You've come a long way, baby

“A man has to live with himself, and he should see to it that he always has good company.” ~Charles Evans Hughes

A few weeks ago, I spent some time perusing my archives. Not necessarily looking to bask in the glow of my brilliance but looking for a post highlighting my socially awkward behaviors. A post that screams: You KNOW you want to be friends with me even though I mumble. Anyway, during my quest, I came across one of my first pieces to adequately show off how I let anticipation run rampant through my life and psyche thus forcing me to stick my head between my knees and kiss my ass goodbye, when faced with a potentially awkward social situation. In this case the famed DC Blogger Happy Hour: The monthly event in which we speak less of blogging and more of the gossip and best practices for taking shots.

Given that I find most NEW situations with NEW people to be particularly frightening and I face it with a rapid fire ‘What if?’ round of questioning, usually starting with “what if they hate me?” and ending with “what if they think I drink too much?” Though most importantly, “what do I do when they decided that they hate me?” Because they will hate me, they have to hate me and maybe if I drink myself into a stupor, I won’t notice the seething hatred spilling out of them. I must say, thank the Lord that it’s a blogger happy hour, for they are the only people able to handle this extreme level of narcissism.

My first HH was an act of experimentation. Balls of never ending nerves and a shaky hand trying to hold a martini glass perfectly steady. That was the happy hour when Cookie and I bonded over double fisting chocolate martinis before Dragonfly’s drink specials ended (I am nothing if not excellent in getting more bang for my buck). It was the happy hour before I knew of the drama that those surrounding me could endure and involve themselves in, stupid shit that need not be detailed. Mostly because my attention span is a grand total of 2.8 seconds. It was the happy hour during which I realized that everyone needs a few drinks to relax themselves, thusly I am not really that much of a lush, just completely normal.

This past Thursday was I-66’s last stint as social chair. We went to Buffalo Billiards. Kassy met me outside with hugs and a kiss on the cheek. We beelined for the restroom and then to the bar, for we are two girls who have our priorities. We were cornered at the bar by a man who wanted to express sincere adoration for us and we in turn, wanted to hug…during which she was gracious and I made my “oh my fuck…there’s better shit to read” face. But it was his sincerety that kept me from awkwardly shifting from one foot to the other. An Argentinean Jew greeted me with a real hug. And these two are not nearly as scary as one might think, in fact it’s there whole “I don’t give a fuck” demeanor that gives me more inclination to love than hate. She thinks I exude smarts and I'm positively giddy each and every time I see her. They’re both hot and fucking brilliant and I want to pet their heads because they like me, they really like me.

Imagine walking into a room and being totally at ease. The ability to approach someone with “Oh….we were trying to figure out who you were” without the recipient punching you in the nose for being so damn rude. It’s not about whether or not they like me or what I had to do and have to do to keep the others for finding me terribly annoying and bull in a china shop-esque. Though I’m sure that the monthly bribes do help a bit. I don’t know what happened or the when or the how, but I suddenly find myself to be gregarious and freely meandering and laughing through waves of people. Genuinely happy to see and meet, while staying out of the fray.

Is it possible that my socially awkward phase is finally abating? Is it that I’ve slowly grown into feelings of comfort and affability when with this particular group? That all remains to be seen. But I can say with complete certainty that there is no such thing as too much drinking at HH. In fact we embrace the drinking whole-heartedly and as the reigning Biggest Lush, that first drink, is on me.

Slippery slope

"The Internet is the most important single development in the history of human communication since the invention of call waiting." ~Dave Barry

Tuesday morning I prepared for work as I would any other day. Including getting up and out by 6 AM so that Fergie could spell ‘delicious’ and ‘glamorous’ out loud for me while I trudged along on the elliptical, a shower and then off to work. The only difference being that I left my keys on the dining room table for my guest: Schnozz.

Growing up during the AOL chatroom era wherein we kept the IBM laptop weighing in at a hefty 27.8 lbs in the middle of the kitchen so that El Madre could peak over pre-teen shoulders to make sure there was no A/S/L going on with some 38 year old posing as a 16 year old. For the internet was a scary, scary place full of pedophiles and stalkers, thusly I was raised to believe that the only people using the internet were balding white men between the ages of 45 and 65 and teenagers using fuchsia for inside jokes on their AOL profiles. I did at one point learn the hard way that the internet was and could be a terrifying place, complete with raging lunatics, but for awhile there it was ‘la dee daa’ and the whirring sounds of dial up.

