(My blog ate this post an hour ago. Even the internet is fucking with me. But apparently all is fixed. Trying this again. If it doesn’t work I’m just going to go set fire to the house.)
Yesterday I was talking to some (now estranged) family members and one said that a local indoor skydiving place just opened. Apparently a super-strong wind is blown up from the floor and you float on it, but I wondered aloud how people keep from suffocating when all that wind is blowing on your face and then everyone looked at me like I shit on the floor because apparently most people don’t completely lose the ability to use their nostrils when they stick their face out of the window in a speeding car. I assumed they were just fucking with me but I’ve asked several other people and apparently this is not a “normal” thing. Or it is a normal thing and everyone I know is conspiring to make me think I’m insane. Except that I looked on the internet and found at least 4 people in the world who’ve asked the same thing so I can’t be alone. Unless I’m those four people and I’ve blocked it out. So I’m asking here. Is it just me?
If you try to leave a comment or even look at comments right now you’ll get a message saying that you’re doing it wrong and should try searching better. So basically my blog is broken and it’s blaming you. I’ve heard it’s not just me so maybe this will get fixed by the time I write this and this whole post will be pointless. More pointless than usual, at least.
UPDATED: IT’S FIXED! Until I break it again, probably. Now to find the post that was eaten…
I wrote this 10 years ago but it still perfectly expresses how I feel. Mother’s Day is fraught with all sorts of weird emotions and I’m so lucky to still have my mother, who loves me and a daughter I adore. Most people don’t get both and so I feel undeservedly lucky each year these two things happen. I send out love and peace to those who are lucky enough to celebrate with joy, and to those who face the day with bittersweet memories or anger. Or both. Because we’re human and complicated and never quite end up with the perfect greeting card life that we imagine.
Originally published Houston Chronicle ~ May 2006
“Don’t buy me anything for Mother’s Day. Every day is Mother’s Day.” ~A direct quote from Nelda Dusek (my mother)
You wouldn’t know it from looking at me but I have a rare blood disease.
It’s called Antiphospholipid Syndrome and there isn’t a lot known about it other than it can cause blood clots, strokes, and miscarriages. I didn’t even know that I had it.
My husband and I had gone to the doctor expecting to hear our baby’s heartbeat and instead were told that it had died. We were devastated and I didn’t leave my house for a week. When my second loss followed in the next year I demanded that my doctor test me for everything in the books. That’s when I found out I had this strange disease which can worsen during pregnancy and makes carrying to full -term nearly impossible without treatment. My doctor recommended baby aspirin to thin my blood but after a third miscarriage it was clear that I needed something stronger to give me more of a chance. They moved me to a blood-thinner that I had to inject directly into my stomach 1-2 times each day. My stomach became a patchwork quilt of bruises. Six months later the pregnancy test finally turned pink. I upped my dosage of daily injections and made fast friends with other sufferers on the high-risk BabyCenter message boards. I cried with them as they continued to miscarry and felt jealous but hopeful as a lucky few gave birth to little miracles. I watched a best friend go through many rounds of failed fertility treatments and watched her support me even though it must have been torture to see my belly grow bigger every day. I had such severe morning sickness that I was put on a drug typically used for chemo patients. When I was about 7 months along the baby stopped moving and I was terrified. I drank sugary orange juice, listened to loud rap music, desperate to get a response. When she finally moved I was so relieved that I laughed and cried at the same time. During labor I didn’t really mind the pain. I was just so scared that she was going to die that it was all I could concentrate on. The moment I heard Hailey cry in the delivery room was the first time I allowed myself to believe that I might actually be somebody’s mom.
People always tell me that the 500+ shots I had to take to have Hailey will one day make great guilt material and that I should demand rubies every Mother’s Day, but I don’t see it that way. I did all of that for me…so that I could be allowed to be Hailey’s mom, to be the one to kiss her boo-boos, to comfort her when she’s teething, to get woken up at 3am and to see that smile that no one else gets from her but me. Every time I check the BabyCenter message boards I’m reminded that I’m one of the lucky ones.
I’ve realized that my mom was right all along. Every day that I’m allowed to be a mom is Mother’s Day.
The first day I met Hailey
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And now, the weekly wrap-up:
These are a few of my favorite things.
Shit I made in my shop (Named “EIGHT POUNDS OF UNCUT COCAINE” so that your credit card bill will be more interesting.):
This week’s wrap-up is brought to you by Renee Charytan’s book called If You Give a Mommy a Glass of Wine. a satirical parody for all the imperfect mothers out there who work hard, try hard and occasionally make mistakes. It’s like If You Give a Mouse a Cookie, but with more booze. And who can’t use more booze? Check it out here.
If you don’t know what Neko Atsume is then just run away now because it is tremendously stupid and I spent months making fun of my sister for playing it until I downloaded it and now I stop what I’m doing multiple times a day to feed the non-existent electronic cartoon cats that live in my phone and take pictures of them and yell with joy when one leaves me a damp, empty matchbox that also doesn’t exist in real life. What’s the point of this game? Answer: There is no point. Unless you’re compulsive like me and must get a picture of every cat and every momento and can’t sleep until it’s done. It’s almost as bad as Simpson’s Tapped Out, which is the only other game I play but I’ve played it for years and have spent real life money to buy imaginary buildings in an imaginary town that exists only on my phone. It’s super fucked up and I don’t even have a joke for it but I just logged in to Neko Atsume and Pickles was embodying all of me today and I thought you could maybe relate.
