Parties

With the holidays fast approaching, I already find myself wishing I had more time.  More time for fun, more time for friends and more time with the family.  I was actually contemplating having a holiday party of some sort but I'm not even sure I have enough friends to invite.  Kind of sad in a way, but I spend so much time at work and with the hubby and kids it doesn't leave a lot of time.  Plus I pretty much work alone, don't attend a religous service so there really isn't anywhere that I know to meet people. 

The friends I do have, I absolutely adore, but they have extended families that up much of their time this time of year.  It makes me a bit sad and a bit jealous.  But I love what I do have so I'll take it. Maybe I'll have a party anyway even if no one shows up....we will see....I'm still thinking abou it.

Happy Birthday

Today is my mother's 70th birthday.  I have not talked to her in 7 years.  She lives less than 5 miles from my house in the house I grew up in.  I haven't set foot in that in house in 7 years, since the day my father asked me to return my key.  Days like today are hard because it signals time is passing quickly and 70 years old isn't as young as 63 was. 

Walking away from family is difficult.  Living with that is even harder.  But choosing to live with what was happening back then, wasn't an option that I had.  If you would have asked me how I felt about it 7, 5 or even 3 years ago, I would have told you I was angry, mad or hurt.  In the last year that has changed dramatically.  It's hard to mourn a family that isn't dead.  There is no sympathy for a family lost to estrangement, especially by choice.  But it isn't any less painful.  There are still birthdays, holidays, births, and deaths that have to be dealt with.

Since the anger has passed, there was a time that I was sad.  Thinking of what could have been if things hadn't been done or said.  The problem with that is that they were said and done.  Moving on is like anything in life.  Dwelling on the past isn't healthy.  I can forgive, I can forget, but I can't undo the past nor would I want to. 

I'm happy here.  Happy with the choices I've made. Happy with the life I've chosen.  Happy with myself. 

I doubt she will ever read this.  I don't plan on going back to that life at all but today, for the first time in 7 years, I can say I wish my mother well.  Happy Birthday and I hope you are happy with the life you've chosen too.

If you really knew me...

MTV has this show that revolves around Challenge Day at high schools.  I like the general concept of taking down walls and showing that all kids have problems but I'm not thrilled with putting these vulnerable high school kids and their serious issue on TV for entertainment. 


It did get me to thinking about my life.  There are so many things in my life that I'm not sure anyone knows about me.  At least my friends or coworkers.  I wish I could have meaningful conversations with people without the worry of what will they think of me or will their spouses not want to hang out anymore. 

There are people who put out there that their lives are great.  They have the best families, best husbands or wives, a good job, kids who study hard and like school.  I'm not saying that everyone's life should suck, but it gets to the point where if we do have a real problem it's hard to reach out because we feel like we are the only one dealing with life's crap while everyone is dealing in roses. 

If you really knew me you'd know that I deal with depression.  I take medication that has helped but if I have an off day or I have a valid problem and someone says "did you take your medication" it makes me angry. 

If you really knew me you'd know that I am estranged from my family.  I miss them like crazy some days and not at all on others.  It makes everything hard.  Holidays, birthday's, seasons, memories.  I can't go back, I wouldn't even if I could, but I just wish I had someone to talk to who would understand my pain.

If you really knew me...maybe I would really know myself. 

Dreadlocks

My husband may think I've lost my mind.  But I'm beginning a process of finding myself.  I will admit to having some mental instability in my family but I don't think that is what this is about.  But if I am crazy, how would I know anyway, right? 

I've decided to start dreadlocking my hair.  I understand it's a long process, maybe that is what I'm looking for.  Progression with no clear end...  I'm not sure.  I'm living a life that I love.  I have a great husband, three amazing kids who are interesting individuals.  My job gives me a certain freedom and the monetary means to spend time with my family.  We have made some great friends that we adore spending time with.  Life is good. 

I'm not a religous person, but I would consider myself spiritually reflective.  I'm also impatient, so I'm going to try to help the process get started.  I've decided to do a bit of backcombing but not use product (such as wax) to help hold them at first.  This will be an adventure for me but I'm very excited...

7 years ago this month....

I can't believe it's March already.  This month my youngest son, Maceo, turn 7 years old.  He is such a great kid.  He was such a surprise and such a blessing to us. 

When I met his dad, I was a single mom with two little kids.  Jake was 6 and Maddy was 4.  We had been dating for about 5 months when we celebrated Maddy's 5th birthday.  It was the first big even that we had done together as a "family".  It was nice and fun to be able to do that.  16 1/2 days later I was laying in bed feeling terrified.  I had an inkling that I might be pregnant but hadn't said anything.  I had bought a pregnancy test and was waiting until I was offically late.  That night we went to bed early.  The kids were away and William was going to run a race very early in the morning on Pioneer Day. 

