All the things you're not supposed to say

I just want to start this post by saying that I know in this day and age, I'm not supposed to admit to any of the things I'm about to admit to.

I know that we're all feminists now, and that girls aren't supposed to want or need to get married, have kids, make a family, have a life partner, etc. in order to feel complete. 

I know. I knoooow. 

I know that we're all self sufficient and independent and Single Ladies is like supposed to be our anthem and shit. I get it.

But for real, can we talk for like five minutes about how...most of that shit isn't true?

At least not for me, or almost any female I've ever met in my life.

Over the course of the last 27 years, my desire to get married and have a legit family have changed - a few times.

When I was little, I wanted to get married because that's what everyone told me I wanted.

TV shows, and movies, and all your little girlfriends, and your mom and your sisters, and fuck even Barbie had herself a man.

You're supposed to dream about the perfect wedding. You're supposed to play dress up and pretend you're getting married.

To be honest, I never did that stuff.

I didn't lay awake at night and dream up the perfect wedding.

When I think now about planning a wedding, I think "I hope by the time I get married I can afford a wedding planner to do that shit for me!". Or I think "A cabin wedding would be cool! Like a rustic ski lodge? Ooh, I like the beach too! Backyard weddings are pretty. Mmmm cake"

Really the only thing I'm sure about is that I want steak at the reception dinner, because more than pretty weddings, I love steak.

After years of pretending that I was all about that marriage life, I hit high school and thought "Hey, I never was that into this shit...maybe I'm just not down with it...Yeah, maybe I don't think marriage is cool! Maybe it's an antiquated tradition! Maybe there's no reason to sign a LEGAL CONTRACT just to be with someone forever! Yeah. I'm against marriage. I am not getting married."

And my social-contrarian little badass self went on propagating that lie for years. 

Looking back, if I'm being honest with myself, I probably kept it up as hard and as long {insert Michael Scott joke here} as I did in part to add even more to the casual, I don't care, I could take you or leave you attitude I tried to portray to boys. 

In reality nothing could've been further from the truth...I cared so, so much.

I digress.

As I've gotten older, and had more experience with dating, love, and relationships, and I've watched friends and family members fall in love, and get married in all different types of scenarios, and for all different kinds of reasons, I've realized something about myself:

I do want to get married.

No, I didn't have my dream wedding planned when I was six, and I didn't ever - and will not ever - drool over centerpieces, or know exactly what I want my cake to look like.

But I did lay awake at night and think about that magical someday, when I would love someone, and they would love me back, and we would love each other enough to want to eat breakfast together every day for our entire lives.

I dreamed about the little personality quirks he'd have, and the stuff we might do together - stupid shit, like rent movies {shout out to the long gone, but not forgotten, days of Blockbuster} and eat Chinese food on the couch together. 

I believed in love so much, and couldn't wait for the day when I would look over at some guy as we drove home from the grocery store or something, and just know that that was what I wanted to do for the rest of forever: drive home from the grocery store only with that one person.

At some point, you find out that you're in your late 20's and you get more wedding invitations in the mail than issues of Cosmo.

You realize that all around you, people are coupling up, settling down, and starting their life with someone.

You realize that you have fewer naughty fantasies at night than you do long, detailed, extravagant fantasies about going on nice dates, hearing a guy say "I love you", and waking up with someone you're going to spend the rest of the weekend with, not have a quick bagel with before you drive home in last night's clothes and this morning's questions, like "Is this going anywhere? Is he going to move this forward any time soon? Does he love me? Do I love him? Will he call me again? FOR THE LOVE OF GOD HOW LONG HAS THIS POPPY SEED BEEN IN MY TEETH?".

I know that, as modern women and whatever, we're not supposed to talk about wanting a man, wanting a marriage, not liking being single very much.

But that doesn't change the fact that as you get older, more than a fancy wedding or a rich doctor husband to take care of you or a chick-flick-romance, you want to be with someone you don't have to act casual around. Someone you can cry in front of, laugh with, talk to, and be real with. Someone you can run errands with, and ask "Is there something in my teeth?" without worrying that seeing you as less than perfect will make them delete your number.

You start to crave real connections and meaningful relationships, and yes, even a life and possibly a family together, with someone that knows you and loves you, and wants to do this life thing with you.

I don't think that makes you less of a modern, strong, independent lady.

I think that makes you a grown up who hates going for bagels with sex hair.

Junk Food Confessions

For some people, when they give into a vice that they've been working on controlling, they might call it "falling off the wagon". 

Recently I think you could say I "fell off the wagon", in the area of eating things even remotely healthy for me.

But I didn't just fall off the healthy-food-wagon.

No. 

I fell off of it, rolled in front of it, got fucking run over by it, and then rolled down a giant fucking hill into a big pile of more bad choices.

And then I built myself a home, and lived there forever.

I would like to pretend that what I'm about to tell you has been only a recent folly into my Fat Kid side, but really this has been going on for like...fucking months. Somewhere around Valentines Day, to be 100% real with you, I just started eating my feelings, and then eating the feelings that the food gave me, and then covering all that food and feelings with like...more fucking food.

It's been gross.

I'm hoping though, that by sharing my experience, and confessing to some of the downright humiliating shit I've eaten over the last few months, I can't let go of my sins, and move on with my life.

Maybe toward a place with more vegetables, I don't know.

Anyway, here we go.

There was a day that I ate grilled cheese sandwiches for every meal. Yep. Even BREAKFAST.

There was one week in which I made frozen pizza twice, ordered pizza once, and ate leftover pizza another night. I literally ate pizza for almost an entire work week.

I ordered 12 buffalo wings. For me. And ate them. All. 

I basically ate all the Taco Bell. I mean, seriously. All the Taco Bell that there is on this planet? It's inside me. I ate it.

