Short story by a friend of mine. It’s a little twisted but it’s not half bad!
Monday, April 9, 2012
168 Hour Rant
Adult life…. what a sham.
Work so you can pay for your car so you can get to work. Work so you can take care of children and send them to school so that they can grow up and work so that they can pay for their cars so that they can get to work.
There’s 168 hours in a week. Most of us work for at least 40 and sleep for another 56. We probably commute for at least another 5. That leaves us with 67 hours a week that we don’t have some anvil of obligatory adulthood tied to our neck.
And for what? So we can work until we’re 70, retire and die two years later of sheer boredom since after 50 plus years of working we have no idea what the hell we’re supposed to do with 168 hours all to our own planning? So some self proclaimed important big wig can sit on his butt and dictate to all of us underlings exactly what we’re supposed to do to make him rich so he can retire at 50 and run off to Rio with some far too dumb and far too pretty twenty something year old who he’ll dump as soon as she starts wrinkling and replace with another twenty something year old?
I’ve had with being the bourgeois.
I’m all set with people who live in these fantasy lands of money (which is ENTIRELY fictional now, by the way, since the value isn’t actually based on anything) and greed and pomp and circumstance.
From now on I work to make my family better and happy.
I just have to figure out how…….
Wednesday, March 7, 2012
Devil Ruins
When do you reach that point when you can trust someone again after they cheat on you? You’re starting to think you just don’t ever reach that point. Once you find out that he not only cheated, but made plans months in advance to do so, flew across the country to do so, then came back and lied about it, and then had the nerve to try and convince you that you weren’t together when the infidelity happened all in some pathetic attempt to preserve his sense of posterity, it’s pretty difficult to trust just about anything he says or does from that point on. He carried on an entire, illicit, relationship with her and thought you’d never find out. This is the man who claims to “love” you.
He claims he lied because he didn’t want to hurt your feelings. Apparently he preferred for you to get a random Facebook message from the whore he cheated on you with, his supposedly “evil” ex girl friend – at least that’s how he always described her. He was obviously full of sh*t. You have no reason to think that he’s not now. He says that your relationship was different then and he was questioning if he really wanted to be with you or if it could work out. Apparently he found the answers to these questions in the vagina of the “Devil”, as he was so fond of calling her. Well, aren’t you just the luckiest girl in the whole screwed up world.
The facts are plain and simple: he cheated. Had you not been pregnant with his baby, you most certainly would’ve kicked his sorry @ss to the curb. People aren’t supposed to stay together just for their children.
Your oldest sons (Gabriel) father cheated on you too when you were pregnant, though it was much weirder as he was exchanging rather unwholesome pictures with dozens of men and women that he met through some weird mobile website. You stayed with him because you wanted him to know your baby and had a sneaking suspicion that if you weren’t together when he was born, he would become a dead-beat. Years later, you’re still convinced that you’re right. He might have wasted a few years of your life, but it was worth it since your son was able to bond with his father. And he never tried to convince you of anything other than the fact that he was painfully sorry.
Now this chump has put you in the same situation. Only this feels worse. You held no delusions about Gabriel’s father and knew before that point that the odds of you two staying together forever were slim to none. He had a penchant for incessant lying, and always about obscure things – like the time he told Gabriel’s doctor that he had a cat in the house despite not only not having a cat, but having a distinct hatred for cats.
You thought your Love, your Light, your Bliss, however, was truly something special. You’d never loved anyone like him and you truly thought he was one of the best men you’d ever met. He was kind, hardworking, smart, genuine, and honest…. or so you thought.
Honesty clearly isn’t his strongest trait and you just don’t know how you can just believe him when he tells you that he’s different now, that Things are different now. It sounds like the same load of bullsh*t all cheaters try to pour on you after they’ve been discovered.
And you suspect that the “Devil” wasn’t the only one he cheated on you with. There’s another little tramp who you had a funny feeling about the moment you met her. She calls him baby for christssake. No girl calls a guy baby without something having happened. You asked him about it today and he gave you that stupid, no eye contact, mumbling response that he always has when he lies or when he knows he’s going to tell you something that will make you mad. You know he’s lying and you suppose it’s only a matter of time until this one comes out too.
Only now, he’s just put down a deposit on an apartment for you two, Gabriel and David. You’ll move, but you know it’s because you so desperately want to escape the hell hole that is your parents house- you have to- it’s just not safe for you or for Gabriel anymore. That’s an entirely different story for an entirely different day. You feel like you have no choice.
