Suburban Bliss:: Birth Control Via The Written Word

Jury Duty

One day in high school I was standing in line ordering my bagel without cream cheese for lunch. After I ordered my lunch I would carry it to the orchestra classroom and eat it there outside of the glare of, what felt like, the constant scrutiny of the other students.

That wasn't actually happening, it just felt that way. But one day during lunch, this one girl came up to me and asked me for a quarter. When I said I didn't have an extra one, she got closer to me and asked for a quarter again. Then she asked again, getting closer, then closer.

We were in the same Social Psychology class so I knew she was performing an experiment we were all assigned. To push a social norm out of the ordinary and see what kind of reaction it sparked.

Finally I put my hand out asking her to stop.

This was riotously funny to her. So funny she went away and gathered a few friends so they could see what I did. She said, "Watch this!" as she recreated the whole scenario with her friends standing around me in line while I was just trying to get my bagel to take back to the orchestra classroom.

I know this was almost 20 years ago and I've learned from some other situations that this kind of thing is silly to focus on. I learned we all do dumb things as kids and to think these tiny things mean anything to anyone but you is very self absorbed and a little silly.

Still, I was the girl who ate lunch in the orchestra classroom so you can imagine how humiliating it was and how it stuck with me.

Years after this, I was looking at a local magazine and there was a feature about local judges and their families. A judge was featured with his family, including his stepdaughter, the Social Psychology student who begged for money in my face.

This alone wasn't really anything. Except the judge was the same judge who heard my father's drunk driving case 10 years (at the time) earlier.

Still that alone wouldn't be a big deal.

Except that today I reported to the county court to serve my very first jury duty summons.

I ended up in a courtroom hearing a (really lame) case in THIS SAME JUDGE'S courtroom.

During the jury selection process this judge asked me what I did for a living because I answered "Self Employed" on the preliminary questionnaire.

I told him I write for a parenting website, a shopping website for kids and I also have my own personal website that accepts advertising.

He stopped, smiled and said, "You made your own career."

That interaction will probably stick with me as long as the stupid incident in the school cafeteria has.

Perspective

We're driving through a not-as-nice area of Detroit. I know to those who love to hate Detroit that seems like an anomaly, but it's true. Just like every other city there are not-as-nice areas of Detroit.

There's a church we pass on our way through and their inspirational sign reads:

"It could always be worse."

This seems like a bit of a stretch as far as "Inspiration" goes.

Father's Day Gift Guide among other things.

Yesterday I wrote about my goals for summer with the kids at the Buzz Off. Since I wrote that I came up with a few more. Make a weekly trip to the library, have a picnic lunch at least every other week, don't kill Maddie when she insists she "can't" play a video game with Max, even though the reason we got the game was because FOUR people could play it at the same time.

Today I closed out a couple of guides at Mighty Junior.

We pulled together 14 great things for dads. The ice cube tray on the list is a little on the inexpensive side, but seriously, it will change the way you look at ice. Of course if you have a husband like mine, you're going to want to take a look at Mighty Good's Top Shelf Father's Day Guide.

Grab a bottle of his favorite liquor and throw in the life-changing ice cube tray and you've made your dad's (or your kid's dad's) summer.

I also closed out a new feature, Wood from Sweet Juniper as Guest Editor. Check out her excellent picks here, I knew when I asked her she would not let me down.

Then, I tried to put all my friend's kids in danger!

The last time we talked I told you about how my son nearly killed himself and his pal while trying to save the cat from imminent danger in the neighbor's backyard. At the end of that post I mentioned how I wasn't happy allowing my son to nearly kill my friend's six year old, later that week I wanted to do something even more wonderful.

I drive home from school every day, my friend drives to school, which is good because it's really the only reason I own a minivan: carpool. A day earlier my friend had asked me to pick up her kids because she was taking her youngest to get his three year old pictures taken. I have two kids and have never had my kids pictures taken.

Consider this "foreshadowing".

I pick up her five-year-old and six-year-old after school and they say, out loud, to me: "Hooray! We get to come to your house today!" And I reply, "No, not today!"

Consider this "foreshadowing".

I drive them home and drive the 1/4 mile back to my house. Max and I are sitting on the floor playing with a new toy and the kids are grabbing snacks when I hear my friend at the back door.

I'm thinking to myself, "Wow, that was fast. What did I forget?"

I say, "Hey, what are you doing here?"

She says, "Ha! You've got my kids right?"

Then I passed out, hit my head on the granite countertop and died.

Only, unfortunately, not really.

My friend ran from the house to get home to the kids. I said, 'I'll call them and let them know you're coming!"

