The duct tape that saved the day.
I thought I'd emerge from this camping trip with some profound words of wisdom. Woman of the Woods, So Independent, WE CAN DO IT, etc etc.
And I do feel pretty...if not badass, certainly something approaching it.
The strangest thing happened over the weekend. I dropped off the kids with their dad for a bit, and headed back home, intending to check a bunch of things off my to-do list (fold laundry, start dinner, vacuum, whatever), and then I thought...f it. None of these are things that can't wait. I'm going to do what I want to do for a minute. I'm going to do something that makes me happy.
And then I realized that I had absolutely no idea what that might be.
I'm serious. I had virtually no idea what I might want to do - just me, with no one else's wants to think about. Did I want to...read? Nap? Watch a movie? I sifted through all the things that sounded like, you know, things people do when they're relaxing, but nothing sounded even vaguely appealing. You know what I really wanted to do? Fold laundry. Start dinner. Tick boxes off lists.
current mood via.
In couples' counseling a couple of weeks ago, I started yelling. I went into the session determined - promising myself - that I wouldn't go there, that I'd follow the rules (use "I feel" language, try not to stick to my "personal narrative," et cetera auuuuuuugh), and that I'd be calm and clear and loving. That I'd talk less, and listen more.
And then, all of a sudden, I was in that place again: the angry place that I didn't know existed in me, but that I sure as hell know about now.
My friend Tia did this braid. You can tell, because it's good.
I have always loved entertaining. More than that, I love being a hostess: making my house look pretty, thinking up cute serving ideas, refilling drinks before glasses are empty. Telling my guests to sit down, have fun, don't you dare touch those dishes, I've got it. I know it might sound odd, but I love it; I really do. It makes me feel good to create a space where where they can feel good. And since we've moved here, summertime has basically been all-entertaining, all the time, because, you know: pool. Which is great, right?! Parties! BBQs! All the festive things!!
Except I can't right now.
I took the kids to Rockin' Jump after camp yesterday. Rockin' Jump, for those of you who aren't parents or don't live in the suburbs, is a massive trampoline park populated by oh god, so many small people, the vast majority of whom are physically launching themselves through the air at at any given moment. For safety's sake, there are also lots of uniformed attendants who will yell at them (and you) if they do anything wrong, and the list of "things you can do wrong in the trampoline park" includes "everything that children want to do a trampoline park."
I know. It sounds super fun.
Except my kids (obviously) love it, and so when they said they wanted to go, I was sort of surprised that camp hadn't tired them out...but I thought, what the hell. Because it's summer, and in the summer you can do things like take spur-of-the-moment trips to trampoline parks, and also because I have a little secret about Rockin' Jump:
Before I launch back into writing about our (first) bathroom makeover (which is FINALLY finished, and oh my god that took forever) and the best ballet flats out there and, I don't know, chicken, or whatever...I figured I should probably address the elephant in the room.
I don't know if we're going to stay in this house. Or even in this city.
I don't know anything.
A few years ago - shortly before my daughter was born - a friend of mine told me that she had cancer.
When I say “a friend of mine,” I mean someone I cared about; someone I had special, beautiful memories with. Someone who I thought was smart, and interesting. Someone who’d just had a baby a couple of months earlier, making her diagnosis worse than the worst thing imaginable.
But by then, we weren’t especially tied into each others’ lives. In the old days we’d mostly been casual, going-out-type friends, and in the years since we’d grown up and out of bars and parties and late nights in the company of dartboards, and we’d emailed only occasionally. When the dust settled it turned out we didn't really have much in common at all, and we lost touch. I didn’t even know what she did for a living, or her partner’s name.
I have a lipoma. This sounds worse than it is - it's technically a tumor, yes, but it's not cancer; it's just a "fatty globule" (hot) the size of a walnut. It's tucked underneath my left armpit, sort of towards my back. I can get it removed, but there's really no reason to other than vanity.
David Sedaris has a lipoma. So does my father-in-law. A couple of weeks ago I had an extended conversation about lipomas with a friend who runs a tattoo parlor in Los Angeles. He has one, too.
All of a sudden, lipomas are popping up everywhere in my life. According to my doctor, they're pretty common in middle age.