You have your days when you think he’s just about the greatest thing there is since Hershey’s, but you have a lot of moments and a lot of days like this where you’re completely repulsed by him and think he’s just like every other scumbag @sshole loser who you’ve kicked out of your life. It’s not a healthy range of emotions.
When you were little you envisioned yourself with some wonderful man who would do anything for you- who would protect you and care for you and never lie to you. Now that you’re grown you laugh at that notion. There’s no such thing as a “wonderful” man. They all lie. They all cheat. They all use you until you’ve turned into some shriveled up, heartless shrew who doesn’t even recognize herself in the mirror anymore.
You just can’t trust him. You have no reason to. He ruined everything.
And he ruined it all for the Devil.
Bread Bitch of Peppermint Valley
Photo Credit: Devil Girl on a Break Smoke Ring by Oleg Birioukov
Sunday, March 4, 2012
Parental Transitions and Prince Charming
You’ve never seen your Love, your Light, your Bliss like this before. He’s completely in love with your new little baby – you’ve even seen him wipe away a few happy tears when they were cuddling and he thought you weren’t looking - and it reminds you of how you felt after your first son, Gabriel, was born.
You’d gone into labor at 6:45 in the morning with Gabriel and within two hours your contractions were strong and steady, happening every four minutes. Your mother picked up you and Gabriel’s father and you couldn’t help but laugh when you saw that she had donned the passenger seat with disposable Chux pads, since your water hadn’t broken yet. Your mind was racing with fear and excitement – fear of the pain and all of the things that could go wrong and if you really had the strength to give birth to a baby and excitement for finally meeting your little son.
You got to the hospital, determined to have a natural child birth, but your little son was positioned sunny side up and by noon you just couldn’t take the mind rattling pain of his bony little head pressing up against your tailbone, so you asked for an epidural. You felt defeated and weak for a moment because women had been having babies with no pain intervention since the dawn of people, and you thought you should’ve been strong enough to do the same. However, pain and experience are far more convincing and demanding than any theories or beliefs that you had about labor and motherhood, and part of being strong is knowing your limits and not pushing them so that you can fit some ideal.
You painlessly labored on and around four in the afternoon, Gabriel’s heart rate started dropping to 80 bpm with every contraction. The nurse called in the mid-wife, who decided to break your water and get him out as soon as possible. The nurse asked if it would be alright if a few of the nursing students came in to watch. At this point you didn’t care, all that mattered was safely delivering little Gabriel. In walked an entire class of nursing students and between your mother, your father, Gabriel’s father, a surgeon, the midwife and a few nurses, there were upwards of twelve people in the room when it came time to push our your little son. The midwife turned off your epidural- she claimed that a first time mother simply couldn’t successfully push without feeling the contractions- and told you to start pushing. You pushed – hard - and your body was flooded with adrenaline and awe-inspiring pain. You tapped into some internal reserve of something you’d never felt before that gave you the greatest strength and concentration you’ve ever experienced in your entire life.
The midwife yelled “STOP!” and you stopped pushing, wondering what was happening. Gabriel had his cord wrapped around his neck, though no one told you at the time. The midwife mumbled something to the surgeon about prepping the OR for a C-section, and then told you that you were going to try to push one more time. Your father whispered in your ear to push with everything you had, and that’s exactly what you did. With that push, he was born. Gabriel was an eerie shade of cadet-blue and didn’t cry. He wasn’t placed on your chest, but rather he was placed under a warming light and had tubes put in his nose and after what felt like hours, but was probably only a minute or two, he let out a grumpy cry and you’d never heard anything more beautiful in your life.
Gabriel’s father placed him in your arms and you couldn’t believe how cute he was – he had a full head of white hair and bright blue eyes. All ten toes and all ten fingers were present and accounted for, and you’d never seen anything so tiny or so marvelous.
You hardly slept during his first few days, convinced that he would just stop breathing or something equally awful if you did. You couldn’t believe that you had been given something so precious and so perfect and couldn’t fathom what you had done to deserve this. Surely something this lovely, warm, fragile and flawless can’t be meant to last.
But he was. And he has. And the only moment that has rivaled the sheer joy and amazement of his birth was the birth of his brother. Both were very different labors and deliveries, but both were equally joyful and life changing. Both are very different children, but both are equally loved and cherished.
