MEDICATION TIME

I know sometimes I ramble on about being alone when in reality, I'm exactly where I want to be. I think I have moments of weakness when I actually do miss having a significant other and then something always knocks me back into reality. Usually, it's someone I know going through some relationship drama that makes me want to vomit and run for cover. At times like those, I feel thankful that my life is without that kind of drama. Unfortunately, my life has other areas that take up the slack. I just read an article today about diabetes and stress. HA! And people think carbs are what kill... First and foremost on my bitchfest for today is my elderly mother. I call her "mother" for lack of anything else to call her. You see, this woman who looks like my mother really isn't my mother at all. The aliens must have abducted her about 5 years ago and put a empty pod in her place. The empty pod doesn't like to do the things my mother used to like to do. In fact, the only activity this pod likes is sitting in the dark and rocking in the rocking chair. 

The pod won't bathe, brush her teeth or eat properly, but when asked about depression, "it" responds that everything is fine. I'm at the point of pulling my hair out because I don't know what to do to help change things. All this stress is effecting my health, but short of installing an on/off switch in my head, I don't know how to just accept the fact that there isn't anything I can do. Believe me, over the past 5 years, I have tried everything known to man to interest the pod in anything and any suggestion I make is met with instant resistence. I even went as far as one day saying to the pod, "Okay we're even!" (I felt she was paying me back for me being such a rebellious shit in my younger years) The pod knew what I meant without any further explanation and it laughed at my frustration! The second bug that has crawled up my ass are people who disappoint me...I know,BOO HOO! I figure at this stage of life meaning "adulthood", people should follow through on things they say they are going to do or else they need to just keep their well-meaning pieholes closed. 

I'm tired of doing things for everyone and in turn, feeling like I'm used and unappreciated. Yes, I know I allow this and need to be a little less giving, but to be honest with you, I don't know how to be any other way. And I really don't think it's me who has the problem! Being able to give to others is an attribute, but the longer I live, the more I see it's an attribute that's taken advantage of by leeches, emotional vampires and other bottom feeders. At this moment I just want to tell everyone to "suck my ass dry!" I NEED DRUGS! NOW! And the sad part is, I'll take a deep breath or twenty and just go about my business. 

Gratitude statement: I'm grateful for being able to tell those around me, the givers of stress to fuck off ocassionally. 

A FUNNY THING HAPPENED

Yes, a funny thing did happened to me on my way to old age! I got distracted, sidetracked and ended up poked away in some hermitage on The Redneck Riviera. How the hell did that happen? Now, many years later here I am in a spot I never thought I'd be. I really didn't think at this stage of my life I'd be alone. Lately, I have laughed at myself for being such a loser. Here I sit typing away about love and life when obviously whatever formula I had carefully devised for successful relationships hasn't worked.

My head is full of stupid idealistic notions and all those notions have accomplished is to keep me isolated and alone. I think my plan royally backfired! I wish some of the married people out here would tell me the secret of success, longevity and of finding the right match for myself and where to search. I know people say as long as you're hunting you won't find what you're hunting for. Maybe so, but what about the last five years I haven't been hunting? Am I so defective and grotesque that the thought of being with me makes men run for cover? Does my independence work against me by causing any potential mate to feel unwanted or unneeded? Am I demanding? Not really! Actually, I'm low maintenance and I think this might be something that has worked against me also. 

You see, I had this foolish notion that the best things in life are free and love needn't be an expensive adventure. After all, they say money doesn't buy love. Also, I’ve never been a materialistic person. "Stuff" just doesn't impress me. I was always more impressed by what was inside a person than by what they owned. I think this is another flaw in my outlook on life. Am I a vain person? No, not at all! In fact, people look at me as a diamond in the rough. I guess I should have spent countless hours at the gym and thousands of dollars on make-up and saved my pennies to buy a pair of implants. Somehow, when I looked in the mirror over the years, I never saw a person who needed make-up and the hard physical work I did all my life seemed to keep me in pretty good shape. 

As for the implants... well 40C seems ample enough for me and since I never had a career as an exotic dancer, I never felt the need to enhance what mother nature already gave me. So what's wrong with me? And how do I fix it? Or do I just let it be and keep right on believing the right person is going to love me unconditionally and accept me for who I am when that has never happened? What are the odds at this point that the remainder of my life will be spent alone? I think statistics are starting to work against me here! Being a few standard deviations from the norm makes me at high risk to be an old maid. It's off to the nunnery for Mildred! The person I have deemed as being "okay" must not be. I wish I could see myself through someone else's eyes and then I'd know what to fix. 

It's hilarious that just recently I thought the metamorphosis was complete because I had emerged from a difficult time in one piece. Now, I’m beginning to think the metamorphosis has just begun and the road ahead of me is unclear! It sounds to me like I'm a prime candidate for a mid-life crisis! Now, all I need to do is find a suitable one...one worth the time and effort of doing. Knowing me as I do, I have no problem believing something will come my way and pique my interest...and probably be a total disaster (my specialty)! So let the fun begin! 