I snuck out of bed to take the test.  My reasoning was that it would be negative and I'd be relieved and then be able to sleep...no problem...right?

Wrong.  The test, of course, came back positive.  It was now the middle of the night and my crazy OCD set in.  At that moment, I had a crazy thought.  We had talked about children at first.  I didn't want anymore.  I already had a boy & a girl and was happy with the way things were.  He always wanted a child but then he met mine.  They were crazy and fun but he thought maybe another one would jeopardize what we had.  By then I had decided maybe one together would be fine, but he seemed past it. 

So here I sat, unsure of how he felt and I was lying there wondering what I had gotten myself into.  I'd been married and divorced.  I had to deal with children having two homes, two families and the problems that come with that.  For a moment I considered leaving, never tell him I was pregnant and running off to raise all three children as a single mom. 

But as I lay there, staring at this awesome man, sleeping...he woke up. He looked at me and asked me what was going on.  As I told him, just an hour or two from when he'd have to wake up to run this race...the fear that I had fell away.  He was so excited and so happy.  I made him promise not to tell his parents, who we were meeting on the way to the race.  It was way too soon in both the pregnancy and the relationship to do that. 

As soon as we saw his mom, he said "you'll never believe this" and she said, "she's pregnant!"  Now she claims she knew, but I think she was joking.  They were just as excited as he was and I knew from that moment that everything would be perfect.

The First Time

My husband & I celebrated the anniversary of our first blind date in early February. We met in a slightly unconventional way. We met online, but not through a dating website or anything. Back in the olden days AOL was the main way people went online. When I left Pocatello, Idaho to come back to Utah after my first marriage fell apart. I moved in with my mother. Not the ideal situation, but one I thought I could deal with for 6 months or so while I got a job, saved up some money and got on my feet. We basically left with nothing but some clothes, toys & a car. I had been a stay at home mom for five years so I didn't have any income coming in.


On the weekends that my kids were gone, I didn't have anything to do, so I went online and chatted with people. I didn't like the chat rooms because they were awkward and random individuals. AOL had a search you could do to find people closer to home. One night I sent him a note because he lived in the same city I was. He didn't want to meet because I wasn't divorced yet, just separated. We chatted off and on for a year and a half. We never met, never exchanged phone number, never exchanged pictures, or even knew each other's last names. We did chat about a lot of personal things, deep feeling and silly things. It's easy to talk to someone when you think you'll never actually meet them. There were times we didn't talk for a few months, but then one of us would contact the other one.

About a month after I moved in with my mom, I realized it wouldn't work so I moved into the cheapest apartment I could find, got a job, and started my life with my kids. My divorce became final and I started dating here and there. I continued to chat online with William and occasionally I'd ask if he'd like to meet, but it became kind of our joke. One day, 11 months after my divorce was final, I asked him to meet. This time he startled me by saying yes. He said you name the where and when and I'll be there.

Keep in mind we still didn't know what each other looked like, last name, where each other lived or even what car to look out for... I decided to meet at Sweet Tomatoes for lunch. I remember pulling up right behind a guy in a white Pontiac Firebird. He parked, I parked. He didn't say anything and neither did I. He walked toward the entrance and so did I. He sat down on the bench right inside as I approached. He said, Sandra. The entire lunch, all two hours was easy conversation, he was funny, charming, and had an amazing personality. He was cute. When we left, I hugged him and told him he smelled good. I didn't want to leave him.

To commemorate that fateful day, we go to Sweet Tomatoes every year. We always take the kids, some times his mom comes, and we’ve even had occasions where extended family has attended the event. I love that tradition. It always reminds me that trying too hard to make something happen isn't always the best way. Sometime it’s just a matter of being ready….

Craving the Personal

The internet is such a great thing!  It gives you so much information at your fingertips.  Helping my kids with homework is a totally different thing than it used to be when I was a kid.  The internet also gets you the opportunity to connect and reconnect with people that you normally wouldn't get to contact. 

I have found that the internet also gives people the opportunity to hide behind the impersonal.  There are so many times that I receive a message online, email, or text and I wish that I could just talk to that person by phone or in person.  I am craving the personal in an impersonal world. 

Because of that I've decided to take a break from online social networking sites.  I have decided to continue the blog because no one reads it...and it feels more like a journal to myself than a form of online communication.  When I get the urge to contact someone, I'm going to make a phone call and see if I can start the chain of personal contact that I crave and see if it will come back to me...

