Okay, so confession time:

I have had the most difficult time blogging about my first half-marathon that I finished back in September.  It’s been months now and I keep staring at this blog post, dissatisfied with it, and I’ve finally come to the conclusion that the only way I’m ever going to get this post out is by starting it off by getting the serious stuff out of the way first.

I was stupid.

I’m not talking “Ha, ha, look at this idiotic thing I did, tee-hee” type of stupid… I’m talking stupid-stupid.

I was stupid, I did not hydrate well enough at the water stations because I wanted to keep going, I did not bring my own source of water, and during the last three miles I suffered heat exhaustion, bordering on heat stroke.

I want to be perfectly clear that the situation I almost got myself into was 100% my fault.  I’ve heard a couple people say that it’s the race organizer’s job to avoid this sort of thing happening, but I disagree.  In this case, it was completely my fault.  I was both under-trained and under-prepared.  The race had hydration stations – I failed to use them correctly.   I also failed to do the research so I knew exactly what to do once I recognized the signs that my body was struggling.

I think the reason I got into trouble in the first place is because I rely so much on my brain to help me think my way through difficult situations… and what I didn’t anticipate in the case of dehydration was how it would shut my thinking power off.  It wasn’t obvious to me, either.  I mean, it seemed like my brain was was working, and it was only when I started feeling better that I realized how dumb my decisions were.  When my body became covered in goosebumps and my mouth completely dried out and I lost the ability to sweat, instead of stopping and finding some shade, all I could  think about was:  Water.  Go. Keep going, and get water.  Becky, you need water, and walking will take longer, so just keep running and you’ll get to the water faster.

I made it to the finish line, and it was scary and wonderful, but later that evening the first rumors came in.

I made it, but another runner didn’t.  He passed out and eventually passed away less than half a mile from where I struggled the worst.

He was 28 years old, in way better shape than me, he ran half marathons before, and he died.  It was more than sobering, and I just couldn’t find it in myself to keep laughing and joking about all the fun thoughts I had about my first half marathon.

So, I put the blog post aside for a bit, but every time I came back to it, I couldn’t really continue because it felt… I dunno. By ignoring how close I came to really being in a bad way and not sharing my learnings with other, it felt disrespectful to the other guy’s death.  I finally decided to include a section at the end of the blog post talking about it, but that felt almost worse.  “Ha, ha, look at how much fun I had!  Also, I almost killed myself and this other dude died, so don’t do what I did.  But anyways, back to the fun….”

So. After chewing on it for awhile, I’m starting this blog post over, and it’s not nearly as funny as the other intro I had, but I need to write it like this.

I’m also going to begin it by being preachy:  If you are a beginner (or otherwise) runner, here is my VERY STRONG advice to you:  Don’t ever attempt a longer run without a source of water.  For those of you who hate bringing things on your run, I get it.  I hate holding things on my runs, I hate backpacks, and I hate fanny packs.  I figured I could hydrate at the water station – that worked for me on my first 5k and my first 10k…. why not my first half marathon?

Look, I’m a queen of ignoring my body when it’s complaining – living with Rheumatoid Arthritis will do that to you.  But I’m also pretty used to listening to my body and judging where I’m at… and I’m here to tell you that yes, I finished my race, but…. but I was very, very close to being in a very, very bad way.

I learned that I don’t do well in heat when my body isn’t prepared for it.   I love the heat of the desert, and I’ve worked in the sun on 102 degree days with no problem… but that’s after my body had a chance to acclimate slowly as the weather heated up from winter to spring, and then to summer.

I do not do well in heat when all of my runs have been at 6am, in the dark, and the race is on an 80 degree day in the sun.   I’m so glad I learned this fact during a simple little race on foot, in the middle of civilization, where there was water, and gatorade, and paramedics on standby.  I’m so glad I didn’t learn this when I was at an endurance ride, on horseback, in the middle of nowhere.  It could have been very, very bad, and I will never, ever, ever, EVER EVER EVER run a long race again without bringing my own source of hydration.

So, once again, that’s my advice to you, if you’re going to do something strenuous, bring your own water.  The worst that will happen is that carrying the water will be annoying.  It’s a lot better than the worst-case of the alternative scenario.

Okay.  Moving on.

Last September I ran the Beat the Blerch half marathon in Carnation, Washington.

If you have never heard of The Blerch, drop everything right now and click on this link below and read this story:

Seriously.  Click here.  Nothing I write will make any sense unless you know the context.

Anyways, sometimes I rattle on and on and give lots of backstory, but lately I’ve been feeling sorry for you guys because my posts have been so long, so I’ll get right to the point:

I almost sold my ticket and didn’t run the race.  This would have been such a big mistake.

When I first bought the ticket back in March of 2014 – beating out thousands of people and a website which kept crashing – I was so excited.  The race sold out in a matter of minutes, so I felt very, very lucky to have my ticket.  I had such high hopes for myself.  I had a plan, a running partner, lots of good intentions, and  I even left almost six weeks of extra “whoops” time for my training.  I’d be in great shape for the race…. wouldn’t I?

Two months before the race found me angry, out of shape, and so very, very disappointed in myself.  I was supposed to be a third of the way through the half marathon portion of my training – averaging 20+ miles a week at a brisk pace.

Instead, not only was I fifteen pounds fatter than when I signed up, I was lucky if I managed more than one run a week, much less 20+ miles worth of running.  I hadn’t even worked my way up to three miles at a stretch, but the training program told me I needed to be at 5-6 miles a run.

I should sell my ticket.  What’s the point, anyways?  I’m not ready for this run, and there’s no way I can get ready in two months.  I’ll probably have to walk the whole thing, and that’s just a waste compared to what I had originally planned.  I can’t believe I took this spot from someone who would have done it justice, someone who deserved it so much more than me.    I should wait.  There’s no point ruining my “first half marathon” experience.  I should sell my ticket to someone who deserves it and try again when I can do it right.  I suck.  

And that’s when I realized – my Blerch is not a fat cherub who encourages me to eat gravy.

My Blerch is a stupid jerk who demands perfection or nothing.  There is no in between for my Blerch, and there is no joy, no reward in half measures.

And you see, on the surface that sounds inspiring.  It’s the sort of thing that sounds good on one of those 1980’s motivational posters you see in gym teachers’ offices.

It sounds good, but it accomplishes nothing.  This way of thinking does not motivate me – it destroys me.  I end up using it as an excuse to quit things, even if it doesn’t feel like an excuse at the time.

That’s what I realized as I was jogging around the track one evening in the middle of July.  It was late evening – that perpetual Pacific Northwest summer twilight that lasts for hours, and as I limped very, very slowly around the track in my inept fashion…

I decided to quit thinking that way.  I’m not sure what helped me make that decision, or why it took me so long to come to it, but I realized – I can’t afford to think like that anymore, not about this race, and not about my life.  If I keep waiting until I’m totally prepared or everything lines up juuuuuuust perfectly, I’m going to be 85 years old and still daydreaming of all the stuff I never did.

And seriously, what a waste of a life that would be.

The thing is, I hate feeling mediocre, but sometimes mediocre isn’t necessarily such a bad thing.  My life is too busy, and nowadays I am just too many people to be able to be truly excellent at everything.  Sometimes I feel like a juggler who has been given too many balls.  Mom.  Wife.  Christian.  Thoughtful friend.  Good family member with extended family.  Athlete.  Horseback rider.  Writer.  Reader.  Laundry-do’er.  House cleaner.  Dog trainer.  Excellent employee.  Healthy eater. 

No matter how fast I move my hands and try to keep all the balls up in the air, I just can’t do it.  Sooner or later I drop one of them… but that’s okay.  It doesn’t mean I need to quit juggling, or get off the stage, or quit.  It just means I need to pick that ball up and reintroduce it back into the mix, and try to do better keeping it in the air next time.

So, that’s what I decided during that hot evening as I shuffled my slow way around the dimly lit track.  I decided to be honest with myself.  Yes, I dropped the “do great at a half-marathon” ball.  Oh well.
Yeah, I sucked.  Yeah, I didn’t make the time for training that I could have…. but you know what?  There was joy to be found in following through anyways.  And even if that joy wasn’t going to be found in the fist-pumping victory of averaging a 12 minute mile as I crossed the finish line…. screw it.  I was going to go anyways.

Maybe it wasn’t going to be the victory I imagined, but it was still a victory.

So… I kept training as best as I could and showed up at the race anyways.  And Claire (my jogging partner) went, even though she had even less of a chance to train than I did.  At one point on one of our runs, we both adopted the endurance motto:  “To finish is to win.” I don’t know about you, but I love that motto.

The neat thing about a run organized by The Oatmeal was that nobody seemed to take themselves seriously.  Claire and I got to the run early – we needed to pick up our race packets, having opted out of packet pickup the day before.

The shirt was amazing… and several sizes too small.  I guess that’s what happens when you sign up for a race expecting to lose tons of weight….and spend the intervening months eating away your feelings instead of running.