PS. This isn’t a well-written post. I don’t have an end for it. Sorry. See above.
So I’ve been super up and down mentally lately and I’m not sure why, but usually when I’m this crazy people tell me it’s because Mercury is in retrograde (and it totally is right now), so my suggestion is that we just blow up Mercury.
I realize this might seem like a radical move but that’s the sort of extreme shit that happens whenever Mercury goes into retrograde, so basically Mercury brought this on itself. And I’m not victim-blaming or anything, but I did just google “how does Mercury affect the human body” and turns out people die of mercury poisoning all the fucking time. So basically it’s us or Mercury and I think this counts as self-defense. Victor says that I’ve confused mercury (the element) with Mercury (the planet) and that’s possible but I’m not listening to him because Victor can be a real asshole whenever Mercury starts going into retrograde and at this point I suspect he’s being controlled by it. It’s like he’s Patty Hearst and Mercury has a loaded gun and lots of charisma.
Also, I suspect that poisonous mercury comes from Mercury because why else would it be named that? The only good thing about mercury is that it’s used inside old-fashioned glass thermometers, but even then it’s only helpful if you’re already sick. Plus, you have to put it in your mouth for it to work and it’s poisonous. I’m pretty sure this is a sign that Mercury is trying to kill us all, starting with the weak and already sick. I call shenanigans. Let’s blow up Mercury and replace it with Pluto, which is still totally a planet in my book.
So say we all.
PS. If this post seems ridiculous and slightly irrational I blame Mercury. I also blame it for me eating too much cheese at lunch. And for the fact that I’m behind on deadlines. Mercury can be a real dick-nugget sometimes.
I was just talking with Victor about comfort books…those books that you read over and over because you find them comforting even if you don’t understand why. He thinks I’m insane and possibly I am, but there are certain books I turn to when my head is in a weird place and I need to go somewhere I’ve been before and relax. I’d tried to explain it to him and he almost understood until I started listing a few and then I realized that most of my comfort books are full of murder and angst and bizarreness and are not really what anyone in the world would consider to be a happy or relaxing read. Books like Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil and Geek Love and From the Dust Returned and The Stranger. Worn copies of Bloody Business and Stiff and The 3 Faces of Eveand Alice in Wonderland and pretty much any of the Sookie Stackhouse series. Books that may not make it on my top ten list, but that I compulsively read again and again.
I wonder if I’m the only one like this? Are these the books my head feels comfortable with because I first read them when I was in a good place and my mind unconsciously wants that again? Or does the darkness of the books remind me that I’m not alone, or that it could be worse? I have no idea. So I thought I’d ask you. What are your comfort books? The ones you’ve read over and over…more times than you’ve read your very favorite books. The ones you’d take on a desert island as a medicine, or would need to pull out on a turbulent plane ride? Do those books even exist for you?
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And now, the weekly wrap-up:
These are a few of my favorite things.
Shit I made in my shop (Named “EIGHT POUNDS OF UNCUT COCAINE” so that your credit card bill will be more interesting.):
Best book I read this week: Through the Woods. (Creepy graphic novel. Full of awesome.)
This week’s wrap-up is brought to you by Jodi Aman’s book: You 1, Anxiety 0: Win your life back from fear and panic to keep calm in a crazy world. Man has been a therapist for 20 years and suffered from debilitating anxiety herself. About the book: “Anxiety doesn’t play fair. It antagonizes you. It lies to you. It steals away the best parts of you. Don’t let it keep cheating you out of happiness! You are too important. This book speaks to why you suffer from anxiety, exposes the tricks anxiety uses to get power, and shares the skills you need to empower yourself and retrain your brain.” I haven’t read it yet but I’m putting it on my to-read list.Check it out here.
The Mack Files: Digesting life in bite-sized pieces through the lens of clichés, quotes & “truisms”. Often irreverent, always honest.
Barking at the Moon: If your dog is your furry child, you will laugh out loud at Tracy Beckerman’s book about her family & a one-dog wrecking ball named Riley.
Wonder and Joy for the Wired and Tired: Feeling wired, tired, and stretched too thin? You’re not alone. Re-ignite your sense of childlike wonder, joy, and well-being with this enlightening and entertaining book by Dr. Pam Stephens Lehenbauer, well-being thought leader and author of the blog, Mother Nature’s Apprentice.
Stuff and Thangs from Xanaru: A mostly funny stuff about my quest for happiness through stories, art, friendship, Great Danes, one naked weirdo alien cat and indiscriminate swearing.
How the Hell Did I Not Know That?: Humorist Lucie Frost shares daily Instagram reels with learnings of the day—words, music, whatever–with plenty of laughs and all the curse words.
Beautiful Writers book: Writers! This coming-of-career memoir (w/ the BEST advice from celeb authors, real shit you haven’t heard) is life. A page-turning beach read doubling as how-to. #Magic
Vanilla Hour: A Love Story Across Time by Neer Ya is a literary novel spanning decades and cities, from Delhi to Tokyo to Goa, that follows Dr. Nandini Yadav, a geochemist and single mother, as a school reunion forces her to finally confront the buried secrets of a past love, trauma, and the man whose shadow lingers in her daughter’s smile.
Sunday Comics With Cooper and Fitz: A light-hearted comic strip about two sibling felines and their life with their adopted family: their relationship is complicated but hilarious, and navigating life with humans adds to the fun.