Rediscovering

I wrote the last post a day or so ago, but didn't have the pictures to post until now.  I loved the title of the post but realized that I had so much more to say about uncovering the past.  There is so much from my past that I've wanted to deal with over the years.  Most of the issues I have with my family I think about on a daily basis but I am very happy with the life I have now and I'm not sure I want to revisit that part of who I am other than on a daily reflection.

Part of uncovering the past is realizing that some things are better left alone, as disturbing things won't bring happiness.  I'm finally in a place where I feel confident in myself as a mother, as a wife, even as an employee.  I'm not as confident in myself as an individual. 

Taking down the walls of who I am is easy when you see that I am a mother, a wife, a worker but underneath all of that who am I as an individual?  I've been someone's mother for 15 years, someone's wife for 12 years and I've been someone's employee for 16 years.

Obviously who I was as a mother has changed over the years.  I've grown more confident as time has gone by, having more children, and realizing that expectations change as they grow into individuals.  When it comes right down to it I don't want my children to have the best grades, the best clothes, the most friends.  I simply want them to be happy with the lives they lead and the choices they make.  Learning to make good choices leads to a good life.  But since not everyone makes good choices all the time it's coming to terms with that and making the best choices you can.

Who I am as a wife has changed as well.  When I got married the first time, I was young and naive.  I don't blame much on the young part...more the naive part.  I made a lot of bad choices and allowed myself to be in a position I didn't want to be in.  When the time came that I finally grew up enough to make a change and make a choice, I did.  That brought me to the life I have now with my current (and last) husband.  I'm not a perfect wife, maybe not even a good wife, but my husband loves me in spite of all my crazy imperfections.  That's good, because there are a lot of those to go around. 

The person I am at work was always someone I felt like I was pretending to be.  I used to look at professional people and think that I was not as qualified as them.  I always felt like someone let me into the corporate world, not realizing that I didn't belong here.  I think that all adults feel that way at some point but they all pretend...  Fake it till you make it.  That is something they should teach in high school.

Underneath all of that is this girl.  She's still trying to discover who she is...

Uncovering The Past

Life is funny.  Everything old is new again at some point.  The world goes round and round.  We decided to pull up the carpet in one of our rooms to see what the original hardwood floors looked like underneath.  It was a test to see if we could do it throughout the main part of the house.  This room is our office/Red Sox room.  It had an awesome shag carpet but it is also the room where our cat food dishes are, which resulted in lots of cat food in the shag carpet that was IMPOSSIBLE to get out of the shag easily.

The result of pulling up the carpet was an awesome experience.  I can't imagine what goes through someone's head when they decide that shag carpet is better than hardwood.  But then I realized it's the same thing that made people wear parachute pants, hairsprayed bangs, and flower child clothing.  It was a trend, it was the fashion and with all fashions some are timeless and some are fleeting.

I'm happy to say we love the look of the hardwood and are going to use this room as a test on how we can get it looking the way we want.  Then we will do the rest of the house. 

The floor isn't perfect and I'm sure it won't be when it's done.  Imperfections and flaws are what give it character.  It's all part of it's beauty and I love it too.

Jake

My oldest child turned 15 yesterday.  This has been the weirdest birthday for me so far.  15 is on the brink of adulthood.  He stands a good 4-5 inches taller than me already but he still enjoys a night time tuck in.  He's an amazing person but it's hard to get to know him since he's so engrossed in his own teenage life, video games, and schooling. 

My favorite times with Jake are when there are glimmers of who he will be when he is an adult.  He has an amazing sense of humor and a hilarious laugh that always makes me smile.  Jake is the person in my life who has taught me who I am, he's had to endure parenting mistakes because he's the oldest.  In a way we have grown up together.  We lived through a marriage, divorce, another marriage, two siblings, elementary school and middle school.  He's known me as a struggling single mom living in an apartment and the woman I am now and at the end of the day, he makes me proud to be his mother. 

A New Year

It's 2010.  It's time for change to happen.  It's up to me to do it.  This last year has opened my eyes up to a world of possiblities.  Things don't have to be perfect for them to be amazing.  That's something that I've always appreciated. It's true of people, work, education, love, and home.  It's often the little imperfections that make things worth more, makes them unique and makes them appreciated. 

I've decided that 2010 is my year to embrace my imperfections, try to improve myself but not get so caught up in what could be, should be or isn't that I don't enjoy the here and now.  I've always had a hard time doing that but realizing that the only thing holding me back is myself and my inability to make that choice was a revelation. 

I'm a work in progress, even if it is an imperfect work.