Go figure, right?

I spent the hour before the start milling around, stretching, and trying to find ways of entertaining myself.  I get nervous right before big events, and when I just stood around waiting I found myself getting nauseous with the adrenaline.  So, I tried to distract myself.  Eventually I made a decision to find all the Blerch posters and get a picture of me copying them.

Hey, it wasn’t the most interesting thing I could have done… but it was either that or stand around belching in an attempt to settle my upset stomach and being eaten away by nervous anticipation.

Admit it.  You all wish you could be as sexy as me.

Finally, FINALLY it was time to line up at the start.  There’s something seriously exciting about the start of a race – the nervous energy, the waves of people – the mental preparation.  I have to remind myself to go slow – much, much, much slower than I want to go, or I tend to sprint, run out of breath, and lose before I’ve barely begun the race.

It took most of a mile before the crowded start began to thin out and I was able to settle into my stride.

Look, I don’t know if I’ve mentioned it before, but I have a tendency to cry when I finish a race.  It’s the most ridiculous thing, but the surge of emotion I get as I cross the finish line overwhelms me, and it just starts leaking out of my eyes as liquid happiness.

Well, for the first time ever I didn’t cry when I finished a race.  Oh, no.

I cried for the FIRST THREE MILES.  It was the stupidest thing.  I’m a very, very slow wogger (jogging so slow it might as well be walking), and as I settled into my back-of-the-pack status I realized I was surrounded by all the other slow-jogging chubbies, and something about it just set off my I’m-so-proud-of-all-of-us emotions…

And I started crying.

Seriously.

Every time I saw a back roll, or a waggling too-large butt, or a jiggling tummy I started choking up. It just felt so beautiful, so amazing, to be a part of this group of people banding together, standing up against our own personal demons, learning to persevere even when the insidious whispering of our own personal Blerches got us down….It was so beautiful… so amazing…. look at us all.

*SNIFFLE*

The fatter the person was, the harder I had to fight back the tears.  I think at one point this really chubby lady passed me, and when I saw her arms jiggling with each step I actually let out a little sob, out loud.

The problem was, not only was it ridiculous to be crying my way through a race as well as a little bit demeaning to the people I was crying about, but the more I tried to hold back the tears, the more my throat closed up, and the more my throat closed up with emotions, the harder I found it to breathe…

And at some point it occurred to me, “Becky, knock it off.  Seriously.   Get your crap together,or you’re gonna pass out, wake up surrounded by paramedics, and then have to explain to the paramedics that you’re not sick, you’re just overwhelmed with fat-people-camaraderie.”

So I plugged my iPod headphones into my ears and turned on my music.  I’d planned on waiting to turn on my music somewhere around mile four or so, but I figured that starting my music early was better than choking to death with emotion over someone’s chubby waist.

For the record, I have the crappiest taste in running music. I used to be on a crew (rowing) team in college, and I learned during my morning workouts that the heavier the beat, the faster/harder I could work out….. so now my running tape is filled with just the trashiest dance music.

However, on that morning, running high on adrenaline and Adderall, the music seemed oddly perfect.

 I’m bringing sexxxxy baaaack….UH.  You other brothers don’t know where it’s at UH.  Get your sexy on UH  Get your sexy on UH.”  
The morning was beautiful – the dirt trail was hard packed but still had a little spring to it, and even though the day promised to be hot, the 9 am start time meant the sunlight filtering through the Pacific Northwest foliage was still cool.

Something something HEY 
Something something HEY 
Korean something HEY 
Oppa Gangam Style

I found my rhythm after a bit and settled into the beat of the music, starting to pass people.  My breath was coming a little harder than I wanted it to, but it felt so good to stretch my legs, to feel myself following through, to be a part of this race – I didn’t mind.

The first hill was brutal, and when the trees gave way to sun baked earth it left me wondering if I was actually going to be able to run the whole way.  I’ve never been good at jogging in the heat, and without the protective cover of the trees, the sun beating down on me promised heat in spades.  I’d been training in the cool of the morning, and I found myself slowing my pace as my legs kept up the slow, steady rhythm.  The air felt dry in my mouth, but I didn’t mind.

I was here.  I was racing.  I was running my first half marathon, and even though it was harder than I thought, I was still doing it.  The mile markers lined the side of the road, and….

…and I was on mile Two.

Oh.  My.  GAWWWDDDDD.

Look, I don’t think I can adequately explain time warp I experienced during the my first three miles of the Blerch.

I’ve never run a longer race than those first three miles.  It felt like I was in the Twilight Zone.  For some reason, every mile felt more like six or seven miles….. and when I discovered that I had literally only run two miles, and that there was actually still 11 miles to go….

I don’t think I’ve ever felt more horror.

I passed by the couch at mile three.

They had the coolest setup straight from the Blerch comic- cake, and grape soda and people dressed up in Blerch costumes who would harass you as you ran by, trying to convince you to join them on the couch, or to quit running and just enjoy the sunshine and eat cake with them.

I wanted to take a picture with The Blerch, with me sitting on the sofa, but I had barely begun to hit the point where my legs felt mechanical underneath me.  Every single time I jog, or run, or race, or whatever you want to call it, I spend the first mile or two having to mentally instruct my body before the movement becomes mechanical. “And now you lift your left leg, and now you set it down.  And now you lift your right leg, and now you set it down.  And now the left leg again….”   I wonder if super fast runners have this problem, or if it’s just me?

Either way, at mile three I’d barely found my rhythm so I didn’t dare stop for a photo. I smiled and waved at the Blerchs, lowered my head and plugged on through.

Somewhere right before mile four I began to feel the same rhythm and sense of completeness that I’d felt in the beginning, only without the bursting into tears.  I hit a couple of good songs in a row and I could feel my stride lengthening. I began passing people – I’m very VERY slow in the beginning (usually a 13.5-14 min mile), but I have a tendency to get faster the longer I run, and people who had blasted past me in the beginning were now falling behind me, one after another, as I passed into the shady part of the run.  My breath came easily, and my feet fell on the rhythm of the beat. “Sultan of Swing” came on, which is my all-time favorite running song, followed by LMFAO’s “Sexy and I Know It”, and I began to feel like maybe, just maybe I was gonna be okay on this run.

I’m sexy and I know it.
I’m sexy and I know it.
I’m sexy and I Know it.

Wiggle, wiggle, wiggle, wiggle, wiggle YEAH
Wiggle wiggle wiggle wiggle—-

And then, with no warning, my iPod died.

Right there, somewhere in between mile five and six,  right in the middle of the wiggle-wiggle portion of the song, the stupid, hideous, good-for-nothing piece of equipment just quit working.  I’d charged it for nearly two days prior to the event, terrified something like this would happen…. and it did.

I’ve never hated anything worse than I hated that iPod the moment I realized it was broken.  I felt so betrayed.  I considered chucking it into the forest, or slamming it beneath my heel, but I was scared of disrupting the rhythm of my run, especially since I had no music to listen to anymore.  I shoved it into the pocket of my pants and a few moments later my ears had adjusted to the silence of the morning race.

Suddenly, I wasn’t flying high.

Suddenly, I wasn’t riding the mechanical, effortless rhythm of my slow-moving body.

Suddenly, I was just a fat person out for a very slow, excruciating, boring jog in the woods.

I could hear the heavy sound of my breathing and it just depressed me.  I tried not to think about how far I had to go – I tried to focus on the sound of my feet crunching on the gritty dirt, or the sounds of the birds in the trees, or the conversation of the other runners….but the overwhelming beauty of the morning had been popped and the whole thing became just one giant, depressing effort not to break into a walk.

I’d like to be one of those people who flies high on joy of running alone, but if I am running by myself I have to blast music .  Without it, the sound of my personal Blerch is too strong.  My Blerch doesn’t try to get me to watch TV or eat – my Blerch very encouragingly tells me to give up, and with every footfall on that silent, music-less half marathon, I could hear it.

You’ve gone far enough.  Just stop at that sign right up ahead and break down into a walk.  It’s okay.  You can probably walk faster than you can jog, anyways.  You can’t do this without music.  Just walk for a bit.  Just a little bit.  It’s not like you’re gonna finish in the time frame you wanted, so why not walk for a bit?

People started passing me – people  nodding in time with the beat of their own music that played on their faithful STILL WORKING iPods, people moving in sync with their partners, people I’d flown past a mile before.

I ducked my head and kept jogging.  I was moving slow enough that I wasn’t out of breath – I’d read on the Internet about the hill between mile 5 and 6 and realized that if I didn’t tackle it slowly I really would end up walking the whole race, especially without music.

And this is the story of how my beautiful, memorable, gorgeous, sexy first half-marathon literally became the world’s most BORING jog.  I had nobody to talk to.  I had no music to distract me.  I didn’t dare push myself too hard, for fear of running out of juice completely.