Some 11 years later, I get an email from Schnozz - someone whose existence I’ve been aware of since November - that she will be flying through Dulles and my only trepidation is that my bedroom looks like the Titanic dining room but without the water and Leo’s baby blue eyes to stare at over the immense piles of debris. Other than that I told her to come on down without a single thought of fear or worry save for the fact that she might tell the internet that I snore loudly and shed enough hair to cause the average shower drain to clog on a regular basis. This is probably a bit of an improvement from most bloggers I meet, for I always fear greatly that I will either pass out or vomit or a lovely combination of both.

A sordid experience ages ago left me somewhat terrified of the internet and yet now I find myself blogging endlessly while willingly befriending and vodka tonic-ing with people whose last names I don’t even know and all without that gut feeling that someone is going to kidnap me and sell my internal organs and pearls to the highest bidder. For there is the 41 year old republican who said “I’ll be in DC for work, lets drink” and so we did and we have ever since, each time even more hilarious than the last. There’s my neighbor whose keys I have who has no problem with me running to her apartment for safety at the sight of a tiny mouse. Then there is the infamous one who leaves me with her child with nary a second thought. When I mention these occurrences to those who have made the very wise decision not to broadcast their every thought to the internet, they give these incredulous looks and find it all very abnormal. Which I’m sure it is on some level and of course I still am fairly wary, yet there is still this odd sense of comfort and lack of uncertainty; for am I the only person who finds most bloggers to be fairly normal so of course I'll hang? Is it OK to say to a virtual stranger Of course you may sleep on my couch and eat my food and drink my wine and prance around with my panties on your head! Why Not?!

Shock me, shock me, shock me

For every surprise event I've attended, that is one more that I've wished for myself. Younger HB always felt that the lack of surprises meant that she wasn't cared about or for with the same force that others cared for their loved ones. Older HB gets queasy and jittery complete with butterflies flying in perfect formation in her belly at the thought of a remote surprise. I'm one of those people who flinches at sudden movements. I'm one of those people who apparently was beaten far too many times as a child thus, my startled state when someone moves their hands to emphasize a point in close range.

I do not do rapid, unanticipated things. They scare me.

But apparently I do, for in just a few moments, I'm getting a spontaneous visit. And now I'm going to shock the shit out of myself and both make my bed, vacuum and pick up my W-2 from off of the floor.

No Pasa Nada: we never cease to amaze you.

Par for the course

“Drag your thoughts away from your troubles... by the ears, by the heels, or any other way you can manage it.” ~Mark Twain

To say that I’ve been in a bad, bad mood as of late would be like saying that today is March 25th, 2007 and it is quite sunny: Stating the fucking obvious. Though I feel I’m preternaturally laden with an awful attitude, I can usually just get over it, but I find that increasingly difficult to do while systematically having your soul sucked out of you for eight weeks straight. Hell, I’m surprised I still have the ability to FEEL without crumbling into a heap of ash and dust.

“But, Heather, why don’t you do anything to make yourself feel better and change the fact that you spent an inordinate amount of time wishing you could remove your eyeballs with a rusty, tetanus riddled spoon?”

Well, hell, why hadn’t I thought of that really easy and simple solution? Or perhaps, I have thought of that really easy and simple solution and yet the ease and simplicity are greatly lacking. Which leaves me to wonder if it’s just me and something I’m doing wrong or maybe I just don’t deserve it. I do not know.

What I do know is that going to bed two nights in a row at 7:30PM only to wake up at 8 AM and lay in bed because I am tired strikes me as somewhat of a problem and inhibiting on any life that involves walking out of my front door and maybe I should just stay in and watch more Borat. Though when I did walk out of my front door yesterday afternoon, with the clouds and the rain and the man who tried to run me over with his Hummer, I complained that it was too bright. Did I mention the clouds and the rain??

Like I said, I’ve been surly at best.

All of this suffering has led me to believe that a) Maybe it’s a sign that it’s high time that I do actually find out what real suffering is about, b) Maybe I should try harder but dude, the trying is getting a little frustrating and vexing C) that I deserve a little something – that isn’t fermented – to ease the pain.

What a good country song is made of

"Every path hath a puddle. " ~George Herbert

Kimber invited me to partake in a few drinks in Chinatown and given my faulty relationships as of late, I decided to give up a night of misanthropy for a pitcher of sangria.