There was even a time I got Taco Bell at night, and couldn't finish it all. I woke up the next day and found a couple tacos in the fridge, all soggy and congealed, and totally disgusting. 

What did I do?

I ate them.

I made cookies, inside of a cookie, topped with a BROWNIE. 

Twice! 

And I ate a shitload of them. 

Have you ever eaten drive-thru from two different places in the same day? Because I have.

Have you ever patronized the same Wendy's, so many times in a row, that you started to worry the guy working the drive-thru was going to recognize you, and judge you? I have. Did it stop me? Not really.

Liquid calories? Otherwise known as booze? Yep, drank all that shit too. Fruity, sweet drinks that you know are like 8 million calories, beer, crown and coke - so much crown and coke.

I made tater tots at 2 in the morning.

Yep. At 2 in the fucking morning, I got up, and TURNED THE OVEN ON, I was so dedicated to my fatty snack. I waited the 20,000 hours for the oven to preheat, and I waited the 15 agonizing minutes for my tater babies to cook. And in this very long length of time, I didn't even once think "I should just go to bed and not eat these, what the fuck is wrong with me"

No.

I thought to myself  "I wonder if we have any cheese I can put on these tater bitches."

We did.

And I did.

And they were so good.

There. I feel a little better. I hope you do too. Just remember, whenever you have your absolute worst fat kid moment - where you're like standing over a pan of gravy, just soaking chunks of break in it and eating them or something - just remember, somewhere in the world, I am eating something worse, and probably in a larger quantity. 

Taking Stock

So, this list is going around like white hot fire lately, encouraging people to take stock of their lives, exactly as they are, in the moment they fill out their list.

Making: Messes. Nothing but messes. The kids have taken over my home, and I no longer posess the will to fight them. At least not until it's less than a billion degrees outside.
Cooking: Right now? Ummm....nothing. I don't think it's safe to cook and blog at the same time. But the last thing I cooked? 26 chicken floutas for my dad's 57th birthday.
Drinking: Coke. Judge me, whatever, at least there's no booze in it.

Reading: East of Eden by Steinbeck, and simultaneously Of Human Bondage by W. Somerset Maugham. When you read books by people with several names, one of which is just an initial, it like automatically makes you more gangster.
Wanting: Cooler weather. The Fall/Winter photography season. More stability. A kiss. A drink. A shot of Tequila. The beach. Lots of things/
Looking: Like a hot ass mess because I am currently covered in kids
Playing: Playing like I don't even want that leftover birthday cake in the kitchen. But we all know I do.
Eating: Probably birthday cake, in a minute.
Wishing: That I was better at handling stress, and that things would turn around already
Enjoying: Jackson playing with his cousin Ryder, and for once THEY'RE NOT FIGHTING.
Loving: Being alive. Ha. Just kidding. Birthday cake. I love birthday cake.
Hoping: For better days soon
Needing: A plan
Smelling: What? That's weird. I don't really smell anything right now. Am I supposed to be actively smelling things?
Feeling: Tired
Wearing: Shorts, and a black t-shirt. Sexy, right? I'm so fancy. You already know. 
Following: If I told you, I wouldn't be a very good stalker, now would I?
Noticing: That I get snarky with questionnaires 
Bookmarking: "Breaking your co-dependency with your house cats, in 30 days"

4 things that are good right now

Pools that feel like soft velvet or clouds, and late evening swims after dusk.

People who help, and love you the most consistently when things are hard.

This neat website where you can look at the weather history for any month, any city, any year, all the way back to the 50's. I'm pretty super stoked for the highest temperature in September to only be 109.

This song:


Ok, so maybe it was another rough week.
We keep going.

Happy 4th of July. May your libations be cold, and your hot dogs never shorter than your buns.

Like your pulse

I have to be careful about the music I listen to sometimes.

I have to pick exactly the right songs.

When I miss you, some melodies are just too harsh.

Too crashing, to jangling, too rambling and loud.

When I miss you I need something soft, 

As the palm of your hand

The flesh of your lip

The beat of your pulse

I need something slow

Like the way you sometimes looked at me

The pause between "I love you"

The days between seeing you

I need something that tinkles, like a bell, and the thinnest strings of a guitar

Something that whispers and sounds like tiny strings of lights

And feels like the way your words ricocheted off every bone in my body, 

When you whispered them in my ear.

To my father, on his 57th birthday.

When I was little and it was your birthday, I would wander through the garage, the carport, the backyard, looking for things I could give you.

I'd collect nuts and bolts and screws from the ground, the floor, under the seats of all the cars in our yard, and fill a jar with them. I'd put a bow on it and feel nervous, and hopeful that you would be happy.

Sometimes I'm still that girl.

Happy Birthday, Dad.

Small Moments

I don't ask you to come here, to stay, to not go

Because I am desperate and pathetic and cannot be alone.

I don't ask you to hold me, stay with me, come to the grocery store with me

Because I am scared, or a child, or too needy.

I just would like you to be here for the small moments in life.

I would like to browse the shelves of bookstores with you

Shop for cucumbers

Get the car washed

I would like to share the silence of a Sunday afternoon where we both do different things in the same room, and occasionally look up to smile at each other.

I would like to watch movies in bed with you when you're sick.

Roll my eyes with you while we sneak sips of whiskey out of the bottle when our teenagers are going crazy, and laugh because we don't feel old enough to have crazy teenagers.

I want a 

Sleep in

Watch you get ready for work

Hug you when you come home

Share the last bowl of ice cream with you

Kind of life.

Kind of story.

Kind of love.

I would like to be sure of you.

To know, when we're in different room, different parts of the house, different moods, 

That you're there, 

Somewhere

And that I'm home.