Crunch.  Crunch.  Crunch.  Crunch.  Crunch.  It was just me, the crunchy sound of my tennis shoes on gravel, and the heavy, wet sound of my fat-person breathing.

And no, that’s not me and my low self-esteem… I was genuinely bored and had nothing else to listen to and eventually I became supremely irritated with every sound I made.  If you had to listen to my fat-person breathing for three hours, you’d hate it too.

Eventually I started getting closer to the turn-around point.  It took me awhile to realize that the amount of people passing me on their return trip had started to increase dramatically.  I lifted my hand to high-five one or two people, specifically this one dude who was literally high-fiving every single person on the entire trail, but mostly I stayed to the far side of the road, steadily crunching my way to the turn around point.  I figured I would stop and take a break there, fill up on some water, and then turn back…..

But when it came time I realized I still had a good rhythm going, so I waterboarded myself with a little paper cup and turned around.  In retrospect… HOLY CRAP, BECKY, STOP JOGGING AND DRINK SOME WATER.

Crunch.  Crunch. Crunch.  Crunch.  Crunch.  The way back was even worse, because I didn’t even have new scenery to distract myself with.  It was just me and my boredom, and my dogged determination to not break into a walk.

It was literally the most bored I’ve ever been while exercising.  I felt like a horse on a hot walker.  I kept looking for stuff to distract myself, hoping I could settle in behind someone to at least pace myself with them, but I was this weird in-between speed.  I was too slow for most of the joggers and too fast for people who were walking, so eventually I just lowered my head and tried to think about interesting stuff so I didn’t get too bored.  I got a few chapters of my book mentally plotted, so there was that, right?

I will say there was something exciting about seeing the mile markers getting into the higher numbers.  Mile 7.  Mile 8.  Despite the fact I was drowning in boredom I was able to find a small thrill of accomplishment for having jogged for so long.

And then there was the couch again, and the people in the Blerch costumes attacked me again.

“Just sit down… you’ve earned it.  Why not have some chips?  How about some cake?  Enjoy some cake….”

I shook my head at The Blerch, and finally high-fived him.  That wasn’t my Blerch.  My Blerch didn’t say stuff like that.  My Blerch whispered at me to not bother showing up.  My Blerch whispered at me to just walk, since I wasn’t going to get a good time anyways.

My Blerch was an a$$hole and I was feeling proud at how much I’d managed to tune him out.

I thought about filling up at the water stations, because I had started to feel disturbingly thirsty, but I was so scared of breaking into a walk.  I’d never jogged this far before, and the only thing keeping me going was the rhythm of my body.  I could feel that if I broke down into a walk my legs would be wiggly and sore and I’d probably have a lot of trouble picking it back up, so instead of hydrating I just grabbed two drinks from each table, double-fisted the water into my gaping maw, and then grabbed a small handful of weird little energy gel packets just in case.

I didn’t know where to put them so I stuffed them down into my sweaty sports bra.  It wasn’t like I was going to be winning any sexy awards anyways, right?

The water revived me, and I felt another teeny rush of endorphins.  If I’d planned ahead and brought my own water and a source of music which didn’t break down on me, I think mile 9 would have been the spot I’d have really shined.  I was amazed to find myself passing people again – people who had blown past me on mile four and five – thin, fit people I never would have thought I could pass in a million years.

I wanted to stretch my legs and really settle into a faster pace, but I’d begun to realize that I might actually be able to accomplish my goal – that I just might be capable of “run”ning the whole thing,  despite only practicing up to 6 miles, and I was scared of jeopardizing that.

Besides, I was thirsty.  I was so, so, so thirsty.  It was almost noon, and the sun had begun blazing down with a vengeance.  In terms of Southern California or Arizona heat it was nothing, but I had been training in 40 degree weather so  I was completely unprepared for 80 degree heat.  I tried some of the weird packet goo I’d stashed in my bra, and realized that… yeah, it was pretty disgusting.  “Chocolate-flavored Goo” is still goo…. but I will say that I don’t think I was capable of chewing at that point, so it was kind of nice just to slurp it down mindlessly.  Also,  it seemed to make me feel sort of perky, so there was that

Mile 10.

I started to feel weird – really weird, and I realized I was actually pretty dehydrated. I have a bad habit of forgetting to be thirsty – stupid, I know, but it’s always been a problem.  One of the ways I can tell when I’m dehydrated is when life stops making sense, or when I start trying to assign it too much sense.  If I find myself pondering weird things and thinking, “But what does it meaaaan???” like some kind of stoned philosophy student, then it means I’m super dehydrated.  And that morning, as I jogged along, I realized my head was beginning to be pretty cloudy.  I fished the last little packet out of my bra and squirted some of the chocolate goo in my mouth….

Only I couldn’t seem to swallow it, because it kept clogging up in my throat.  It took me a few tries for me to realize that I was so dehydrated I wasn’t even making enough spit to swallow stuff.  I knew that probably wasn’t a good sign, but I couldn’t really do anything about it, so I just pushed it to the back of my mind. I started applying the goo to my finger and rubbing it on my gums, figuring at the very least I could absorb it, or something.

Crunch.  Crunch.  Crunch.  Crunch.  My muscles and lungs felt fine, but I was so, so, so very thirsty. I think it was at this point I started asking other runners that I passed for water, only nobody had any left.

Mile 11.

I started feeling very weird, and somewhere in my water-deprived mind I came up with the rationalization that I wasn’t tired, I was just thirsty…. so dropping to a walk didn’t make any sense. What I needed was water, and water would be at the finish line, so I obviously needed to get there as fast as possible, right?

Hey, man, I was pretty dehydrated at that point.  It made sense to my brain.

Crunch.  Crunch.  Crunch.  Crunch.

I passed a dad and a daughter who were on their bikes and not even a part of the race, asking them if they had any water.  They didn’t.  I passed more runners.  They also didn’t have any water.

I passed a policeman holding up traffic for the race.  He didn’t have any water either.

I was so thirsty.  Drinking was all I could think about.  If someone had handed me a shiv, I could have happily shanked someone for water.

I noticed the trail was actually getting fairly close to the river, and for a little while I considered abandoning the race to go drink…. Giardia could kill me later on – I wasn’t just thirsty, I was dangerously thirsty, and I knew it.  I really considered doing it, but I realized I was so very thirsty and feeling so very weird that there was a very real chance of me passing out if I bent over to get the water, and since there was nobody around that section of the river, I was worried nobody would be able to see me or help me.

Crunch.  Crunch.  Crunch.  Crunch.

The trees died away and I was in the sun again.  I reached up to scratch at my forehead and watched little flakes of dried sweat fall off – awesome.  I’d lost the ability to sweat.  Clinically, I knew that was a bad, bad sign….. as was the fact that the sun felt almost cold on my body.  The hair on my arms was standing on end, and I was covered from head-to-toe in goosebumps.  I knew exactly how bad that was….

But in my water-deprived brain all I could think was “I’m thirsty, not hot, so I just need to get to the finish line and water as fast as I can. Jogging is faster than walking, so that’s my best shot.”

I kept asking people for water, but nobody had any.  Finally.  FINALLLLLLY, I saw someone with a small Gatorade bottle half-filled with water.  I was so excited I felt like crying…..

…..until I got close enough to realize it wasn’t just someone, it was the race photographer.

I couldn’t ask him for water – if I did, he wouldn’t be able to photograph the people behind me, and my lack of preparation shouldn’t mean that they had to miss out on their photographs.  (I realize now I could have STOPPED and waited for the people behind me to pass by… but again.  My brain was not making good decisions right about then.)

I’ve never hated anyone the way I hated that man.  Forget hating my iPod – my iPod was a saint compared to that stupid photographer.  How dare he be the only person in three miles who had water, and also be the only person in three miles who couldn’t share?

Crunch.  Crunch.  Crunch.  Mile 12.  My steps were so slow I was almost jogging backwards, but it was still technically a jog.  It was frustrating – my muscles were capable, but I was so thirsty I didn’t dare do anything but the lowest, tiniest of steps.  Crunch.  Crunch.  Crunch.

I saw someone on the grass with a small thing of Gatorade – about quarter of a bottle left.  I veered off road.  “Please.  Please, I’m so thirsty.”

They gave it to me, and I felt like a basking shark.  I unhinged my lower jaw and literally dumped it in.

I couldn’t even feel it wetting my mouth. I didn’t even have to stop jogging – it went that fast.   It tasted life-saving, and my goosebumps prickled my harder.  Heck, maybe it was.

I said thank you as I jogged away – I meant it more than I ever meant anything else.  I love you, random, faceless stranger who shared your old drink me.  I loved you so much right then, and I still love you now.

The sun shone down on me, but there started to be more and more people on the side of the roads. Less than a mile left – I decided to quit asking people if they had any water.  I was so close I could see the finish line.  I could get water there.

