The Good News:
* Person at work says my skin looks “beautiful”
* Husband notices I look slimmer
* Eating more vegetables than humanly possible, am slowly becoming green pepper
* When not gnawing on my knuckle, I have more energy
The Bad News:
* Have another 6 days on Phase I of South Beach
* I see pasta everywhere.
* I see carbs everywhere
* Salads are highly overrated
* Being healthy and slender is also overrated
For many of us, the difference between “curvy” and “chubby” is open to interpretation (and rather dependent on the beer goggles of the admirer). Enter the South Beach Diet. It’s healthy! And low in carbs! And fun! Veggies! At! Every! Meal!
So far, quite a contrast to the diet I have been eating (Carbs! At! Every! Meal! Wine!), and so I suppose it’s not surprising that I’m a little… well.. South Bitchy lately. I mean, do you feel me on this, sisters and brothers?
WTF does one eat vegetables at BREAKFAST for? Isn’t that sort of bad for the human spirit or something?
My usual fare (peanut butter toast, coffee, swearing, sugar sugar) makes me feel good on the INSIDE. This tomato juice and egg white omelet routine just makes me want to run around the house yelling “Fuck! Fuck! Fuck! Down with the man!”
Alas, I fear roller derby isn’t enough to get me back to goddess status, so I’ll stick with the FSB* for now. And I’ll be honest. I need to look hot for my trip to Atlanta…. Why you ask? Gold lame, baby. Gold. Lame.
*Fucking South Beach
I whooped and hollered when I read this piece in today’s Bellingham Herald and made a vow: I’m trying out for the Bellingham Roller Betties, our town’s all-girl roller derby team next Sunday at 7pm. Mark my words, friend.
I’m having a mid-life crisis anyway, and a violent, costume-rich sport is far healthier than a young Latin boyfriend and a corvette, don’t you think?
Move over Farrah, I’m getting some short shorts, fishnets, and puttin’ on the wheeeeeeels!!
**also wrote about this over at Babble****
The Enacter implies that perhaps a midlife crisis is at hand (mine) and perhaps the named issue is “mindlessness,” to wit: “Rachael. Your mindlessness is a going toward something else.”
Huh? “A life perhaps?”
Yes, I’d say a life.
But aren’t we all? Going toward our lives? With either gusto or grace, but almost always with too many carbs and too much selfishness? Isn’t that the whole point? I suppose it is always finding ourselves wanting and not enough poetry to climb over from where we are (mud pit) to where we want to be (chorus with angels singing and awards).
You?
P.S. If you want to be a therapist (a male therapist, for chrissakes) perhaps you should refrain from having so many drums hanging from your walls.
Ah.. the Sonnets. A perfect end to a wild day… We met with the Soul Enacter, and as with so many of life’s kookiest people, he ended up quite lovely and sharp and insight (incite)ful. Though, honestly, why couldn’t my “issue’ have a better name than “Chaos”?? How about “butterfly” or “gypsy” or “Clarissa”?
Sonnet XXIX (which is # 823.456, I think)
When in disgrace with Fortune and men’s eyes,
I alone beweep my outcast state,
And trouble deaf heaven with my bootless cries,
And look upon myself and curse my fate,
Wishing me like to one more rich in hope,
Featur’d like him, like him with friends
possess’d,
Desiring this man’s art, and that man’s scope,
With what I most enjoy contented least;
Yet in these thoughts myself almost despising,
Haply I think on thee, and then my state,
Like to the lark at break of day arising
From sullen earth, sings hyms at heaven’s gate;
For thy sweet love remember’d such wealth brings
That then I scorn to change my state with kings.
-Shakespeare
*****
Let’s say (hypothetically) that you were a middle-30-ish lady with a grillion children living in a hippie town. Let’s say you and your hubs were having a trying time of things, just everyday things like cleaning and cooking and not fighting about soap and you figured it was time perhaps to talk to a guru or Buddha or Jesus, or someone like that. Important. Religious. Appearing from the sky on angel’s wings.
So you ask your friendly friends who were the guru - therapist types they would recommend and they come back with the usual list of naturopathic healers and hemp dealers. One of the cutest girls gives you a name of a man who talks to people who sometimes have trouble talking to other people and so you decide to give it a whirl.
But when you find out his company name, you giggle and giggle. He’s probably great. His inner child most likely shines.
But “Soul Enacting” seems like an awfully big mantle to tote around. Yes?
Because the piece you don’t see is the dirty laundry piled up all around the bed, the rolly-eyed husband who has graciously agreed to try and take your picture and make you look sexy for Kristen’s MILF Radio Show, and the dishes piled up in the kitchen downstairs. Lucky for you, you also do not hear the crying jag going on in the crib down the hall.
Appearances, thankfully, are nearly always deceiving. As are words and promises made in the dark (Pat Benetar, where would bittersweet accusations be without your lyrics to guide us?). Fantasy, that hobgoblin of the middle-class ordinary, can often save us from the grim realities of our day-to-day and give us that extra transcendent yum that bolts us out of bed and into some pretty shoes, or into a regular day at a regular job.
