Don’t get me wrong, I love my jeans. Usually high-end, designer jeans and if I can find them on sale, all the better. I live in my jeans and have quite a few. So, when I went through my closet recently and got rid of a few old jeans, I had to replace them. SHOPPING TRIP!!!

Big mistake. Every pair of jeans in every store I went into was a skinny pair of jeans. Dark denim, light denim, distressed denim, low-rise, mid rise, capris, modern skinny, slouchy skinny and, the worst of them all, painted-on-like-white-on-rice skinny. Urrrgghhh, they all sucked.

I love the way I look in a great pair of jeans. Let me tell ya, skinny jeans are not a great pair of jeans. For starters, as you all know, I play A LOT of soccer. My thighs are developed and in the wrong pair of jeans (skinny) I look like a frog. Don’t get me wrong, I have great legs. Tan (thanks to my Hawaiian father) and in shape. You would never know it in a pair of skinny jeans.

After trying on about a dozen or so pairs of jeans, I left and indulged myself in a latte and a pedicure. I’ll buy a cute skirt!!!

Ciao for now

Unfortunately, my husband didn’t wait!! My husband was married to his first wife for almost ten years. After two kids and, what the SS found out, multiple affairs later, the “Ex” decides she does not want to be a wife or a mother and is moving to Denver with her boyfriend. I say…..”Thanks for fuckin up!!! So, nearly ten years after she has this epiphany, I become wife number #2.

Now I have to tell you that this woman is not the most stable person. She not only left her husband, she also gave full custody of her boys to my husband and disappeared for a good five years. She has been on many medications for depression and bi-polar disorder and has been counselled for eating disorders and suicide. Shortly after I met my now husband, the “Ex” broke up with her boyfriend. We didn’t see her much after that for about three years.

Five years ago, she shows up with a new boyfriend. I call him “Lurch”. Nice enough guy, but dumb as a box of rocks….SERIOUSLY!! I want to tell him to run Forrest….RUN….but I don’t. None of my business really and the “Ex” could have gone through extensive therapy and is a “changed for the better” person. Everyone can change….right? Not this kitten!!!! IT’S WORSE!!! She is up for the “Best Mother of the Year” award because she has always been so close to her boys. She is best friends with her ex-husband (NOT!) and they co-parent their boys together. What a fabulous team!! (I think I just vomited in my mouth)

Two years later, the “Ex” and Lurch run off to Vegas for a quicky wedding and some dinner and….VIOLA….the “Ex” is back in the game. What she didn’t figure on was a formidable player….ME!! Ya see kiddies, with me, it works like this….I can be your best friend or your worst enemy, you choose. I am really smart and, strategically, I am usually three moves ahead of you. So, if you want to try me on as an enemy….TAKE YOUR BEST SHOT!!

So what do you think she chose? It isn’t what you think. Truly, she believes we are friends and I allow her to think that we are while it serves my purpose. Remember, I have two step-sons to consider in this equation. My strategy has to include keeping them out of harms way. It isn’t hard. If I give her enough rope, she has hung herself in record time, everytime, and it never comes back to me.

Thich Nhat Hanh said “My actions are my only true belongings. I cannot escape the consequences of my actions. My actions are the ground upon which I stand.” Shaky ground for the “Ex”. What I don’t know is what karma is coming back upon her husband to have the “Ex” for a wife. They have been married for three years, unhappy for half their short married life and just recently we were told that they are separating. No big shocker for us and for anyone that is aquainted with the “Ex”. We’re surprised it lasted this long. My husband and I are placing our bets on how long it will take her to find another nice but really dumb guy to fool. The odds are in our favor. The “Ex” needs someone dumb enough to take care of her, her dog and two cats because Lord knows she can’t. Over-lapping relationships is her MO and she has it down to a science. Ten years ago it was dating websites. Currently, her venue of choice to find a mate…yup, you guessed it…FACEBOOK. She has over six hundred friends on facebook and the numbers are growing. She will be friends with anyone and everyone. She is on it so much, I would bet (again, my odds are good) she is fast becoming the Alexis Carrington of facebook. And YES, I am that old!!

Sadly, my husband and I can’t shelter my step-sons from the pain and suffering caused by their Mother. We can’t keep them from learning all the ugly truths about her… facebook and texting will take care of that. All we can do is help them to understand that everyone is human, that we all make mistakes and, more times than not, we don’t learn from them….and there’s the BITCH!!

Ciao for now

When you try to build something on a rocky foundation, you are never on solid ground. I should have trusted my first instincts and kept the friendship on a casual basis. People will always tell you exactly who they are in the first ten minutes of meeting them. It’s your job to pay attention. Look back on any bad relationship, whether it is a romance, a friendship or a random encounter. Something was not right from the get-go. What I did wrong was to try to convince myself it was just a one-time deal. Dummy!!!!