I resisted the urge to speed up.  The world had narrowed to me and the road.  The sound of my feet.  The feel of the cold sun on my dry, goosebumped skin.  I was almost to the water.

The road began to slope around to the right, and I realized I was there – there was the finish line, around the curve and down the straightaway – and I also realized that even though I’d never been this thirsty before in my entire life, I still had plenty of gas left in the tank.  I may have been jogging ridiculously, ridiculously slow before, but suddenly, desperately, I wanted to know that I’d given the race my all.

I picked up my feet and started running harder.  My legs felt leaden and wobbly, but I forced them to quit complaining and pushed harder.  I spend almost every day of my life being forced to listen to a stupid body that eats itself when I get stressed – it was time for my body to shut up and listen to me.  I passed one person.  Two.  Three.  A pair of girls.

I saw someone ahead of me, and I realized that if I sprinted, I just might “beat” him in, and decided to make that my goal.

My body felt like it was separate from me – a willing horse I was riding, digging deep to give me its all.  I stretched even further, feeling the ground beneath my feet.

The rush of air in my lungs.

The sound of people cheering me on, the knowledge water was just ahead, the knowledge I had done it.

I felt my body telling me that it was done.  I didn’t have anything left – I grabbed deep, and sprinted the last few yards, and made it in past the man.

All around me was cheering, and people smiling, and…AND SHUT UP AND GIVE ME MY WATER.

I pushed past the people trying to collect my race timer chip from my shoe and hand me a medal, and began pacing around.  I’d heard of someone who died when a crew race was done from stopping too suddenly, and I could feel my heart skittering in my chest, feel the lack of water, and didn’t want to stop moving all at once.

“Where’s the water?”

A volunteer smiled at me, and said something in gibberish.

“The water?  I need water.  Do you have water?”

She smiled again, speaking WingDings or something, and gestured at a barn that seemed impossibly far away.  I could have cried, if I had any moisture left in my body.  “I just need water.  Please.  Water?”

She gestured at the time tag I’d attached onto my laces, and I shook my head.  Screw the time chip.  I needed water.  Someone came up and tried to hand me a medal, but it wasn’t water.  I think they looped it over my head for me, but I couldn’t tell.

Claire had finished before me, and she and her husband approached me.  I thought they wanted to talk.  I couldn’t talk.  I needed water.  They said something, but I spun away from them, circling, heading towards the barn, pacing, trying to calm my breathing and the frantic beat of my racing heart.

It took longer than I’d like to admit for me to realize they weren’t just coming up to chat with me, they were trying to push a Gatorade bottle into my hand.  I tore off the lid and pounded that thing faster than I’ve ever pounded a drink in my life, and it staved off my desperation long enough for me to make it over to the volunteer tables where I proceeded to drown myself for the next ten minutes in water and Gatorade.  I have no idea how much I took in.  I know it took almost 10 bottles before I started to feel myself again.  I actually didn’t feel like drinking Gatorade, but after a ton of water I realized I probably had to consider electrolyte imbalance so I started alternating between the two.

I kicked off my shoes and socks and found a water pump and turned it on, delighting in the feel of the cold water on my skin, the way my goosebumps were receding, the way sweat began to bead on my brow again.

I’d finished in 3 hours and 12 minutes and I jogged the whole way.  I accomplished all of my goals.

I also learned a day or two later, as I mentioned above, that someone died at mile 12 from heat stroke.  I’m not just saying this – it could have been me.  It very, very, very easily could have been me.  I was in the middle of writing it up when I found out, and it just took the wind out of my sails when I did.

So.

Bring water.

I don’t care if it’s hard to hold, or if you don’t like the way the belt feels, or if you’ve never needed it before.  Here’s my request of you   Don’t be me.  If I’d been thinking rationally I never would have made decisions that were that dumb…. but when you’re tired and dehydrated you’re not exactly at your most ration or coherent.  BRING WATER.

And now onto the less practical, more touch-feely thing I came away from the race with:

Everyone’s Blerch says something different.  Mine wanted me to sell my ticket rather than “waste” my first half marathon with a crappy attempt.  I certainly wasn’t prepared at ALL for the event.  I hobbled after the race for almost two weeks, and my thighs rubbed together so much during the race that I rasped the skin right off and bled enough my pants stuck to me.  I had scabs on my legs for more than a week, and my sheer stupidity literally almost killed me….

But on the other hand, I still did it.  My Blerch whispers to me that I’m not enough, and that I need to be perfect before I can even try.  My Blerch whispers to me “Why bother?”  My Blerch whispers that trying and failing is more disappointing than not trying at all.

That is such a horrible lie.

I love the photos of my sprint to the finish line.  I think I’m going to frame them one day.  I like what they say, even if I don’t even look particularly “sexy” in these photos.  I look at them and I compare them to the super thin girl of my childhood, or the toned up teen of my younger years and my initial reaction was to wince at how heavy I am, and hide them away.

But… but that’s wrong.  Look, these photos.  This is the photo of a chubby mom who ran thirteen miles on willpower alone.  Who cares if I have rolls?  I kind of rock.  If I’d listened to my Blerch, I wouldn’t have these photos, or this knowledge of what I’m capable of, or the feeling of having accomplished something that means so much to me.

I wouldn’t have the knowledge that I had this much “try” in me, and I wouldn’t be able to apply that confidence to other areas of my life.

Besides, I’m pretty far from perfect.  If I put my whole life on hold waiting until everything is perfect, before I enjoy it, I’m gonna spend the rest of my life in my living room.

And what a waste that would be.

Good morning!  Welcome to Computer Tips with Becky!  Today we are going to go over one of my favorite projects – updating your personal website. We’ve got a lot of material to cover, so let’s get started.

1. You’re going to migrate over to WordPress eventually, but until you can pay someone to do it for you, you need to make do with Blogger.  You’re a big-time, important writer now.  You’re creating article proposals.  You’re submitting short stories.  You deserve a website that reflects how big-time and important you are, so you need to make sure you research it and do it right the first time!
2. Spend a long time on Pinterest, looking up blogging tips.
3. Congratulations – you have now designed the world’s most amazing imaginary pantry for your kitchen. What do pantries have to do with websites?  Nothing, other than the fact that you’re on Pinterest, and ohmygosh, look at the shelving space on that one!
4. No, really.  FOCUS.  Websites.  You’re here about websites, and researching what makes one look professional.  Here, let’s just focus on one thing.  Why don’t you find the world’s most perfect Blogger template?  Surely you can focus long enough to do that, right?
5. Oh, you found it!  Oh.  Oh, oh, oh!  It’s perfect!
6. Oh, wait.  The “World’s Most Perfect Blogger Template”  costs money.  Start your search over, and include the word “free” in the search bar, because that’s how you roll.  You’re classy like that – nothing but the best for you, baby.
7. Find the “World’s Second Most Perfect Blogger Template”.  Go to download.  Realize that it’s a scam.  Start over.
8. Settle on something that looks good enough – it’s not flashy, but it’s clean and it’ll do nicely. Save it to your desktop.  The last time you saved it to your downloads it disappeared and never resurfaced.
9. Upload the template onto your blog.
10. Stare at it in horror for a few minutes.  That’s…. that’s not what it looked like on the preview mode.  That’s not what it looked like AT ALL.  Screw it – you should just go back to your old template.
11. Wait… where is your old template?
12. Oh.  CRAP.  You mean that “old template” you were supposed to download before uploading the new one?
13. Spend several minutes cursing.  Your kids are hanging around eavesdropping on your mumbling, so try to make it creative.   MOTHER FLETCHER!  FLAMING HECK!  OH, FOR THE LOVE OF PICKLE FARTS…. STONE OF A PEACH!
14. Realize with a dawning sense of horror that it’s up to you to fix this monstrosity of a website. Why is your header so teensy-tiny?  Why is it off-center?  Why are all the gadgets all over the place?  Why does nothing make any sense?
    