In those first few days of his life, you fall in love with your new little son, David. As you watch his father, your Love, your Light, your Bliss, falling in love with his son and transitioning in his own remarkable way into parenthood, you feel like you’re seeing him as a man for the first time, and he’s never been more beautiful, but there is still hurt lingering in your heart.
You hope that this will last forever, because, quite simply, he’s the best man you’ve known, you’ve never loved anyone the way you do him, and you and your children deserve the kind of stability and serenity that a decent loving man can bring to a family. You’re also getting older and your heart isn’t as resilient as it once was, and you feel like if this doesn’t work out then you’re done with love.
For now, you try to just relish these first few days of David’s life, forget about past hurt, and try to re-open your heart again. After all, no one said Prince Charming had to perfect.
Thursday, March 1, 2012
Hear the Lioness Roar: Child Abuse
In a glimmer of an instant your life became an absolute nightmare.
You can’t even think clearly enough to gather a thought more cohesive than this: all it takes is a solitary act of abuse to permanently damage a child and change their entire life. The flashbacks, the guilt, the feelings of dirtiness, the self loathing, the feelings of unworthiness. It happened to the abuser first so they think this somehow justifies what they’ve done. The victim, if they truly understood the damage that was done to them, wouldn’t then become an abuser. Maybe you’re wrong, but you know what you heard and you know what they’ve done before and you will not let them hurt anyone else, even if it means losing your family, your job, your well being. You’ve never felt more bewildered, lost or enraged in your whole life. You don’t know how to confront them, but you’ll figure it out. You must.
As a mother, it is your duty to protect you children and you will protect them, no matter the cost.
The cycle ends here and NOW.
Wednesday, February 29, 2012
Biological Parents and Blonde Babies
You start wondering about your birth mother, whether she'd even care or not that she has two grand children. You wonder if they have any of her features. You wonder if you do too. No one in your family has an insatiable need to write or a knack for music. You've always wanted to know where you get your quirks from – like your sense of humor and flair for all things dramatic, or your freakishly large feet and freakishly small ears…. Little things that most people take for granted because all they have to do is look at the people sitting at the dinner table. It seems silly. But to you it’s important.
You've just always wanted to feel like you belong - something you've never felt in your adopted family or anywhere you’ve ever been.
You start to cry fearing that you'll never meet her. Your adopted mom told you it was a closed adoption and that she’s sorry, but there’s just no way to find out who your mother was. This has left you bewildered since you were a little girl, but you tried to just forget about it and move on with life. It’s not like the parents you were given were all that bad.
Then you start to suspect that your mother isn’t exactly being truthful about finding your birth mother. After your first son was born, your father told you that your Birth Mother tried to contact you when you were 16, but your biological mom "didn't think it was a good idea." A few years later he asks you why you never went to Maine to pick up the letter that your Birth Mother had written to you. You told him that you had no idea she had. He said, “I could’ve sworn your mother told you. I must have been confused.” He’s never confused. You didn't speak to her for weeks after you found about this. She claims it was in your best interest, but you know damned better. She's somehow threatened, and you suppose you can understand to a certain extent. But you feel like it is your inalienable right to know where you came from and you don’t know how much forgiveness you can muster for anyone who interferes with this.
For now, you’ll just sit and take care of your babies, and brush their blonde hair, wondering how in the world you, an interracial, brown eyes brunette, managed to have two blue eyed blonde babies with a couple of other brunettes.
Your next step is to try and find some way to get your original birth certificate from Maine. All you know is that when you were born your name was Naiomi, your mother was a college student at the University of Farmington and your father was apparently MIA.
You aren’t trying to replace anyone. Your parents are your parents and nothing can change that.
You just want to know where you came from. Doesn’t everybody?
Monday, February 27, 2012
Birth, Forgiveness and the 1000 Mile Void
You seethe and cry and scream until you have nothing left in you and come to the realization that you're a 27 year old divorced mother of two, and both from different fathers, who lives at home and doesn't have much going for her so you figure you better make it work with this one. You're not getting any younger and the emotional baggage just keeps piling up.
You rub your enormous belly, and your little boy kicks your hand in response. While you watch him dance and wiggle you decide that you'll ignore how much he's hurt and betrayed you. You'll ignore the fact that you feel like he doesn't deserve you and that you don't deserve to be with yet another man who you just can't trust. You'll just distance yourself as much as you can emotionally from him without completely dissolving the relationship until you think he seems like he's worthy of being trusted. You still haven't reached that point yet. And the void between you feels like 1000 oceans.