No…I will not say what you want to hear. No….I will not “come clean” on something you think I did. No….I will not apologize for something I didn’t do. So…..I’m not ready to make nice!!!

It’s not just Orange County or New York City…OH NO!! They could have a Real Housewives of Trailer Park #109 and there would be the same middle school antics and Survivor alliances. The only distinction, instead of Versace and Chanel, they would be wearing wife beaters and K-Mart blue light special denim.

Let’s think about this for a second. If you stripped it down to bare essentials (no pun intended) just on a basic level, the majority of women endure and inflict the same backstabbing, judgmental, misunderstood bullshit to each other and themselves and we aren’t on TV. Why would we do that??? When do we realize that it isn’t worth the time to think this crap up. Are we really teaching our daughters to treat each other like crap? Isn’t it hard enough just to get through our already crazy lives? Why do we make it harder on our selves and each other?

Is it so hard to be genuine, caring and accountable? So much so that we would rather hurt other women than be honest with ourselves? I would like to believe that we can stop the madness and be accepting and respectful of each others feelings and opinions.

…..AND then another show comes on!!!

Ciao for now!

And my children wonder why I am so pissed when they whammy me with something at the last-minute!!! Hence, the stern talking to my son received yesterday morning when he needed money to buy a ticket to the LAST school dance AND it was the last day to purchase tickets. You couldn’t have told me about this on Monday???

Realizing that I am definitely the crazy exception and not the rule, I absolutely appreciate whatever tricks work for you. Given that there are so many lists produced in a day. My girlfriend has at least five lists going at any given time….the grocery list, the chore list, the to-do list, the kid list and the husband list. Me being me, I suggested condensing lists. For instance, chores and to-do on the same list, kids and husband on a family list and so on.

Oooooh no no no!!! That just wouldn’t work! How silly of me!! PALEEEEASE!!

Last week, I started to think about these different lists. The three-year goal list, the five-year goal list, the bucket-list. I also started to think about my current life situation. Happily married, unemployed with four kids going in four million directions and my husband and I going in six million directions. The economy is in the crapper and there are no jobs in my field that aren’t at least a four-hour daily commute and those jobs are very few. The part-time jobs closer to home are buried under the bajillion resumes of applicants ranging from a snow balls chance in hell to so over qualified its hysterical and I am somewhere in between.

So, what is an unemployed, overachiever, newly stay-at-home Mom to do with this over-abundance of time?????

I….have NO idea???   Truly….NO IDEA!!! LOOOHOOOOSER!!! And then it hits me, like a lightning bolt. I can do ANYTHING!! For the first time in my life, I CAN DO WHATEVER I WANT!!

I ran into the office and pulled out one of the many unused, very cute and functional note books that I so love to buy with every intention to write important things in and never, ever do. I pick a very nice one with tropical flowers on it and a good size. Not to small so I can read and write easily and not to big that I hate carrying it around in my bag. I open it to the first page and at the top I write…

The Un-Enjoyment List

This is my list of all the things I have ever wanted to do, said I would do and haven’t gotten around to do. I am going to learn Spanish and maybe even French. I am going to play my guitar. I will learn how to play the piano. I want to be certified in SOMETHING. I don’t know exactly what that certification will be but it will be something worth while and nothing to do with a job related project. Just something I’m interested in. I have a whole list of things on my un-enjoyment list and my goal is to complete as many things on my list as I can before I go back to work. Which I will…someday. Until then…..I’m gonna enjoy my un-enjoyment!!!

Ciao for now!

So much has changed in the last two years since my last blog. For the most part, it’s better than I could have done!! After eight years, the soccer stud figured out he liked it so much he put a ring on it. The proposal…I’ll leave that for another post. Four months later we were married!!!

Two weeks before the wedding, I was laid off from my current job. Not the construction company (again another post). Just a shit job that was boring me to tears and right before the wedding was perfect timing. The wedding was a complete blast…which was ALL that we wanted…and off to living our life in Gig Harbor. Four kids, four dogs and a house that we need to add-on and remodel. No time for a honeymoon, the holidays and State Cup killed that one. We talk about going on a honeymoon in the future but…don’t all newlyweds do that??

After the holidays and State Cup, I found myself in a situation that I had never been in nor would ever think it would affect me in such a precarious way. I was BORED!!! Seriously, BOOOORED!!! I used to write about being bored for ten minutes and what a wonderful thing that would be. To actually be able to sit and wonder…what am I gonna do for the next ten minutes? Hah, be careful what you wish for!! Boredom turned into depression (another new one) and depression turned into pre-menopausal hormonal imbalance…WTF!!?? Are you kidding me?? I can’t POSSIBLY be PRE-MENOPAUSAL. I’m only 42…what the hell!!??