15. Spend 45 minutes clicking around uselessly.
16. Spend another 30 minutes clicking around angrily.
17. Finally lose your temper.  Is something out of place?  Delete it.  Is something else out of place? Delete that.  In fact, delete everything. If it wanted to stay on your blog, then it should have behaved, amiright?  DELETE EVERY SINGLE THING THAT DARES MISBEHAVE. That’ll show your stupid website who is boss.
18. Calm down.  Realize you deleted important stuff.  Calmly try to re-add those important items.
19. Wait, what were the  actual links on your sidebar of your favorite websites? You can’t remember.  That’s why you created those links in the first place – so you wouldn’t have to remember.  You mean you didn’t even screenshot the thing before going on your deleting rampage?  Crap.  DOUBLE CRAP.
20. Give up on fixing the “Most popular posts” or “Websites I Like” gadget.  Instead, you should probably try to fix your header.  I mean, it’s the most important thing, right?  It’s the first thing that people see when they first go to your page, so it should probably be gorgeous and perfect and reflect who you are as a writer.
21. Fiddle around with the teensy-tiny, crooked header for another 45 minutes.  Get angry and decide to start from scratch. Delete it.  Look in your computer for the saved version so you can try uploading it.
22.  BOB SAGET!  You accidentally deleted the old header when cleaning out your pics the other day, and you even emptied the trash can. Settle in for another round of creative cursing, doing your best to avoid anything that has the word “fart” in it, because your kids still haven’t finished singing “Pickle farts!  Pickle farts!” at the top of their shrill little lungs.
23. Fifteen minutes later you should probably give up and delete the header entirely.  Whatever. You didn’t need a header anyways.  Headers are for stupid people.
24. Give up trying to fix your “Pages” section.  That’s okay.  Nobody needs an “About Me” section anyways.  “About Me” sections are for stupid people, too.
25. Spend several minutes trying to delete the navigation bar at the top.  It’s cool, but you can’t figure out how to fix it.  What the heck’s a shortcode, anyways?  How do you get that to redirect to something useful?  What’s a layout button?  This seems important – I mean, you’re having problems with your layout, so wouldn’t accessing this fix everything?  Then why can’t you access this to fix?
26. Maybe you should take up drinking.  You can’t help but feel that an entire bottle of tequila would make this night marginally better.
27. Whatever.  Websites are stupid.  Turn the computer off, turn on some Norah Jones and Jack Johnson, and pick up a book about werewolves.  You can’t actually kill anyone,  even if you’re in the mood to, but at least you can pretend to be a main character who can kill people, right?

Anyways, this concludes my latest installation of “How to Update Your Website.”  Tune in next week for “How to Throw A Computer Through a Window” or “How to Stab a Laptop Screen”.

I’m sweating.  It’s 6:40 in the morning and I’m literally sweating.  Yesterday it was sunny and in the mid-60’s….. in February, for crying out loud. Today it’s not even 7 and I am waking up five minutes before my alarm because I’m sweating beneath the covers.  I throw them off of me and ease myself out of The Bean’s unconscious too-warm hug, seeking a cool spot on the sheets.

I wiggle around for a few moments, but there’s no cool spots to be found.  It seems I used them all up as I clawed my way to consciousness.  I give up on sleep, sliding tired legs out of bed, groping for a robe.  I stagger to the bathroom in an uncoordinated wobble, willing energy into my barely-functioning limbs.  I haven’t jogged in days.  In fact, I’m edging closer to two weeks of no jogging.   It’s not a “I wanna look good in a bikini” thing, although I wish it were that easy to look good in a bikini.

The thing is, my body’s natural state seems to be wooden, kept at bay by regular movement. Every day I don’t exercise finds me returning to petrified…  glue?  I dunno.  Petrified wood is like a rock, and rocks seem sturdy, strong.  Useful.

My body feels like glue.  Thick, ropey, wiggly strands of useless glue.  Moving feels like swimming through mud, thinking feels like peering through a fog, and it’s my least favorite part of rheumatoid arthritis, or lupus, or MCTD, or whatever the heck is going on with my immune system. The blood tests were inconclusive, so they need to be interpreted by a specialist.

I consider making a return appointment with the fancy rheumatologist in Portland I’d been referred to… but I dismiss it almost immediately.  I still haven’t forgiven her.  Three months of waiting for my appointment, and she turned me away for being 9 minutes late.  I know it’s not really her fault.  I should have left my house earlier, should have left time to be stuck in traffic, waiting on the world’s slowest train to cross.  I tried explaining, but the receptionist was firm.  I may have been 9 minutes late to the appointment, but check-in time was 15 minutes prior to appointment time.  This seems silly to me.  If they wanted me there at 2:30 rather than 2:45, why didn’t they just make the appointment for 2:30?

After wasting years of my life in waiting rooms, something about the whole scenario is incredibly insulting.  I know it’s just business, but I can’t help feeling snubbed. I’m not ready to get back on the waiting list yet.  Soon, maybe, but not today.

So, I waddle through the house on my glue-thick limbs, yawning, battling an exhaustion which constantly clouds my limbs, thoughts, body, brain.  At least I’m not flaring anymore.  I’m pain-free right now (or as close as I come) so that’s a plus, but it’s small consolation when you’re left driving a body that resembles something closer to overcooked spaghetti than it does a useful bit of meat and bones.

I suppose I should think better of my body than that, but right now we’re like two angry roommates forced to share a bedroom.  We’re barely on speaking terms.  If we were siblings, we’d have the cereal box between us so we didn’t have to look at each other in the morning.

I stagger into my muddy work boots and head outside in the early morning light to let the chickens out of their coop.  This morning they’re cross, and their disgruntled clucking mirrors my own feelings.  I agree, ladies.  Morning did come too early, didn’t it?  Sorry I wasn’t here before dawn. After years of safety I grew complacent, leaving their coop unlatched at night…. and yesterday I got a worried text from my neighbor while I was dropping the DragonMonkey off at school, having missed the bus.  Had I checked on my chickens yet?  They were acting weird – huddling together, quiet, subdued….and there were feathers everywhere.

It took almost 15 minutes to get home to confirm:  Goodbye, Moaning Myrtle.

It feels a little dumb to mourn a chicken that I was considering giving away next fall to someone’s stew pot.  Chickens stop laying regularly around 3-4 years old but can live for almost 10 years….  I love my chickens but I love regular eggs more.   Moaning Myrtle was approaching her eggless years, and while the plan had always been to treat our hens like farm animals,  who can eat a chicken they’ve named?  Not me.   So even though the plan was for them to end up in the stew pot, I’d always planned for it to happen off-screen.

Besides, there’s something more than a little macabre having to spend a morning picking up little bitty chunks of your pet all over the yard – feathers with bits of friendly fowl and fond memories still attached. The other chickens had followed me as I cleaned up, clucking quietly.  Itchy.  Scratchy.  Martha Stewart…. even fat, clueless Tanesha.  They circled me, pecking at the feathers I scraped up with a rake, courage returning with my presence.

It’s not love, but there’s something soothing about the consistency of a hen’s greedy hunger.  Chickens are hardly sentimentalists.  If they thought they could get away with it they’d happily eat me.  Still, I feed them, and in exchange they bolt towards me in an ungainly sprint when I call, making me laugh.  It’s a relationship which works for us.

I head back into the house, kick off my boots and heading upstairs, flinging open the boys’ curtains. Wake up.  Time to hop in the shower.  No, I’m not carrying you downstairs – you’re too big.  No, whining won’t change my mind.  Hush – you know better than to complain before I’ve even had a sip of coffee.

By the time they tumble downstairs and are stripping down for their shower I’m working on remedying my coffeeless state – emptying the coffee grounds while holding my robe closed with an elbow.  Why does it keep untying itself? The Bean passes by me as he heads into the boys’ bathroom.  He reaches for the light bulb, preparing to unscrew it and bring it back to our bathroom, but he’s met with a chorus of cries from the boys.  They can’t shower in the dark – the bad guys will eat them… or something.

The Bean sighs and returns to his bathroom for his shower, and I promise to hurry the boys along so he can have the light bulb by the time he needs to shave.

I echo his sigh as he leaves, frustrated at myself.  It’s 2015.  We should not be huddling over our house’s only light bulb like it’s 1915.  I need to get to the store.  I really, really need to get to the store.  Maybe I should go instead of jogging today?

I lean forward to pick up a toy and feel some kind of ligament pop in the back of my knee from the motion.  No.  No, I need to jog.  I’m going to turn to stone if I don’t get some exercise soon.  I need to remind my body how to circulate, or whatever it is that running does for me.  Besides, my eyeballs feel like I’ve coated them in itchy, hot sand.  I don’t know why jogging helps with my dry eye, but it does.  If I don’t jog today I’m going to end up with red, itchy, burning eyes that make me look like I’m high on pot.

The coffee is percolating, releasing a scent which improves my spirits, so I go hunting in the fridge for some kind of breakfast.  We’re almost out of almond milk, which means we can’t have cereal…. and after three weeks of being passionately in love with zucchini omelets, the boys have suddenly decided they hate zucchini.  Figures.  We’re out of anything easy to make – no microwaveable-this or toaster-that.  We’re out of bananas.  In fact, we’re out of fruit.

I tap my fingers on the side of the fridge, conscious of the time crunch, and finally decide on a loaf of bread, a carton of eggs, a bit of butter and the last swig of almond milk.  I’ll make french toast – who doesn’t like french toast?

I start the pan heating on the stove, to cut down on the cook time, and rummage through the washed-but-not folded laundry.  A pair of pants…. a sock…  the boys’ outfits emerge one at a time, crackling with static electricity.  We’re out of dryer sheets.  I really, really, really need to get to the store.

I whip up the eggs, vanilla almond milk, and a bit of cinnamon, soak the bread and toss it on the sizzling butter in the pan.  Then I begin the rapid-fire breakfast dance – drying skinny little boy bodies, flipping the bread, helping an arm find a sleeve, soak a new piece of bread, button the pants, switch out the toast on the stove, hoping the boys don’t notice the blackened edges.