Before you know it, you're in labor, huffing and puffing through each contraction wondering when this little guy will just get here already. Your love, your light, your bliss stays with you the whole time, excitedly writing down the exact timing of every contraction. After 12 hours they're still no more frequent than every seven minutes apart and you start to wonder if you’ll be in labor for the rest of your life. Your Love, your Light, your Bliss, is turning in for the night, seemingly disappointed. You are too.
Another 12 hours later and your contractions are kicking it into high gear, coming at least once every five minutes and stronger. You think it might be a good idea to go to the hospital, especially since you’re now screaming through them. You get to the hospital and the intervals go down, but the intensity remains the same. They tell you that you’re only 3 centimeters dilated and that you may stay like this for a few days so it would be best to leave and return when you’re sure you’re in labor. You mumble a rather audible “You’ve got to be fucking kidding me” and then you almost start crying. If you stay like for DAYS SOMEONE’S gonna get shot – you think. Your Light, your Love, your Bliss seems a little bewildered too, but he tries to stay positive because he knows you’re getting tired and just want this little one to be born already. The nurse suggests you go for a long walk and you glare at her through slitted eyes. You leave, get a gluten free pizza, screaming at your Light, your Love, your Bliss anytime he drives over a pothole that you don’t like. You finally get home and grunt and groan some more, scaring your little son who keeps trying to comfort you, but he’s still too little to understand that mommy’s ok and that this is just part of having a baby. His fear makes you think that maybe you should go back to the hospital. God know it hurts more than it did when you left and if they tell you to leave this time, you’ll tell them EXACTLY where they can go.
You head up to maternity ward and they ask you to sit in the waiting room. You’re grunting and groaning and the other people there- probably waiting for the birth of their little nieces, nephews and grandbabies- are trying politely not to stare as you moan and groan as demurely as a lady can when she’s in labor. A nurse walks by and asks if you are alright. You just stare at her blankly and she rushes away to the desk. A few minutes later they come out to get you and the nurse you spoke to at the front desk says, “I had no idea! You weren’t complaining enough!” She also gets a blank stare. They take you to your room and find that you’re 6 centimeters dilated and baby is definitely on his way. The contractions are happening about every 2 minutes apart and you are moaning like you’ve never moaned before. You’d had an epidural way before this point when you went into labor with your first.
The nurse offers you Nubian to help with the pain until you can have an epidural (sorry – childbirth au-natural is not for me) and you happily agree. The Nubian hits you and the contractions become manageable and you’re actually able to smile for the first time since that morning. Then it either starts to wear off or the contractions are becoming stronger. You can’t tell the difference. All you know is it HURTS. Finally, 31 hours into labor, the anesthesiologist places your catheter (though he did miss the first time and had to stab you twice in the spine which is no pleasure cruise, but in the middle of labor it just feels like a searing unrelenting pinch so that’s one twisted plus to all of that pain) and you are completely numb, cool, calm and collected within 15 minutes. Your Love, your Light, your Bliss holds your hand and rubs your back and seems excited. He’s sitting next to you while you’re trying to sleep and all of sudden you hear a loud BOOM on the Doppler and feel what feels like the biggest kick that this baby has ever kicked. The nurse lifts your blanket and announces that you’re water has broken. She calls in the doctor and after they have you flip around a few times you are ready to push. You tuck your chin to your chest, grab on behind your knees and push with everything you have when the doctor says push and stop when she says stop. Three pushes and he’s out, wailing his beautiful little blonde head off. Any hint of resentment is completely irradiated and is over taken by an all encompassing love and amazement at just how ridiculously cute he is.
The doctor places him on your chest and you just shower him in k
isses,- his nose, his cheeks, his lips, his hands – every inch of him is exquisite even with all the newborn gunk still stuck to his hair and skin. Your Love, your Light, your Bliss stands next to you and he has never seemed so over joyed. He almost appears humbled. Like in a single instant he went from a lost boy to a man with a purpose and a destiny. In that moment he is the single most beautiful man you’ve ever met and you just don’t want to meet another. And in that single instant, nothing would ever be the same between you again and the 1000 ocean void vanished.