Talk about weird!! I had NO idea what was happening. Couldn’t sleep, unless it was two in the afternoon. Had no drive of any kind, whatsoever!! It was enough to just get in the shower, clean the kitchen and do laundry. Any more than that and I was ridiculously pissed off…and where did that come from? I can get pissed off but never because the bathroom needed to be cleaned or I needed to go to Target for hair color!! It was so crazy that I wouldn’t have been surprised if my husband was contemplating slipping me a Prozak-micky in my morning coffee.

For fear that my new husband was seriously questioning his marriage proposal, I decided to start moving. No matter how pissed off I was, no matter how tired I was, I got off my ass and moved. I took every soccer game opportunity that came my way. I walked our four dogs every afternoon and I walked around the track at my husbands games. I did what I had always done…stayed busy. I made menus for the week and cooked dinner every night. I read books…lots of books!! Anything and everything I could think of to keep my body and mind stimulated…I DID!! It helped a lot but I still wasn’t the same. I began to wonder if I ever would be the same ever again.

One Wednesday night, after sitting with my soccer girlfriends watching our soccer husbands play, we all decided to go to our favorite sports bar and get beers. One of my girlfriends is a complete health nut…vitamin supplements, hot yoga, naturopaths, you name it she knows it…and I confided in her that I had been, for the most part, BLUE.

She says, “You’re not BLUE! You have a hormone imbalance. It happens to all of us at our age.”

At our age?? What the hell does that mean?? Our age!!! I’m only 42 for fuck sakes!! I’m not my Mother…am I?

She continues to say, “You need to get this supplement and this creme and you’ll be good in about four months. Come by my work and I will hook you up.”

Supplements and creme, REALLY? That’s ALL I need to be GOOD again? To be me again? Bullshit…I call BULLSHIT!!! We laughed and joked about being over forty and went back to husbands, beers and soccer. Supplements and cremes, hah….MY ASS!!!

A month later and I’m still thinking about two words, hormonal imbalance. So, I did what anyone else would do…I GOOGLED. Yes, talking to a doctor or naturopath would probably have been a better choice, but I know now that my fuse and my rational was limited at the time. So…I googled. What I found out was my girlfriend was right. Supplements and creme is what I need and with the $40 my husband gave me, I am off to see my friend at work. 

I am a month into my new supplement and creme routine and happy to say that my girlfriend and Google were right. I feel more and more like the self that I remember everyday. I am sleeping better and at night. Up early, rested and ready to get on with my day. Blogging again and out of the BLUE!!

I couldn’t wait for Friday nights and usually started partying on Thursdays. Now, I just want to go and hang with the kids for awhile then crawl into bed and read my book before putting in a movie and falling asleep. My social life has become my soccer teams and playing three nights a week. I still hang with my friends and we do what we love, which is playing soccer.  Some how, it feels the same. In my head, I know I’m not the same.

Maybe because I’m not where I want to be….for myself, my kids, my family. I thought I would never get married and that was okay for me. Miss Independant, don’t need a man, I can do it on my own. Well, I’m doing it on my own, every day, and it isn’t as satifsying as I thought it would be. To take care of my self and my family on my own, to make all the decisions and carry all the weight of them. What was I thinking?

That is why I am so tired at the end of the day. I watch those people with the perfect lawns, BBQing in the back with friends and family and they always seem to have so much energy. Everything is done…the house is clean, the lawn is beautiful, the bills are paid, refrigerator full and all the laundry is clean, folded and put neatly away. I’m bustin my ass to get the lawn mowed and the garbage out on the right day. My car needs to be washed, weeds need to be pulled, my daughter wants blue streaks in her hair and my son has to read two books in two weeks to get a passing grade in advanced reading. What am I doing wrong???

I can build and run a successful construction company but I can’t run a successful home. Bullshit!!!

…and then it hits me

I can’t do it all ALONE! The one thing I thought I didn’t want and didn’t need is exactly what I need most! I pay people to help me with my company. I delegate jobs and projects to the appropriate people and the outcome is successful. So, lets try my personal life. I need a partner, a friend, a mate. Some one to help with the chores, the money, the kids, the lawn. Now where do I find the right one?

1. My new business was busy as hell towards the end of 2008. Being an insurance restoration contractor business had slowed down during the summer months and it was a bit nerve racking. The business was very much a happy ending to my year!
2. I became un-engaged to the Soccer Stud. I knew it was going to happen. Lets move on….
3. An ex-boyfriend and possibly the love-of-my-life called me from a mental institution! Yes, you read right….MENTAL INSTITUTION. The funny part (if there can be a funny part to being in a mental institution) he is the only person I know who would make it a party!