I dial the number and a man answers and now, a pedophile has realized the kids are home alone and is "babysitting" for them. I ask who it is, it's good to know the name of your friend's babysitter. He answers, "This of Sargent Thomas. Is this the mother?"

I started hyperventilating, I don't handle things like this very well. Especially when I'm so stupid.

"Ha ha! No! This is the mother's worst friend ever! I was supposed to take the kids home with me instead of dropping them off after carpool. And.....clearly I didn't do that. Ha! Ha! My kid also played with an ax the other day. Heh......."

I had no time to let my friend know that the police were waiting for her at her house so she pulled into her driveway with three police cars in it.

Luckily her kids were not hurt or anything terrible. They had realized she wasn't home after a few minutes and thought to call 911 since they didn't know my number.

Unluckily, my friend had left her house early in the day in a hurry to get to her appointment, so a used Pull Up happened to be laying on the floor. Also, they'd just celebrated their youngest's birthday so candy and other treats were lining every surface in the kitchen. Also the kids were playing with their Wusthoff Juggling Set.

Every one was fine and I'm mostly done beating myself up about it but that was just about the exact moment I started to realize what people mean when they suffer from depression and they can't concentrate or focus and that maybe going off my medicine while I'd been sick was actually affecting my ability to deal.

Ways I've Felt Like The Shittiest Parent In All The Land This Month

I know people always say they're "Winning Worst Parent" and pretty much all of this website makes me the worst parent in all the land according to a surprising number of people. Still. This month I've had a few moments where I was just standing there, experiencing things like near loss of consciousness, self flagellation and hysterical weeping.

I'm writing about one of them because, I promised a thing about what I've learned about dealing with difficult relationships. I've been wrecked with the realization that I'm really just a woman who flails through life so probably my advice is as good as the advice of the disabled lady at Target the other day who called the cashier a bitch who she hoped would one day not be able to walk again. (I'm sure she meant that in the nicest way possible.) I'm having a bit of trouble with that post so let's just do this for now.

A few weeks ago Max had a friend over after school. As they played in the back yard with various Matchbox cars, I marveled yet again at the fact that I live in a place where I have a back yard where children can play. One of the kids came in to tell me Gary, the smallish puma who lives here, was in the yard behind our house. How could he get out because there's a fence between them.

I pointed out that he'd get back the same way he went in, not to worry. Off they went to play.

But boy, Max was really worried about Gary being stuck in the neighbor's yard. Really worried.

He was so worried he went into the garage looking for something he could break down the fence with. He tried a shovel to dig a hole under the fence. He tried a broom to try and knock the fence down. Then he had a really great idea. We own an ax we use to chop firewood. The ax is hung on a holder high up in the garage, so high, we thought, the kids couldn't reach it.

Honestly, I thought my kid wouldn't even think to touch it. I have kids who have an innate sense of civic responsibility. A few months ago we went to Detroit and took a ride on the People Mover (Detroit's light rail that takes you....in....a...circle around the city). We'd bought the kids ice cream cones before getting on the train and were going to let them break the "No Food" rule because, well, it's the People Mover and there's rarely anyone even on the thing.

But no, Madison read the rule and went against our wishes and threw her half eaten ice cream cone in the trash. She also cajoled Max into throwing his ice cream cone away too even though we insisted it was fine, Detroit doesn't really expect you to follow the rules.

I could spend days complaining about the bickering and the eye rolling....but not following the rules is not something I can complain about.

I guess though I didn't specifically lay down a rule about not reaching for the very bottom of the ax handle and getting the God damn thing down.

I'm in the house and hear some banging but I assumed it was a neighbor working on their yard (something the people in this neighborhood are very adept at doing). Then a few moments later Max started calling for me with a certain amount of alarm in his voice.

I walked to the back yard and see the backyard neighbors standing there and Max holding a tall wooden handle.

Neighbor I've never met says, "Uhm....why is he hitting the fence with that?"

I look, thinking, "Yes, why is he and what is it?"

Then I realize it is an AX. Like Lizzie Borden AX A Cut-Your-Head-Off, Maim-Your-Friend, Lose-A-Limb AX.

I swear to you I thought I would pass out as I realized it was an ax and all the horrible things that could have happened in the last 15 minutes passed through my brain. I couldn't breathe, I couldn't see, I could barely gather enough breathe to explain to my kid why I was going to have to kill him.

And Max, poor Max, says as I begin to Freak The Fuck Out, "But Mom! Mom! It was for a good cause! Gary was trapped over there! I had to get him out."

I send Max into the house thank the new neighbors for not calling Child Protective Services and, oh yes, introduce myself. Mortifying.