You rub your enormous belly, and your little boy kicks your hand in response. While you watch him dance and wiggle you decide that you'll ignore how much he's hurt and betrayed you. You'll ignore the fact that you feel like he doesn't deserve you and that you don't deserve to be with yet another man who you just can't trust. You'll just distance yourself as much as you can emotionally from him without completely dissolving the relationship until you think he seems like he's worthy of being trusted. You still haven't reached that point yet. And the void between you feels like 1000 oceans.
Before you know it, you're in labor, huffing and puffing through each contraction wondering when this little guy will just get here already. Your love, your light, your bliss stays with you the whole time, excitedly writing down the exact timing of every contraction. After 12 hours they're still no more frequent than every seven minutes apart and you start to wonder if you’ll be in labor for the rest of your life. Your Love, your Light, your Bliss, is turning in for the night, seemingly disappointed. You are too.
Another 12 hours later and your contractions are kicking it into high gear, coming at least once every five minutes and stronger. You think it might be a good idea to go to the hospital, especially since you’re now screaming through them. You get to the hospital and the intervals go down, but the intensity remains the same. They tell you that you’re only 3 centimeters dilated and that you may stay like this for a few days so it would be best to leave and return when you’re sure you’re in labor. You mumble a rather audible “You’ve got to be fucking kidding me” and then you almost start crying. If you stay like for DAYS SOMEONE’S gonna get shot – you think. Your Light, your Love, your Bliss seems a little bewildered too, but he tries to stay positive because he knows you’re getting tired and just want this little one to be born already. The nurse suggests you go for a long walk and you glare at her through slitted eyes. You leave, get a gluten free pizza, screaming at your Light, your Love, your Bliss anytime he drives over a pothole that you don’t like. You finally get home and grunt and groan some more, scaring your little son who keeps trying to comfort you, but he’s still too little to understand that mommy’s ok and that this is just part of having a baby. His fear makes you think that maybe you should go back to the hospital. God know it hurts more than it did when you left and if they tell you to leave this time, you’ll tell them EXACTLY where they can go.
You head up to maternity ward and they ask you to sit in the waiting room. You’re grunting and groaning and the other people there- probably waiting for the birth of their little nieces, nephews and grandbabies- are trying politely not to stare as you moan and groan as demurely as a lady can when she’s in labor. A nurse walks by and asks if you are alright. You just stare at her blankly and she rushes away to the desk. A few minutes later they come out to get you and the nurse you spoke to at the front desk says, “I had no idea! You weren’t complaining enough!” She also gets a blank stare. They take you to your room and find that you’re 6 centimeters dilated and baby is definitely on his way. The contractions are happening about every 2 minutes apart and you are moaning like you’ve never moaned before. You’d had an epidural way before this point when you went into labor with your first.
The nurse offers you Nubian to help with the pain until you can have an epidural (sorry – childbirth au-natural is not for me) and you happily agree. The Nubian hits you and the contractions become manageable and you’re actually able to smile for the first time since that morning. Then it either starts to wear off or the contractions are becoming stronger. You can’t tell the difference. All you know is it HURTS. Finally, 31 hours into labor, the anesthesiologist places your catheter (though he did miss the first time and had to stab you twice in the spine which is no pleasure cruise, but in the middle of labor it just feels like a searing unrelenting pinch so that’s one twisted plus to all of that pain) and you are completely numb, cool, calm and collected within 15 minutes. Your Love, your Light, your Bliss holds your hand and rubs your back and seems excited. He’s sitting next to you while you’re trying to sleep and all of sudden you hear a loud BOOM on the Doppler and feel what feels like the biggest kick that this baby has ever kicked. The nurse lifts your blanket and announces that you’re water has broken. She calls in the doctor and after they have you flip around a few times you are ready to push. You tuck your chin to your chest, grab on behind your knees and push with everything you have when the doctor says push and stop when she says stop. Three pushes and he’s out, wailing his beautiful little blonde head off. Any hint of resentment is completely irradiated and is over taken by an all encompassing love and amazement at just how ridiculously cute he is.
The doctor places him on your chest and you just shower him in k
isses,- his nose, his cheeks, his lips, his hands – every inch of him is exquisite even with all the newborn gunk still stuck to his hair and skin. Your Love, your Light, your Bliss stands next to you and he has never seemed so over joyed. He almost appears humbled. Like in a single instant he went from a lost boy to a man with a purpose and a destiny. In that moment he is the single most beautiful man you’ve ever met and you just don’t want to meet another. And in that single instant, nothing would ever be the same between you again and the 1000 ocean void vanished.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)