Somewhere in the middle of my whirling ballet of busyness The Bean steals the light bulb, and the boys gravitate out of the dim bathroom to the kitchen with its fluorescent lighting.   I slap the french toast onto colorful plastic Ikea plates and comb their hair while they eat.

“This is really good!”
“I love my Mama’s cooking!  You’re the best cook in the world!”

They’re still trying to mollify me for the way they reacted to the Ruined-Chicken-Nugget incident from Valentine’s Day. I’d messed up the crock pot carnitas. Just so you know, you can turn on a slow-cooker all you want, but if you don’t plug it in it won’t actually accomplish anything.  The only meat I had left was chicken breast, so I tried to make gluten-free chicken nuggets from scratch.  They looked good, but who knew Lawry’s seasoning salt would be so salty?

The worst part is I couldn’t even serve them with ketchup to mellow the taste – man, I really do need to make it to the store.  The boys were disgusted at the idea of a too-salty, nearly inedible dinner, but I was too tired to try for a third round of culinary failure and called it quits.  A little salt never hurt anyone, right?  DragonMonkey and Squid were horrified that I wouldn’t cook anything else and there was nothing for them to make on their own, so they complained how horrible their dinner was until I almost broke down into tears.

They’re only 4 and 6 but they know when they’ve pushed too far, and they’ve been making an effort ever since.  It sounds forced and fake, but I figure learning how to give fake compliments is good training for the future (who knows if they’ll marry someone who can cook?) so I don’t call them on it. You’re welcome, future spouses.

The coffee finishes brewing right as I’m shoving a snack into DragonMonkey’s lunch bag, and The Bean emerges from the bedroom – freshly showered, starched business clothes, bright-eyed and brushed teeth.

I retie my frumpy robe for the 17th time and pour myself my first cup of coffee, clearing the mossy cobweb-feeling from my mouth with the first sip.  I close my eyes, finding a moment of stillness in the morning chaos, letting the aroma of coffee swirl around my brain as I count backwards from 10. I can afford ten seconds to myself, right?

10.  9.  8.  7.  6.  

“DON’T TOUCH MY BACKPACK, SQUID!”

5.  4.

“I said leave it alone!  Don’t touch— MOM!  HE SPIT ON ME!  SQUID SPIT ON ME!”

Six seconds.  Apparently I can afford six seconds.  I set the cup down and intervene, eyeballing the clock behind me.  The Bean offered to drop DragonMonkey off at the bus stop this morning, but if they don’t leave in three minutes, they’re going to miss the bus.

I let them know this, and both the Bean and DragonMonkey grow visibly anxious.  They’re cut from the same cloth – both loving schedules, and order, and rules, and the idea of being late makes them leak an anxiety that’s almost palpable.  I’m throwing shoes on DragonMonkey, fishing discarded Superman hoodies off the porch, stuffing take-home folders into Angry Bird backpacks, kissing, hugging, waving, and they’re finally out the door.  The Bean returns for a quick kiss – he smells like soap and tastes minty fresh, which means I don’t.

Man, I really need to start brushing my teeth first-thing in the morning.  I hate feeling self-conscious about goodbye-kisses.

“If you miss the bus bring him back and I’ll drop him off!” I pause, wondering if I ought to add something more romantic.  It’ll be about 14 hours before I see The Bean again, and that’s only if I stay up late to greet him, otherwise I won’t see him until tomorrow morning.

I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again:  Friends don’t let friends become public accountants.

“Love you!” I holler as they head out the gate.  Hey, it’s not exactly a Shakespearean sonnet, but I’ve only had one sip of coffee.  Speaking of which….

I pick it up and take a sip, making a face.  It’s lukewarm, edging towards cold, and I cross to the sink to pour it down the drain.  I hate wasting it, but I’ve never gotten the hang of microwaving coffee.  It always tastes… well, microwaved.

I ditch the robe and find jogging clothes, tripping over dogs that circle me in quiet adoration.  Squid is standing in front of the couch, staring wordlessly at Caillou. I grimace at the sound of it.  I hate that show – it’s like they’re deliberately teaching children how to be whiny little ingrates, plus the main voice actor was a 17 year old girl who died in a car crash, so I can’t even feel right about hating it.  Still – it captivates Squid, and he’s still for the first time all morning, staring up at the TV with his scruffy hair spilling over the back of his shirt in a little mullet.  I wince.

“Squid, come here.”  What he needs is a haircut, but what he gets instead is a quick trim on the back of his hair.  We don’t have a lot of standards in this house, but I have to draw the line at mullets.  It’s a bit crooked, but hopefully nobody will notice.

I glance at the clock as I gather up the plates from the kitchen table, noticing as I do that in the excitement of getting DragonMonkey out the door on time one of the dogs has somehow managed to countersurf the baggie of leftover Valentine’s Day candy off of the kitchen counter and is now hiding with it in her kennel.  Well, I say “one of the dogs”, but I know exactly who the culprit is.

“ARTEMIS, COME.”

She slinks toward me, all apologies, and I glance inside her kennel – it’s too late – it’s already gone.   There’s nothing but empty wrappers and slobber.  She stares at me, guilt-ridden, and I sigh.  Yelling won’t bring the candy back, and at this point the only thing that’s going to stop her counter-surfing is getting the mouse traps someone suggested…. but again, there’s that trip to the store I keep putting off.

I help Squid into shoes and walk him over to daycare, realizing as I do that I’ve forgotten my coffee on the counter again.  By the time I get back it’ll be cold.  I think I managed two sips out of this cup. We go through creamer at a horrific rate, but the truth is that I feed most of it to my kitchen sink.  It’d probably be cheaper to pour myself coffee one sip at a time, but that just feels dumb.

I glance at the clock, mentally ticking off the errands still left on my plate.  Let’s see…. make sure the chicken water is filled, let the dogs go potty, check the cat food…. find my keys and squeeze in a sanity-saving jog before heading to work.  Pick up the DragonMonkey on my lunch break, make lunch for both boys, drop both DragonMonkey and the lunch off at the sitter’s, and return to work.

I want to see Caspian today – it’s been too long – but do I have time?   How much work is on the docket today at the barn?  I love the fact that I’m making money working at a horse barn, but I can’t seem to find as much enjoyment as I want to.  There are no set hours, and I find myself unable to relax.  While I’m there I keep thinking of all the unfinished tasks that are waiting for me as soon as I’m done, and I spend the whole time weighing the decision of thirty more minutes of paid work versus thirty minutes of unpaid chores at home.

Speaking of unfinished…. I wince as I remember the still untyped dictation I owe… no, no Caspian today.   Again.   I need to finish up the dictation so I can get my time card off to my job.  I need the check for board, so it’s a non-negotiable item.  I can do it after work,  before I pick up the boys at 5…. but by that point it’ll be dinner time.  Should I chance a trip to the store with hungry kids, or try to go after dinner? I keep trying to go after dinner, but by that point I’m so tired I don’t even feel safe behind the wheel, which is why we are living a life of One Shared Bathroom Lighbulb. What I need to do is cancel the jog with my friend and just go to the store now.  It’s makes the most sense.  Maybe I could make my body learn how to release itself by writing, instead of moving?

Speaking of writing….my blog – my poor, un-updated blog.  I need to be blogging more than ever now.  If I’m really taking this whole “writer” thing seriously, I need regular posts.  I need pageviews, and likes, and a ready-made audience to better “sell” myself to agents and publishers….

But seriously.  Whose stupid idea was it, anyways, to brand myself as a humor writer?  I think of the dozens of partially-finished stories in my drafts box, and find myself shaking my head.  I’m too tired to be funny today.  Today, walking up the front steps of my house is as much of an effort as I can handle.  There’s just nothing left in me to make other people laugh.

I’m so lucky – most of the medications for auto-immune diseases have side effects like “cancer” or “death”.  Don’t get me wrong, it’s better than living a life of crippling pain, but still scary as heck.  I’m so lucky that thus far I’ve been able to keep serious flare-ups at bay… but I really do need to make an appointment with that rheumatologist.  This last one took it out of me.  I’ve been mostly pain-free for almost two weeks, but I’m still caught in that flare-up fog.  I’m only 33.  Walking to my front porch shouldn’t feel like this big of an accomplishment, but it does.  A trip to the rheumatologist might give me some answers.

But seriously, I was only 9 minutes late.  Between gas and baby sitting and time off of work it cost me over $30 to make it to that appointment, only to be turned away for being 9 minutes late.  I search my feelings and realize I’m still a little too angry to make the call, so I shuffle inside, searching for my keys.