No, my life has not changed much. There is always soccer, men and business situations flying at me like a meteor shower and I am now in the midst of creating the first ever meteor rock umbrella…and it comes in 10 nifty colors for the more fashion forward. I’m always looking for a new money making venture!!

We were snowed in for Christmas and my sister came for a surprise visit for New Years. All in all, 2008 was a pretty good year and 2009 is starting out to be better than ever.

So why do I ask….”What have you done for me lately??”

Well, it seems that is the question of the year and I am constantly asked this question, in one form or another. From my kids, my business partner, my customers….everyone one wants you to do for them! Come on people….yes, there is an economic crisis. Yes, we have a new President with big solutions to everything including world peace. Yes, its a new year, out with the old and in with the new. So, lets trying doing for ourselves instead of asking someone else to bail us out of our problems. We got ourselves into it….lets get ourselves out!

My friend called me today and told me this story…

Once upon a time, my friend used her credit cards to much and was $7K in debt. Later, my friend took her son to the orthodontist and got him braces without checking to see if she had coverage. Now she is stuck with a nice $10,000 debt. My friend only works 3 days a week and is in a quandry as to how she will ever pay this off. My friend decides to ask her Father to lend her the money to pay off the debt with the plan to repay the loan over the next 3 years with monthly installment payments. My friends Father says “NO, you figure it out!” My friend is so upset she tells her Father that he has never cared for her, or her boys and does not respect the fact that she is a single mother and has done it all on her own for all these years. Clearly upset, my friend calls me to tell me about the awful way her Father has treated her regarding the money she would like to borrow from him and just can’t understand why her Father can not do the right thing and lend her the money.

Completely enthralled with this story, I give her this answer…..ARE YOU KIDDING ME!?

Most people would love to be only $7,000 in credit card debt and what were you thinking taking your son to get braces without calling to find out if you have coverage! Sounds like a personal problem and I agree with your Dad…FIGURE IT OUT FOR YOURSELF! You got yourself into this mess, get yourself out. Personally, I would never ask my Father to bail me out of any problem, unless the lives of my children depended on it. If that was the case, I would never have to ask…my Father would be there.

Still, why do we ask so much from others and are not willing to do for ourselves? What have we become, did we grow up or did we grow incompetent to take full responsibility for our own actions? Have we been prepared for the road or has the road been prepared for us?  It is never too late! We can still learn from our mistakes and be better for them.

I leave this question for you…..“What have you done for YOU lately?”

“You look Goooood!”

Was I supposed to wake up on my 40th birthday and somehow look different from the day before? Come on people…I was just 39 yesterday! Did the ugly fairy miss my house on the way to the over-the-hill store to purchase the black and white decorations for my surprise birthday party?

Naaaah, I don’t think so! Is it just good genetics? My Mom and Dad would like to think so, not  to mention my siblings are definitely hoping the ugly fairy will miss their house as well come their 4th decade on this earth.

I personally think it is our personal choice how we look and feel at any age. My grandmother, God bless her, is 89 years old and she is doing great. A little slow sometimes but she was parting up a storm at my surprise birthday party. She bailed at about 10:00 pm, way past her bedtime, yet she would not have missed it for the world. That is what I want to be doing. Partying at my granddaughter’s 40th birthday party.

I don’t think we ever get to old to change those things we want to change in our lives. You can look good at any age. Your life can be better from one year to the next. Sure life happens to us all, what we do with it is what defines us. Not an age, not a year but the choices we make will determine who we are today, tomorrow and every decade.

Ciao for now!  

In addition to this amazing turn of events with my company, I get to have a little fun with my new found success at the expense of my former employers. I received my last paycheck this week which is $455 short. No surprise! They have been doing this for years to former employees and I kept telling them is was illegal and someday they will short the wrong person. Well, that day has come. I immediately filed claims against my former employer with every state and federal entity and they are now under investigation. Again, KARMA ROCKS!It gets even better! It seems, two of the larger jobs they have are unhappy with the way things are being run without me and are now MY customers. And the hits just keep on comin!!! 

So many people have been hurt by these people in such a short amount of time, it is truly amazing. It is true that we dig our own graves. To watch as two people that I believed were the smartest and most business savvy people I have ever met destroy their company, relationships and lives in four months time is unfathomable. Had someone told me this would happen, I would have told them they were smokin crack! Yet, here it is and people that just six months ago I believed were family are now people that I don’t even know nor would I want to know.

I promise, I will be blogging more often.   

Ciao for now!