The sangria being mostly weak and Kimber being my esteemed counterpart when it comes to all things fermented, we decided on an Irish bar down the street for she wanted to partake in ‘real drinking’ and I am nothing if not a ‘real’ drinker.

Upon approach of the second establishment an ID was required and none was produced on my part. Though I shook it off and we decided on Clyde’s. Though annoying and with a royal stick up it’s ass because of it’s claims on popularity, it’s there and easy and there wasn’t a burly black man at the door with a blonde Mohawk. So off we went.

We sat at the bar. I batted my eyelashes and smiled to pilfer a bar stool from two gentlemen who then proceeded to check out my ass. The bartender took our drink requests, Pilsner, Bud light…and before getting to me, he requested an ID.

Never have those words yielded such a look of pure pain and sorrow and essentially heartbreak. I stammered and stumbled something about taking my license out of one bag before putting it in another as I had recently been flying.

He responded with the look of ice cold seriousness that he needed an ID.

I ordered a diet coke and proceeded to look away in order to fight back tears when he actually produced a diet coke that tasted like ass flavored water, while those around me enjoyed the fruits of Czech labor. I literally went from jovial to humming a little diddy about how my man done left me and my ID has gone astray. A very sad and lonesome tale of a poor girl trapped in a bar unable to enjoy her much needed ketel one and tonic because she didn’t have proof of age*.

But by the look on my face you would have thought that my dog just got run over by a hummer just minutes after finding out about an unplanned pregnancy and a tornado done blew my home away. What can I say? I take my drinking very seriously.

Investing in a car and driver

“The best car safety device is a rear-view mirror with a cop in it.” ~Dudley Moore

Only when it comes to the important things has my date of birth ever been a source of complaint and woe. Though now the next milestone to hit, in terms of legal activities, is the ability to walk up to the Avis counter and rent a car, just like all of the big other kids.

Getting my driver’s permit was a breeze. I was then relegated to the parking lot at Walmart to drive circles and eventually graduated to the SUNY Albany campus loop. Then came merging and driving on windy roads past the horse farms then rain, flurries and eventually the big test; snow. In fact a few weeks ago during a brief fluffy flake wintry mix, I drove LB in ye old sable to and from upper Northwest. As the heavy flakes came down, she who hails from Phoenix asked whether or not it snowed like this in upstate New York. I laughed and replied that in upstate New York, if it snows a couple of inches, you shovel and go on with your life. In upstate New York, we have these things called blizzards and speak of snow in measurements of feet. I’d trust an upstate New Yorker with a crap ass sable that shakes when you try to brake to drive me to and from AU Park in heavy snow, before I’d trust a Pasadena native with a fully equipped, four wheel drive hummer to drive me from one side of Capitol Hill to the other.

It took only two tries for my license. The first time the failure was due to sub par parallel parking skills, which I find most interesting given that I now live in metropolitan area that requires regular parallel parking between a Porsche and a BMW. Though now I can do it while eating sushi with a chai latte between my legs and walking it out to Unk.

Six days after I got my license, I drove to the Key Bank and attempted the very tricky maneuver of switching lanes. Though did you know that when trying to switch lanes, it helps if there is more than 5/8 of an inch between your bumper and the car in front of you? Well I was not aware of this and rammed my minivan into another minivan and subsequently pissed all over myself because my mother was going to beat the ever living shit out of me.

But she did not. Instead she saved that hostility for my coup de grace of one sunny day after school when tooling around in Walmart, I shoved my license plate under a parked car by running into it while I, myself, was parking. She beat the ever living shit out of me for not being able to discern between an empty space and a parking space with a Honda Accord. Tricky stuff there. Until today, I have denied doing that until I was blue in the face because somehow my plate had disappeared and miraculously ended shoved into someone else’s rear bumper. Then the Easter Bunny shot out of my ass and sprinkled fairy dust all over my little boo boo.

On Monday I was in a fit of excitement and kissing the US Air gods for placing me in their good graces long enough to get me home in time to run a few midday errands. There is nothing that gets me off the way that grocery shopping in the middle of the day does. I get chills just thinking about it, which is why I willingly sat in the center seat from Palm Beach to DC smiling giddily because I would have first dibs on all the frozen brown rice and vegetable flax seed tortilla chips, I could ever want.