I glance at the clock  It’s not even 8 in the morning and I’m already exhausted.  Of course, is “already” the right word?  I haven’t stopped being exhausted, not for days.  Still.  There, that’s a better word. It’s 8 in the morning, and I’m still exhausted, but that’s okay.  I’ll feel better after I jog.  I don’t have time for a jog, but I can’t afford not to.  The store can wait.

Every year I go through the Valentine’s Day cards at the store…..

And every year I refuse to buy one, because they never say what I really want to say.

So, this year…. I made my own.

Happy Valentine’s Day, Bean!

DragonMonkey is dyiiiiiing for a tablet.  His one friend has a tablet.  His other friend has a tablet.  His other, other, other friend has a tablet.  Can’t he have a tablet, too?

Son, you’re in kindergarten.  You’re getting matchbox cars and firetrucks for birthdays and Christmases.  If we start you out on little miniature iPads now, we’ll have to upgrade to weird stuff like hookers and cocaine by the time you’re in your teens, in order to “top” last year’s gift.

The DragonMonkey is not amused, in case you were curious.

Anyways, my parents were over at my house watching the SuperBowl game last night, and as such they brought the Holy Grail… or rather, their tablets.  The DragonMonkey happily buried himself in a sea of blinking computer lights and downloaded airplane game apps for several hours while we watched a quiet, practically child-free Superbowl game.

Video games suck in the DragonMonkey like nothing else – he’ll hone in on them with a ferocious intensity and only emerge to notice the world around him from to time, like a swimmer surfacing to breathe.  It’s a little like me and books, so I can’t say I don’t understand.

Last night he emerged briefly during this commercial:

If you haven’t seen it, you really need to watch it for this next part to make sense.

Anyways, the sound of the pig rocketing out of the barn drew DragonMonkey’s attention, and he eyeballed it dubiously.

“What even is that?  A… a cow?  A…. a warthog?”  He shook his head with absolute disgust, rolling his eyes in disdain before slipping back into his video game coma.  “That kid shouldn’t do that to his dog.  That’s not nice.”

Sure, son.  We’ll buy you a tablet.  And a Nintendo DS and heck, why not an XBox One to go with our PS3?  You don’t need any more actual life experience.

On a side note, does anyone know when the county fair is coming to town?  I want to go show my son the non-flying warthogs.

Look, I’m just being honest here.  I’m a nosy, nosy person.  I’m usually discreet, but I find people watching (and, I guess, living room watching) endlessly fascinating.

Anyways, there’s a company based out of New York called Urban Compass – it’s a real estate platform which helps you find a place to rent, based on your personal tastes.

You know how you go on Craigslist and start searching for apartments in your budget, and then you Google the address, and then maybe use Street View to figure out what kind of area it’s in?  And then you might narrow it down, but you still have to kind of drive around and get a feel for the area and waste a bunch of gas money trying to figure out if it’s a good fit for you?

Well, it’s like that, only someone else is doing all the annoying work.

Anyways, they’re doing this thing right now called Starter Stories where people are sharing stories about their starter home – either their first home or the home that gave them a fresh start, and all the trials and tribulations and joys that go into renovating and decorating and whatnot.

All of this to say- dude.  It’s like my old Domino’s job – I get to gawk at people’s living rooms and it’s not even illegal.  

Score.

Anyways, after spending waaaaaaay too long looking up other people’s stories I decided I wanted to participate too. This was gonna be so much fun!  I could spend a couple of days scrubbing the house till it shined, and then I would use the “good” camera to take the prettiest “after” pictures. 

The thing is, sick or not, unattended piles of cat vomit or not, I really do love my home.  It’s a quirky little place – and I still find myself kind of in awe that I’m an homeowner.  There’s something so deliciously grown-up feeling about inviting people to spend the night in our guest bedroom.  It makes me feel… I dunno.  Mature.  Responsible.  The kind of person you’d trust to water your plants when you go on vacation.

Note:  Please don’t hire me to kill your plants.

In other words, it’s a Hobbit House.  We have second story full of tiny, cozy little hobbit caves, which sounds adorable, only nobody ever uses any of those Hobbit caves.  I mean, the kids do sleep in their bedroom, and occasionally we have an overnight guest, but still.  We have all of this square footage that sits empty, and some days it frustrates me.    

I even tried creating a little theater-style seating in the bonus room, hoping we could turn it into a “media room” where people would lounge and hang out and play video games, but to no avail.   I’m the only one who ever uses it.

On the other hand… checkout my kickass homemade theater seating.  I was originally going to paint the bottom white and line plywood in the little holes so we could use them as little pockets to stash stuff….. but I’ve changed my mind.  Instead, I’m going to cover the bottom with carpet so they look built-in.  The cushions are just old futons I got from garage sales and friends, and the sheets and pillows I grabbed at GoodWill.  Eventually I’m going to sew the sheets as covers, rather than just tucking them, and it’ll look super fancy….

But man, I hate sewing almost more than I hate laundry.

I don’t know about you, but I think I rock.  Who kicks butt decorating her house on her monthly budget of $0?

I do, that’s who.

Anyways, I’d say 85% of our time is spent in itty-bitty living room, the other 10% is spent in the kitchen, and people only venture upstairs when it’s to sleep. I’ve pretty much given up trying to lure us upstairs, although… I dunno.  Maybe I could lay some Reese’s Pieces up the staircase and lure us up?  I mean, what’s the point of having a second story if nobody uses it?

Also, I’m pretty sure that last sentence is the most stuck-up, #FirstWorldProblems sentence I’ve ever written in my entire life.  The next thing you’ll know, I’m going to be flapping my hands about how uncomfortable my money mattress is, or how the help doesn’t prepare my nightly filet mignon to my standards.

It’s just…. Dude.  WHY DID THEY CUT MY LIVING ROOM IN HALF TO MAKE A FIFTH BEDROOM?   I WANT MY LIVING ROOM BACK.  Don’t  get me wrong, my bedroom is lovely.  It has gorgeous hardwood floors, and tons of floor space, and a giant walk-in closet, and a lovely attached full bath.

From a seller’s perspective, it was a brilliant move. 

From a practical perspective?  Unless one of us eats bad sushi, or has some other stomach bug which makes us grateful to have a bathroom only a few steps away…. I daydream almost daily about tearing that wall down and reclaiming that space.

I mean, think about it:  how much time you really spend in a bedroom, unless you’re a depressed teenager?  The answer is:  not much at all, unless you’re asleep or, uh… you know.  “Folding Laundry” with the hubby.   I dream almost daily about going all Fried Green Tomatoes on that wall.

Confession:  I’ll never actually do it.  I mean, like the idea of crazy renovation like that, but it just seems like so much work – and who wants to work that hard on a house when there are so many horses to ride, or new cities to visit, or books to read?   I mean, wasn’t the whole point of moving to a small town in the Pacific Northwest to, you know, actually GET OUTSIDE?

I sure didn’t move to St. Helens – a small town outside of Portland – so I could spend my time decorating and redecorating and re-redecorating my living room.  We moved here because – well, because it’s GORGEOUS.

St. Helens is a small town, full of friendly people, has an amazing laid-back vibe, and there are tons of fun little hole-in-the-wall businesses and gorgeous trails to explore.  If my living room feels too small – I dunno.  Maybe I it’s a sign I need to spend less time in it.

Now, I don’t want to make it seem like I’m against doing big projects on the house, or that renovation projects are bad.  I’m all for buying a house that needs a little work.  I fact, I have to say that some of the best money we’ve ever spent was the $1,000 we spent on our chain link fence.

Before

After: caged children are infinitely preferable to free-range children

One of the neat things about installing our fence is that I’ve met more than one person who admitted they thought about buying our house when it was still on the market, but ultimately passed on it because it didn’t “have a yard”.

Best.  Money. Spent.  EVER.

Also, best front yard.  EVER.

Narnia.  I live in Narnia.  Well, Narnia in the spring/summer, and a mudhole in the winter, but who cares?  It’s Narnia some of the year!

  

We have lots of plans for our house, and if I had an unlimited budget and the energy of a six year old, we’d probably have them all done by now.  After all, we’re going on three years living in this house.   The reality is, though, we don’t have an unlimited budget, nor do we have endless energy, so we have had to figure out which projects and purchases mean the most to us.

Would our living room look a million times more spacious with that gorgeous, soft grey, “L” shaped sectional I saw over at Fred Meyers?  Absolutely.

Would I end up eating my children or skinning my dogs when they inevitably tramped mud or spilled apple juice on it?  Absolutely.

So, fancy furniture will have to wait.  It’s not worth the headache, you know?

I am, however, a big fan of painting.  It’s amazing how much new paint can really change the feel of a room.  I especially love bright, happy colors.  Orange.  Red.  Yellow.  Maroon.  Teal.  The brighter they are, the happier they are.

The Bean?  The Bean’s more of a black/white, and occasionally a nice, muted grey kind of a guy.

Sometimes I feel like we’re literally living out Fool Rush In.  Have you seen that movie?  You know the scene when Salma Hayek’s family comes and paints their boring, dull, ugly house all those happy colors for a wedding present?