Also, later that week I dropped my friend's 5 and 6 year-olds off at home when I was supposed to bring them home with me. They were alone in the house and my friend came home to three policemen in her driveway. That made me feel pretty awesome.

Hopefully the Difficult Relationship Post will be coming along soon.

Overwhelmed, by nothing.

I just realized I haven't taken my crazy medicine in three weeks.

Also just realized going to the grocery store should not require three days of mental preparation.

First stop: Pharmacy.

Audience Participation.

For the last month or so Logan's been scheduled with about 100 hours worth of work on various projects, even though generally one works about 40 hours a week, 60 if you have no life or kids or house or wife. A-hem. Things are reasonably caught up so he's decided to take a day off tomorrow.

Do you understand what this means? Tomorrow, I get to spend the entire day with my husband. Alone.

Yee-Haw!

All week he's been telling me to think about what we should do. The options are endless really, the first thing that comes to mind is, you know, things married people sometimes do. Alone. Logan's good at those things, but not 7 hours worth of good. I think at the 7 hour mark when married people are doing the things that married people sometimes do alone, there may be chafing.

So here's my question, how would you spend an entire day (kids go to school at 9 and come home at 4) alone with your favorite person you also sleep with?

It's supposed to be partly cloudy and 69 degrees (Oh Dear, 69, how appropriate.)

Belated Mother's Day

Maddie talked on the phone with Logan's mother on Mother's Day.

Yes, My Mother In Law who I'm not allowed to talk about here. The one I don't speak to and such.

Logan is right this minute frantically running around his office looking for alcohol, any kind of alcohol, so he can read a little further. In fact if you have some heroin he'll take that needle in his arm right now thank you. He's probably drinking Listerine in the bathroom because he knows what kind of hell can be unleashed whenever my dangerous fingers type the words "Mother In Law".

On Mother's Day Logan called his parents to wish his mother a happy Mother's Day. He handed the phone to each of the kids.

Maddie said, "Happy Mother's Day and thank you for giving me the dad I have."

And I'd be hard pressed to argue with that sentiment.

I think that sums up where I've been with my in laws for about a year now.

About a month ago I got almost 15 emails from people struggling with their in-laws. April must be bad for family relationships. These struggles were either in relation to writing on the internet or just in the general sense of "I think I want to kill my mother in law and I'm wondering how you kept your hands away from sharp implements on holidays."

All those emails are sitting in my inbox because, like almost all my email that requires a thoughtful response, it apparently takes me a long time to have coherent thoughts in my head.

I do have some general advice for handling difficult in laws, actually it's advice for dealing with anyone you must deal with on a regular basis who makes you want to spend a few hours in your room crying. Repeatedly.

It will have to wait though because, although I'm sure Logan love slugging down Listerine at work, I actually don't want to make his life any harder. So he has to have a look at what I write before I publish it. What I very carefully write so that I'm not actually talking about "My In Laws", but rather "General Difficult Relationships With Any Person You Can't Seem To Get Along With."

Stay tuned.

Two Quick Things.

If you need to buy a gift for a one year old any time soon, here you go.

Lots of great ideas at Mighty Junior. (Click on the image to go there.)

Or you can read about chapter books to read with your kid at the Buzz Off.

Today is supposed to be the only beautiful day here this week. So I'm going to spend it writing, picking up the, now fixed, parts of our trampoline (Logan's act of JackAssery), getting my passenger door fixed on my van (my act of Jackassery continues to flare up) and trying to convince AT&T that they shouldn't fix my Blackberry but should instead just cough up an iPhone.

I think they're going to go for it.

Feeling a lot older than I am.

We're hanging out, describing our visit to the 80's Night at a local club to a friend who wasn't there.

"There were all these creepy guys on the dance floor. They'd come up and rub up against you until you gave them a look."

"Yeah, and even worse the guys who lined up around the dance floor staring at everyone."

"Right! And as the night went on the girls were wearing barely any clothes. It was, ugh. Weird."

Pause.

"So wait, what you're saying is that you were at a club, where people dance and try to hook up with people?"

"Right.....and then? All these women were dancing suggestively and it's like everyone was there just to meet someone to have sex with. Or something. My God. What kind of place is that!?"

"Yeah, that's what the kids call a 'Club'."

"....Well, yes.....I sound a thousand years old don't I?"

"Pretty much."

Portland Mighty Finds

First, let me set your mind at ease. Gary the cat came back. Of course the neighbors didn't try to eat him, but don't think that means they won't at some point.

Back in February, I went to Portland with Maggie and then all the ladies came at the end and it was very fun. The only problem is we bought all this stuff and then I left it in Maggie's apartment for her to deal with. Which was understandable, I only had two bags to get home with, but still not very fun for them.

We bought a lot of stuff.