In the thrill of the moment, that prospect of all of the bags of frozen organic peas I would acquire and so instead of slowing down two blocks from a yellow light, I decided to rev it up to 60 and whip a left hand turn out of fear that the peas would be all gone and then what? Of course to my right there sat a member of the metro police department. Who noticed my fast acting turn – for the peas! – and turned on his lights behind me. I silently prayed and flashed my cutest smile and apologized profusely. He let me off with a warning to slow down. I smiled and went on my merry way carefully stopping at each light and sign between my apartment and the next two blocks.

Literally 47 seconds later, I rear-ended a DC Central Kitchen van while getting onto 395. 20 minutes later, I almost rear-ended a parked Harley.

Tomorrow I’m going to try something basic, like walking and chewing gum at the same time and I will be sure to let you all know how that goes.

Feel for me

“No man needs a vacation so much as the person who has just had one.” ~Elbert Hubbard

As I recall, last year, Marci returned from Boca Raton exhausted. And I thought well, that’s a load of bullshit, boo fucking hoo. Go cry in a corner you tan whore.

Then I went back to my lame ass life to cry on my bed about how the world and Jesus are out to get me and if this isn’t Hell, then I don’t know what is.

While it seems highly incredulous and baffling, it is entirely possible for one to completely tire of South Florida. With the sun and perfect weather and pristine beaches and shit and the looking up in the sky and finding it mystifying that it could be snowing enough somewhere to cause flight cancellations because the Sun is fucking shining.

Marci’s ditched me in Florida, where I am ‘stuck’ until Monday to wallow in my sadness of being ‘trapped’ at a five star resort to tan.

But I swear on my life, if I see one more motherfucking Bentley (not mine) or Ketel One and tonic (most certainly mine) I’m going cry. I’m going to cry the real tears of horror and sadness that one cries upon realizing that she might have to go to the spa. Again.

Emboldened

"Vacation used to be a luxury, but in today's world it has become a necessity." ~Author Unknown

Raise your hand if you need to be up in eight hours to finish packing in order to make your flight to Boca so that you can flaunt a really lovely citrus scrub in Marci's face while she works.

Raise your hand if you need to do the above and you're four martinis deep.

Also raise your hand if you've been an ornery, pissy, bitch as of late and you're pretty damn thankful that you're friends haven't thought of interesting and non-messy ways to off you.

Raise your hand if you're semi-cautiously optimistic but your pessmism sometimes trumps any remote optimism.

Finally, raise your hand if it took you 139 tries to spell optimism.

Pot o' gold

"When after the Winter alarmin',
The Spring steps in so charmin',
So fresh and arch
In the middle of March,
Wid her hand St. Patrick's arm on..."
~Alfred Percival Graves

When I was little, my mother would take us to the Jazz Festival at SPAC. An all day affair that meant fried chicken wings and my mother’s onion dip. It meant sitting outside on the grass and eating by day and James Taylor by night indoors. On occasion we’d be walking around and see my father on the opposite side of the grounds where he’d have a tent and a grill set up. The difference between the two parents was that my mother would be filling up on coke while my father enjoyed an Amstel or three and cognac. It was during one year that I was given my first sip of Coor’s and promptly swallowed with a look of pure disgust. A look that conveyed my disappointment and bewilderment towards grown ups and their obsession with the fermented drink and why on earth would one enjoy drinking in the middle of the day.

I probably also believed that Santa Clause shoved his fat ass down the chimney and that an adult woman flew through my window to take my grimy baby teeth in exchange for a bright and shiny half dollar.

I’m practically a small child therefore I do not do well during an all day affair. I get tired and need a nap or a place to just put my head for a short while. I’m not really a marathon take it easy, yo, type person. Which is why my feelings towards an offer of VIP tickets to Shamrock fest* was met with trepidation, even though it meant free beer all day long (!!!) Which meant rejoicing for any day that begins with Bass and Heffevisen is a day to be extraordinarily grateful for.

I’ve been trying to piece the events of the day together, so as to come up with a comprehensive Pulitzer Prize winning recap. And yet the lasting effects of an innumerable amount of drinks, has left me mildly slack jawed that yes in fact I did say that. OUT LOUD. I only wish I had been a little more prepared and better with my copious note taking skills.

While I’m not completely sure how things are in other cities heavily populated by bloggers, I know that we DC bloggers are notorious for our coveted abilities to drink as much as possible without passing out or puking. Shockingly enough I am not an all day drink fest type girl. I’m more 5K than 26.2 miles if you catch my drift. Thus the reason for why I tend to stick to happy hour. ‘Hour’ being the operative hour. I almost vaguely remember DJ AM being there and that anytime someone said ‘falafel’ I had a pavlovian reaction and began drooling immensely. My eyes lit up because oh my hell, food. And this children, is why you should say no to the beer. Well that and because too much drinking often leads to fashion faux pas. It was almost like a throwback to the college days – for they were so long ago – when I mastered in keg stands and watching sorority girls show off their pink thongs. Those days were good.