More importantly, fantasy is what keeps us smiling and laughing and talking to the small, smelly, loud people, who will, someday we dream, be old enough to tattle on us to a therapist, or cry about us to a friend, or brag about us in secret to a roommate.
Real Moms. Making Love in Our Minds…the Only Place We’re Still a Size 6
**Real Moms Postcript May 2007***
Real Moms Are Fallible and Adulterous
True Mom Confessions is the brain-child of brilliant and lovely and ultra talented Rebecca Woolf (also of Babble and Girls’ Gone Child) and Romi Lassally. The need to confess is deeply human and if the traffic to the True Mom Confessions site is any indication, has not gone the way of other relics of past religions. It is an incredibly powerful thing to read and absorb what’s “really” going on behind the closed doors and baby gates of American motherhood. Confessing mistakes and fallibility explains much of the pleasure of reading (and writing) blogs. And the touching manner in which the fabulously gifted writers of the Internet share their angst and joy and express their feelings about motherhood in such a beautiful way is inspiring.
I’ve pondered whether to post my confession over at TMC, and decided against it. I’m already terrible on paper, so why not go in for the full range of judgment? In the end, no one can judge me as harshly as I judge myself (though honestly they can call me terrible hurtful names to good effect).
I recently had an affair with a married man who has children of his own. My husband and some of my family members know about it. Some of my closest friends know. Most don’t. I feel ashamed and embarrassed and terrified of the consequences of what I’ve done. My husband and I are seeing a counselor and trying to keep our family together.
In some ways my life as a mother and wife left me feeling stifled and trapped and without oxygen. Choosing an escape from this was a mindless way of coping, a way to find something transcendent, overwhelming, a way to be free.
I’m not asking for forgiveness. Or understanding. I’ve hurt many people as a result of this action. And for that I’m very sorry. The problem of living a full and passionate life while being a good faithful wife and mother remains an unsolved mystery to me. Maybe some day I’ll find the peace that has thus far eluded me.
*****
Enter the Real Moms Truths contest for Mother’s Day by going here….
Put on a dress and hook me up to the wine-drip, Sally! Mama’s got her CRAZY on!! Tonight is the auction. We’ve got 350 people coming and plan to raise $140,000 to prevent child abuse in my corner of the world.
I’ve got a temperature, my house looks like a homeless shelter, my husband isn’t talking to me, and my kids are watching “Cars”… but it’s all good, baby. It’s all good. You know what makes it that way?
It’s the gown and heels, my friend. The Gown. The Heels. The Makeup. The mysterious recent weight-loss. I’m high on flu and sympathy and dirty dishes fumes. And for some bizarre reason, life seems good. Strap me onto the fun wagon, I’m going OUT!
Post Script:
Great time had by all last night… We raised a record amount of money, including the highest amount for our dessert auction portion (organized by yours truly). My feet hurt from the gorgeous PINK high heels I stormed around in, but never was there a happier pinched feet gal in town. Also in the ensemble was 50’s dress with crinoline and appliqued pink roses…matching pink pearls and 50s style make-up (a la Ann-Margret). Sigh. I love Ann-Margret. Am now officially wracked by flu, but I don’t care. Memories of dancing, drinking, flirting, laughing carry me through….I’ll give you the total raised when final, but it’s looking like well over $150,000 and well over our budgeted goal. WOO HOO!!
Meanwhile, enjoy her:
This morning at 7:30am, my boss came and asked me to edit the auction catalog and make a variety of font, writing, and picture changes, so that it could be ready to go to the printer tomorrow morning.
In came my co-worker a few hours later who took one look at what I’d done and then burst into tears. She was crying her heart out there at her desk because she thought it was her project and here I’d taken it over. It didn’t take long for me to dissolve into tears too, which brought up once again the joys of NOT working in an all-woman environment any longer.
We’re all patched up now, she and I, and all is relatively well. I’m always surprised when something so everyday is cause for a crying jag. Crying and work simply do not go together. Frankly, I”m not a huge fan of crying at all. Sometimes, I wish I was someone who could bottle it up inside and be a cool cucumber. A Mommy with nice nails and a clean shirt. But alas, that ain’t me.
I love to look at websites full of houses for sale. It started as an innocent diversion, a useful endeavor even, when we were looking for houses almost 18 months ago. But now it serves no practical purpose whatsoever. It’s just a dreamy diversion from my cracker carpet filled living room.
Maybe if we move… Maybe if we live closer to the grocery store…
The dream is less about the house itself (I like small, cozy, unusual even though I currently reside in big, fancy, and cookie cutter), and more about what it represents: A better life, better schools, walking distance to pubs and coffee places and restaurants and bookstores. In short, it’s a proxy for all my big dreams.
When you have kids housing takes on this extra dimension. It’s nesting, in the truest sense. Nesting… ah.. the fun of nesting. Cuddling up, picking colors, finding comfy furniture, making a place homey and welcoming a warm.
I’m a real estate hussy. But I simply cannot give it up. At least not today. And at least I’m not alone in this wicked pursuit.