Gratitude statement: I actually am grateful to have lived this long to be faced with what to do with the rest of my life. 

EROTICISM AND THE WALMART SHOPPER

I hate crowds! I also hate shopping! I guess that not only makes me unAmerican, but also the atypical female. Sometimes I used to go grocery shopping late at night to avoid the crowds. Very late one night, I went to Walmart where I encountered a middle-aged couple ahead of me in the checkout line purchasing 3 items. I made the following observations about the couple: 

 1. They were a well-dressed, affluent, middle-aged couple. 

 2. They were obviously enamored with each other because they made frequent passionate public displays of affection (PDA) 

 My smile turned to utter delight as I became mentally captivated by the 3 items they purchased. To this day I often wonder why any couple would come to Walmart at 2 a.m. to buy a roll of duct tape, a reclining lawn chair and a can of whipped cream! No, I didn't follow them home, but I have to admit I was tempted! 

Gratitude statement: I'm thankful for having a keen power of observation and enough sense to know when to leave well enough alone! 

The Definition of Confusion

When my children were still in school, they used to visit their grandparents on school holidays. I would drive halfway to Pensacola to meet my mother and place my children in her care. The first few days always seemed like bliss and then the house gradually seemed way too quiet. By the time I would pick up my children, I was more than ready to have them come home again. I welcomed that deafening chaos.

My mother was always rather rigid while I was growing up and had a very diplomatic way of handling punishment. If the guilty party didn't confess the first time when we were asked who did it, we all suffered the consequences. As I grew older and eventually became a parent myself, the woman who raised me seemed to change. She got soft in her old age! Had I broken her spirit? Possibly! But each time my children would rave on about the fun-loving person who they perceived their grandmother to be, I knew it wasn't the same person who raised me. My mother was proof that aliens do exist! Ask anyone from my old neighborhood! They knew my mother was a force to be reckoned with. Her voice alone could raise the dead.

Each time my children would go for a visit, it took weeks before I could straighten them out. My mother waited on them hand and foot and made them do nothing but fun things while they visited her. When they came home sassy and quite lazy, I would want to pull my hair out. One time while driving home, my children seemed quite mesmerized by a joke book one of them had gotten while in Pensacola. One of the visiting rituals was to take my three children (her angelic grandchildren) to Hawsey's, a used bookstore and let them each purchase a large paper bag full of books to read.

Since they were quiet on our trip home and this was an oddity, I tried to engage them in conversation only to be told they were reading jokes. That explained the occasional chuckle I heard from the backseat. I asked them to read aloud some of the jokes. My youngest child, Matthew spoke up and said he would read one. Although he was only 7 at the time, his reading skills were quite advanced for someone his age. As Matthew read, I almost drove off the road.

Whats' the definition of "confusion"?
Twenty blind lesbians in a fish market!

What? Now, with glee they started reading more jokes from the book until I asked them where they got the book. In unison...HAWSEY'S! And your grandmother let you buy that? Well, she never screened the books that were bought, so the book titled Truly Tasteless Jokes was easily purchased by my son, Daniel (age 9). When they all went on to recite the dirty little ditties my mother had taught them I knew she had lost her mind or maybe the rules that apply to being a parent were different from those being a grandparent. It definitely was a gotcha moment lovingly given to me by my mother. To this day, my mother just smiles innocently when this story is told.

An example of one of the my mother's ditties:

A flock of birds
Chocked full of tirds
Flew over my father's castle
They stretched their necks
And shit a peck
Then closed up their assholes.

Gratitude statement: I'm thankful I don't live in a castle near a fish market.

FEATURED YOYO

Daniel Fogelberg
August 13, 1951 – December 16, 2007
Written by an anonymous fan: "Dan, I finally hugged my father before he left; I finally found peace after lost love; I finally claimed a purple mountain for my soul -- all this because of your musical journey, always more than lyrics and melodies. I finally discovered gratitude and grace. Your music is timeless; your heart, boundless."

Gratitude statement: Sometimes lasting memories are formed under the strangest of circumstances and sometimes people only need to briefly touch your life in order to have a lasting effect on it.

I GAVE BIRTH TO A PRINCESS

This is my beautiful daughter, Princess Christina. She would like to have people believe I hung a porkchop around her neck as a child so at least the dogs would play with her. What a sassy little vixen she is and also she's bursting at the seams from being full of crap! She's talented in so many ways and I truly wish she would see her full potential instead of spinning her wheels like yours truly (I guess this comes from being raised by a mother who had potential, but did everything she could to destroy it).

Gratitude statement: I'm thankful for rubber porkchops because they are reusable!