Ahh memories.

And it seems that over the years I've gotten over my disdain for adults who drink in broad daylight. In fact, I now EMBRACE it. With two hands to boot.

*Many thanks to I-66, KassyK, Arjewtino, and Freckled K for putting up with my drunk ass all day long.

Reason #357 for self medication

"Many of our fears are tissue-paper-thin, and a single courageous step would carry us clear through them." ~Brendan Francis

I’m sure that when I announced that I was leaving on a jet plane yesterday, you all assumed that it was to somewhere fabulous. Alas it was only a night in Albany. During which I indulged in Fridays and Friendly’s, because that’s just how I roll.

Returning home just now, I decided to try on a brand new dress from Anthropologie. My rule when dealing with my body, is quite simple: If I can wear clothing from Anthropologie with ease, then it’s all good. The end.

I began glancing at myself in the mirror. Sticking my hands in the side pockets and twirling. When out of the corner of my eye….and I’m loathe to write this…I see a dark spot on a sticky mouse trap in the corner of my closet. I step closer, over the massive pile of clean clothing and there they are. THEY. THEY. THEY. TWO WHOLE MICE.

Just laying there. In the fetal position. One probably got caught and then the other probably came to save its best friend. Which makes me revisit that whole being there for my nearest and dearest thing. One could die in the process.

In lieu of actually picking up the trap with the advised three plastic bags and a broom theory (courtesy of my brother and my pal), I’m sitting here with a rum and coke. Two and half shots of rum to be exact. I’m partly sad for the little critters and partly disgusted beyond belief that they are laying in my closet just dead. And I’m in a fleece and my dress and some Uggs.

Suddenly I remember the quick effect that rum and coke has. It’s powers are magical and I almost don’t remember the reasons for why I stopped partaking in the rum. But I’m sure I will in the morning.

Speaking of drinking and uh randomness….Shamrock Fest this weekend! DJ AM, Carbon Leaf, Flogging Molly at RFK and me drunk and busting out the Irish in me while retelling this story! People, y’all don’t even know the debauchery and fun that is about to ensue.

I promise more fun and excitement than mice in a closet.

Up on high

“...I pick the prettiest part of the sky and I melt into the wing and then into the air, till I'm just soul on a sunbeam.” ~Richard Bach

There is nothing better to me than flying. I love to fly in a way that is a complete antithesis to the average person who finds flying some horrifying experience akin to jumping across a volcano for fun. I find my window seat. Sit down and pass out for 50 minutes to 10 hours and I just chill the hell out.

What I dislike about flying is the airport. Actually I didn’t mind the airport that much until the woman next to me decided to call her friend and loudly and obnoxiously complain about how awful her watery queso was for her chips. “Literally, unbelievable” that’s what she keeps saying about her fucking queso dip. She’s going to write her friend who apparently has the stellar position of being high up in the California Tortilla hierarchy, to tell her about her displeasure with the fucking queso.

Flying should be calming. Flying shouldn’t lead to violence. Flying should make me want to toss my filet o fish at the woman with her fucking queso dip complaints. Not to mention the fact that she’s not only complaining about the damn dip, but also doing so with her mouth open. Damn BWI, once again not being up to par for the masses and their need for high quality queso dip.

I’m just going to sit here, relax, and think of flying.



*Penned today at 3:57 PM from the B terminal in Baltimore/Washington International airport.

The mouse will play

"I like the word 'indolence.' It makes my laziness seem classy." ~Bern Williams

When Mel moved in, she promised furniture including a glorious wine rack and table combo. She delivered exceptionally as that was pretty much the selling point for her. It also helps that if I were to ever find myself stranded in Hawaii, I’d have a free place to stay.

As she mentioned the wine rack, my eyes lit up with anticipation, because she doesn’t drink. Not a sip. Something about enzymes or another. To which I replied, that I only drink occasionally. And only wine, as I’m sort of an oneophile. The first night she slept here, I drank an entire bottle of yellowtail while telling her about the price of shots in Salamanca. Poor girl didn’t realize that I have the capability to be completely full of shit, especially when I come in Wednesday through Saturday, having enjoyed my share of an open bar. My feelings on that are as follows: It’s free and someone has already paid for it. Why let all that delicious Ketel One go to waste?