We also learned that Portland likes a)pottery and b)green things

I finally got around to listing all our fabulous finds over at our Etsy shop. You should go, take a look and see if you can't find something wonderful for your house.

I bet you can.

Here's a slide show, it makes me miss the Ace Hotel room where we took all the pictures after shopping for hours.

I think the Bad Neighbor is serving my cat for dinner.

Life is awfully slow in the interesting ways around here.

Here's a quick story. There's one neighbor here that nearly everyone hates. Which is refreshing because in our old neighborhood I was the one neighbor everyone hated. When I try to explain why everyone has feelings for this person that range from "FUCK YOU, YOU HORRIBLE WOMAN!!!!"*** on to "Enh, I wish she'd move."

Every time I try to explain this, I fall into a blood pressure raising discussion that spans over 10 years of stories and interactions with this person. She is....awful is too nice a term to use when referring to her. I mean Liver and Onions is, in my opinion, awful. She's more like Head Cheese. Head Cheese is repugnant. It defies explanation. It's something you wish you didn't know existed.

***Clearly I fall into this category.

We've started letting Gary The Cat outside in the new house since we've lived here for nine months now. Not sure why that makes a difference but in my mind he's more committed. Tonight, we let him out and I haven't seen him since. Usually he hangs out by the door and runs inside the minute I open it. Also, coincidentally (or not) I noticed the husband of the neighbor I like to think of as Head Cheese out rolling around a heavy wheelbarrow.

Now if Gary comes back tonight I'll probably think this was a stupid thing to think. But I think Husband of Head Cheese had Gary, knocked unconscious,  in his wheelbarrow and they're currently burying him in their trash cans for the Friday pick up.

I'll keep you posted.

In less bad energy inducing news, I wrote about Mother's Day Giveaways at The Buzz Off. You could win stuff and telling you about it lessens my chances of winning so maybe I just earned back my karma.

Probably not.

Also Maggie closed out the Mother's Day Gift guide at Mighty Goods and Mighty Junior. We combined our efforts (meaning I contributed three gifts to the guide and Maggie did the other stuff). Considering that my siblings and I are buying my mother a privacy fence for her back yard (as a Mother's Day + 60th birthday gift) this makes a lot of sense. For Christmas we bought her a new stove.

We're very thoughtful as a family. Actually the members of our family who do not share DNA with us are thoughtful. Actually, everyone in our family who is not me is very thoughtful. I did give you that Giveaway link and that gives you access to my new favorite source for dresses. So I am thoughtful....in a way. Too bad my brother can't exactly use that link.

I love the 80's.

This is what I did this weekend. My friends went to prom and I tagged along.

It was my friend's 35th birthday celebration and in spite of myself, and my week long round of whining about having to find something to wear which would remind me of probably the most painful and miserable decade of my life, I had a really good time.

I didn't look like this in the 80's though. In fact, I never actually went to prom. I looked more like this.

I hated it even then, note how I'm flipping off the camera. Still, if I thought I hated the 80's, check out my sister's look. Holy Shit.

In other news Pam from Union Station contacted me and I put her in touch with the people I needed to. Thank you for your emails!

Help!

Remember that time I went to New York City and chased my husband through the streets while he ran a marathon? Remember how I sat in a bar for two hours waiting for my husband to show up after the race, pondering how I was going to tell my children their father went to New York City to run a marathon and apparently just kept on running away from us.

That was a really fun time. Remember that?

I bring it up, not for the usual reason (I enjoy beating the shit out of dead horses). I bring it up because that night after the marathon we had plans to go to Union Hall in Brooklyn for drinks after the race because the very nice lady who owns it, invited us to come? (But then we couldn't because we ended up in The Meadowlands watching a Lifetime movie....good times. Good times.)

I'm bringing this up because I have lost the email address (and the name) of that nice person and I'm wondering if she still reads this website and can shoot me an email. I need to get her in touch with a friend.

It's all about the odds.

Lost, driving through Rutgers campus a few weeks ago before I fell deathly ill and tried to die in Alice's guest bedroom.

Susan: "Weren't a group of students from Rutgers on the Lockerbie plane?"

Me: "I'm dying."

Chris: "Hmm...I don't know. Actually I went to Africa in college and one of the girls on the plane had a sister who died on that flight. Her parents were terrified for her."

Susan: "Oh God, that would be so scary."

Me: "I'm dying."

Chris: "Sure, but I was really soothed by it, I wanted to sit right next to her. Because really what are the chances one family would lose two daughters in international plane wrecks? There was no way our plane was going down with her on board."

Susan: "It's true. I mean kind of sad, but true. Their loss, your gain."

Me: "I'm dying."