought it was a lovely tradition and so my mother in-law and  I started adding to the children's collections as well.  Now when it comes time to deck the tree each of my three children has their own box of ornaments.  Each ornament has a memory.  We remember which ones came from our neighbour Marjory, which ones came from Meme,  which came from me and which came from friends.

 The kids have added to their own collections as well.  There are the hand made ornaments, like the star my son made in beavers when he was 6.. he’s 15 now!  Each ornament speaks to me tell of a child that was, the sparkly ballerina that my oldest wanted to be at age 6.  The figure skate from her years at the rink.  The hand coloured ones that my middle child made with her best child hood friend, the Cat in the Hat that was so popular one year, the Bob the Builder who that long ago 4 year old boy worshipped and there are the beeswax ornaments that our old babysitter Daneille made for us many years ago.

 Even the ones that I bought for myself tell me stories.  The sparkly glass ornaments and tear drops that reminded me of the trees from my childhood.  The plastic gold balls that I got when the kids were tree wrecking toddlers.  The bells that Sam liked to tie to the poor cats tails and of course those steadfast wooden soldiers.  The ranks of those soldiers have thinned over the years.  Like remembrance day services, each year there are fewer and fewer of them.  Mine have fallen victim to marauding children, cats and time, but a few still soldier on.

Now my tree is beginning to be populated by a new ornament.  The ones  that I get each year in case.. , in case this year my oldest comes and says, "Mom, I’m going to put up my own tree at my house this year” and she takes her box and my tree will look empty.  A few years later each child will take his or her box and go to a new tree.. so each year I add a few ball and bulbs, just in case, and try not to think sad thoughts for the future,  but I can’t help but get a little teary when I look at all those ornaments that speak of those long ago babies and toddlers, princesses and little boys and see the beautiful adults they are becoming.

 My Christmas tree tells the story of my family, my life, my adult hood.  It whispers to me like the spirits that haunted Scrooge, of what was past and what is still to come.  I remember the advent tree decorating parties with those wide eyed babes.  Now we have the boyfriend girlfriend tree decorating parties and for a while we may have some empty nest tree decking parties where we can keep company with other lonely like minded folks.  Someday I hope there will be the grand children parties but I know what ever will be, it the memories will live in my heart forever.

Free boob

I had an experience today that really made me think about my body image and how it relates to theory’s such as Judith Butler’s. Early this afternoon I was relaxing in my Pj’s when one of my kids said, “ Grammy and Grampy are here” my first thought was, “ Shit, I guess I had better go and put a bra on!”

You see I generally go free-boob in my Pj’s. It is much more comfortable than wearing a bra and in my own home I feel comfortable that I don’t have to try and conform my body to the worlds standards, after all my husband sees me with my clothes off all the time and he likes what the reality is, the rest of the world, on the other hand, is probably not ready to face the cruel truth.

 For those of you young-uns who are thinking, “it really can’t be that bad” I will briefly explain what the effect of milk coming in and failing to breast feed does. Do you remember the line in the Grinch who Stole Christmas “the Grinch’s small heart grew 3 sizes that day” ? Well picture your boobs doing that in one day. Unfortunately the milk eventually goes away, but the over stretched skin does not, leaving behind something that more closely resembles oranges in tube socks than the nice perky breasts of Hollywood. The up side is that if I ever suffer a bad burn and need a skin graft I know just where there is lots of extra that they can harvest, no tissue expanders needed. The result is that I rely on super heavy duty bras that have more engineering than the space shuttle. They aren’t comfortable, but I wear them in order to conform to societies standard that attractive breasts are young perky breasts.

When I first started my job as a bar manager at the local legion one of the members jokingly asked if anyone told me that Tuesday was topless night. I replied that I was game if he was but it would probably be a lot more like national geographic than playboy channel. So I asked myself this afternoon, is this part of what Butler was talking about when she discusses how we shape our bodies to conform to our social discourse of gender identity? (paraphrase). I think so, but am I ready to step outside of that discourse and enact emancipatory change in my life? Not yet. I know that squeezing myself into uncomfortable bras is denying the beauty of my body as it is. I know that it is denying the reality of motherhood and age, but I am not yet ready to become my mother-in-law. She is a 68 yr old who has larger and saggier breasts than mine, but still regularly wears tube tops (or as my teenagers call them, tube belts). She free-boobs like there is no tomorrow. She claims that it is because bras rub on her heart surgery scars and make them sore but I have known her since before her surgery.. She has been going free-boob for longer than that. I think she burned all her bras in the 60's and never looked back and she is obliviously happy to the comments made behind her back. She notes the stares with approval, taking them for admiring glances. I, on the other hand, am not ready for the social judgement that comes with just being who I really am. Makes me wonder who the smart one really is here.

 Ironically, while most of the feminist psychology I have explored blames our need for conformity on patriarchal society, I feel the most comfortable with my body in the company of my husband. When I went to put my bra on he said, “ gonna put them puppies on a leash are ya?” To which I replied, “ how would you feel if I decided to just let them roam free from now on?” he said it wouldn’t bother him in the least, he thinks they look great either way. I guess based on his mother, Freud would have something to say about that, but that is another topic altogether.

Bikini contemplations

I have reached a point in my life where I have realized that if I didn't like my body when I was 16, size 4, with no stretch marks or wrinkles I am probably never going to like it. Honestly though, I didn't like my body then because I focused on all the flaws that I saw and I judged those flaws based on my socially constructed western beauty ideology. I have long accepted this ideology of beauty as fact rather than what it is, an idea that my society has formed based largely on the ideals of the Hollywood media culture.

 Realizing all this I have begun to look at my body based on a different reality. Is it healthy? Pretty much. Does it function well? Yes. Do the people who matter find it repulsive? No. Am I ever going to be size 4 with no stretch marks again? No. Does that mean that I should wear a burka all the time? No!

 Now in case you are wondering were this is all going I will ask you, have you ever seen the bathing suits designed for older women, you know the ones with the skirts that hide every thing, and a hundred pounds of liner to hold the boobs up and suck the rolls in? Well I have to tell you, as a person who loves to swim, they suck! They are clingy and heavy and they never dry! As I lay dripping on the beach enviously watching the teenagers prancing by in their itsy bitsy's I get quite jealous and think, I wish I could wear one of those but sadly I will never be able to again... and finally it has occurred to me that no one is stopping me but me!

 There are no bathing suit police patrolling the beach who are going to come and tell me,  "for gods sake woman hide those stretch marks and wrap up that flab!" And really if people look at my body and mock me behind my back, then that is their problem, not mine. I keep saying if you don't like what you see then don't look. To that end I have bought myself my first bikini in about 10 years. I haven't yet had the courage to wear it out in public yet, but I am working on it as we speak. One of these days I am just going to say Fuck you western perfect body ideals! I love my body and I don't care what anyone else says.

Postscript:
as you can see in the picture, I have since worn said bikini in the company of several teenagers who have been known to moonlight as bathing suit police and their verdict was," its not horribly tragic!"