The other day she said that she would be going to Texas for a few days. My heart skipped a beat though I doubt I let it show. I said “oh ok” while envisioning walking around the apartment in my Calvin Klein’s and eating everything and not putting the dishes in the dishwasher. I had to keep myself from clicking my heels and confessing my plans to party up and be irresponsible with housekeeping for four. whole. days. It’s like my mom was going away and I had free reign to turn the living room into a disaster area and not get the stink eye for being and indolent lush. It's like the woman of the house is away and I, the man, can, do as I please without the old woman being all up in my shit.

For the past three days I have consumed crustini and gouda for breakfast and as a quick hors d’ouevre. After that I went straight for the bottle of wine and the egg rolls. And tonight I’ve gone to a new low: Rum and diet coke and a bagel pizza with some peas on the side.

My laundry is strewn through out the apartment and I can watch House without her covering her eyes and saying ‘ewww’. My bras are hanging on the back of the front door, the bathroom door handle and the outside of my bedroom.

I feel like such a fucking rebel. Tomorrow I’m going to watch Sports Center all day and polish off my case of Yeungling. I’ll just be sure to hide the bottles so mom doesn’t find out.

Notes on a weekend

“It doesn't hurt to be optimistic. You can always cry later.” ~Lucimar Santos de Lima

Let me be brief in this startling look into my weekend. Despite the popular believe that I live lavishly and fantastically, thus the copious amounts of wine and overpriced apples. The sad truth is that I’m woefully boring and I spend a lot of time doing stupid shit. And though I’ve asked this once before, why would anyone care how I spent the last 48 hours? But then I could also question why anyone would care to read me on a daily basis, which then delves into why people blog etc, and my God, with the amount of Amstel consumed, now is not the time to get into deep psychological discussion of why others are attracted to a stranger’s trainwrecky life. Besides, it would involve a lot of words and as we all know, I do not do well with words.

There is nothing exciting or enthralling about dropping a bottle of rum on one’s foot. Really. Nothing. Save for the large bruise left on said foot and the accompanying awkward gait. Sadly, had I already consumed the alcohol I would not have felt it and yet at 4 PM, I was uncharacteristically sober and my I was most certain that my foot was broken because large bottles of alcohol can cause serious injury.

To say that I’m merely looking forward to the next two weekends would be an understatement. Let’s just say I’ve turned a new leaf from complete dire straits and wondering when exactly a lightening bolt would strike me down and (thankfully) kill me to cautiously optimistic. And that’s all that will be said on that.

The hits, they just keep on coming. Next up: I will discuss, in detail, my nail growth, because nothing can get as exciting as the state of one’s cuticles. Nothing.

Impromptu

“A daughter is a mother's gender partner, her closest ally in the family confederacy, an extension of her self. And mothers are their daughters' role model, their biological and emotional road map, the arbiter of all their relationships.” ~Victoria Secunda

El Madre came down for meetings yesterday. Approximately two hours of meetings and one hour chasing me down Connecticut Avenue, in heels. While I stomped and swore and tried to keep my tights from falling completely below my ass. Which they did and I was wearing a wrap dress. And my does that early spring air feel good.

There was a miscommunication and she felt bad that she almost missed lunch but my anger was somewhat assuaged when she mentioned Raku and since I’ve had this insatiable craving for sushi as of late (Note to self: DO NOT get pregnant. Ever) I grumpily accepted her accord only to begin crying over salmon and avocado maki.

We’re talking deep tears here, people. The kind that have been waiting to make an appearance at some arbitrary time wholly unconducive to my life or schedule. She petted me and suddenly turned into full on ‘I’m going to kick those motherfucker’s respective asses’ mode. The woman who once shuddered at the thought of having her own children, felt protective and said she didn’t realize that I had been that upset. Not that I’ve been at all surreptitious about my misgivings on every facet of my sad and pathetic existence as of late. Clearly the phrase “I’m seriously going to lay in front of a bus on Pennsylvania Avenue and pray that it hits me” didn’t carry much weight for her.

But no matter. Tears were shed. Mothers show up at the perfect time and are equipped with rational behavior. They become understanding and equally as upset and frustrated. They can impart knowledge that despite the ‘take a number’ mentality, soon all will be right with the world.

And permission is granted and money shelled for random vacation sprees and a much needed sugar cane scrub*.

*that was for you, Marci.