This scene doesn’t have the right effect on me.  I think the colors they chose for the house are goooooooorgeous.  Cognitively I understand I’m supposed to dislike the paint job, but my heart? My heart is in looooove.

This used to be a point of contention between The Bean and I, but somewhere  along the way we figured out the perfect compromise between The Bean’s fascination with boring colors and my fascination with gaudy colors.  The Bean gets to pick the nice, mellow paint colors, and after we’ve made our house all boring neutral looking, I get to splatter the walls with happiness.

     

And honestly?  It looks a million times better this way.  I’m no interior design expert, but one thing I have learned is that bright things look less garish on sedately-painted walls.

Speaking of paint, I’m going to repaint the whole downstairs.  The current paint colors aren’t that bad, although the ceiling is painted a lovely “1980s smoke-stained yellow”.  One of the previous owners did start painting the ceiling white, and it looks great…. But I guess they got bored halfway through the project and gave up.

Of course, I can sympathize.

That painters tape has been on that wall for four months now.  I swear I”m going to finish painting the bottom half a nice shiny white by 2016.  For realsies. Also, fiiiiiine, Bean.  You were right.  I know I said I hated blue…. but you’re right.  It really does make our bedroom look bright and pretty.

  

I’ve mentioned before, but I’m horrible at choosing paint colors, so I’ve pretty much abdicated that responsibility up to The Bean.  My only requirements are:

1. It must be at least a shade or two brighter than the “flesh” colors that our house came with.  It really makes a difference on those grey, rainy days.
2. It must be a scrubbable paint.  Whoever painted before us put flat paint on un-textured walls…. which means I can’t give my boys damp sponges and order them to scrub walls as punishment for bad behavior.  Washing the walls is my favorite punishment for bad behavior – it’s as boring as standing in the corner, but it actually accomplishes something useful.

Our new downstairs colors: Sedate, calming, flowing  

I can’t wait to ruin them by hanging something delightfully tacky on the walls. 

I plan on attacking the downstairs with our new paint scheme some time in February. I actually put the project off last summer because I knew that by February I’m usually hungry for something bright and cheerful to look forward to, so a painting project will give me something to occupy my time while I wait around for longer days, warmer weather, and less mud.

In addition to the tiny projects we’re doing to make our house nicer, we usually have one or two “big” projects we try to get done each year.  The first of this year’s “big” projects was accomplished over Christmas break… which, I guess, technically makes it last year’s project, but whatever.

We finally, FINALLY, ripped out the totally useless built-in…. uh….display case? Floating shelves?  Weird bookshelf area?  I have no idea what it actually was designed for – all I know is that the shelves didn’t fit books, they didn’t fit dishes, and  I constantly bumped my head on them.

Before (from listing photos)

During

After – it looks a bazillion times bigger.  We’ll eventually pull out the top most shelves, but I don’t feel like trying to match ceiling texture quite yet, so this is my compromise.

This house actually has less storage than my first studio apartment, so it may seem odd to remove shelves, but the Bean Family motto for 2015 is:

Less Is More

I mean it.  We are really trying to live that this year.  For instance:  You know how I’m always complaining about how much I hate doing laundry?  

Well… this year I did something about it.

I have a drawer of undergarments, a drawer of pajamas, and a small box of exercise clothes, and THAT IS IT.  Also, you’re totally impressed by my photoshop skills, aren’t you?

Do you have any idea how freeing it is to get rid of almost all your clothes?   I mean, I’m not exactly a fashionista, so why did I have a closet full of clothes?  How many different variations of slovenly did I really need taking up space?  And even if I do fit into my “skinny” clothes again…. if I really lose all that weight, doesn’t that merit new clothes, and not clothes from half a decade ago?

My closet wasn’t the only place I purged.  DragonMonkey is six years old.  Squid is three years old.   Did they really need 417 different types of t-shirts?

The answer is no.  No, they did not.

What’s that, boys? You’re out of clothes to wear? 

Well, let Mama do ALL OF THE LAUNDRY in one afternoon.

I don’t know when exactly when my new mindset clicked, but it did.  Maybe it wasn’t that our house didn’t have enough storage.  Maybe it was just that we had too much stuff.  We are not a fancy family, hosting fancy dinner parties and scouring interior design magazines. I mean, there is literally a pile of cat puke under a tupperware bowl in my laundry room.  Fancy is not who I am, or who I strive to be, so how much crap do I really need?

So…. instead of renovating this house to fit my dreams, I think I’m kind of renovating my dreams to fit this house.  It’s not that I’m giving up anything – I’m just altering the landscape as I remember the whole reason we chose St. Helens in the first place.  If clutter-free is important to me, maybe I don’t need to dream of a house with better storage and better closets.  Maybe I just need to get rid of some crap.

In addition to getting rid of clutter, I’m trying to figure out how to make everything in my life actually useful.  For instance: my upstairs office is everything I dreamed it would be – clean, quiet, peaceful:

The walls are not as yellow as they show on the right – 

my cell phone’s panorama mode and I are NOT friends

But if I never write in it because I don’t actually like sitting at a desk and the chair hurts my bum, what’s the point?  Who cares if a room looks “nice” if you never actually use it?

So sometime this summer I’ll be selling the desk and will be scouting garage sales for an “ugly” but infinitely comfortable recliner.  Maybe I’ll even find one of those fake fireplace heaters or, daydream of daydreams…. a LoveSac.  I had to sell my LoveSac when we moved here because it took up too much space in the moving van, and I’m still sad about it.

I actually would have already redecorated my office, but it’s off-season for decorating.  Garage sales are seasonal (due to the rain) here in the Pacific Northwest, and because of the lack of competition people on Craigslist charge exorbitant amounts for used furniture.   If you think I’m exaggerating, go check it out.  I once saw the world’s UGLIEST used sofa going for $900 just because it was “vintage”.

People – old and ugly does not mean it’s vintage.  

You know, if I had the time and energy, I’d spend all summer picking up cheap furniture from garage sales, all fall/early winter painting,  refurbishing,  and reupholstering, and then make a pretty decent profit selling stuff on Craigslist during late winter/early spring, when prices are at their highest.

Buuuuuuut……I know I’m never going to do that.  I don’t have the energy for the stuff I already have on my to-do list, and there are already SO MANY PROJECTS we still want to do – amazing projects which will make living here a million times cooler.

We are going to punch a hole through the useless area at the foot of the stairs and frame in part of the laundry room and create a walk-in “L” shaped pantry.

My imaginary Pinterest pantry is sexier than your imaginary Pinterest pantry.

The fridge is currently just sitting in the laundry room – fridges are much bigger than you think, and it’s the only place it really fits (one of the joys of a century-old house.)  

Inside the pantry we are going to punch a hole in the wall so the back half of the fridge can sit in the pantry, while the front half can be easily accessible through the toy/breakfast nook area.  That’s where they had the fridge when we bought the house, but it was so big it made the entire room unusable.  Besides, it stuck out, and eventually it was like looking at someone who has a giant whitehead  – all I could see was that giant pimple, err, fridge sticking out, so I eventually moved it to the laundry room. 

It’s a nicer view from the living room: but I am really looking forward to not having to walk into the back of the house every time I want to get the milk.

Speaking of breakfast nooks, I can’t WAIT to build a breakfast nook instead of the catch-all playroom for the boys:

We also want to tear down the looks-only plaster wall (where we just tore down that bookcase thingie) and replace the useless under-stairs-Harry-Potter closet with  a little reading area by the kitchen.

We want to rip out the entire kitchen  and replace it with USEFUL cabinets. I’m really looking forward to this, because when we do it we’re going to create a little drop-down barstool eating area….. and that space can then used as part of the living room.

We also want to put laminate down instead of the old-style wood flooring.  The idea of having 1916 flooring is just so much cooler than it actually is.  Not only is it painted over with funky-looking paint which would cost thousands upon thousands to strip and refinish, it has so many cracks and holes that whenever you spill water in the kitchen, it actually drips through all the way down to  the basement floor beneath it.

We want to build a deck in our giant, “useless” backyard.

Pretty to look at, but with the rocks, and the steep hillside, and the drop-off, 
nobody ever goes out there.

And on that deck there will be a with a REAL fire pit area we can enjoy during the rainy season most of the year.

Like this… only more roof and less expensive-looking, unless we win the lotto

We want to frame in and de-horrify the serial killer’s lab which passes for our basement. 

I think we can all agree that all it’s missing is some plastic sheeting and some Dexter

With short ceilings (only 7 feet) it will never be totally inviting, but we can at least make it functional.  I want to line the walls with storage cabinets, and maybe hang a punching bag and get some workout equipment.   

We’re also planning on framing-in and creating a downstairs office for The Bean, although how he’s going to get any accounting work done with us galloping around overhead, I have no idea.

We want to repaint the porch floor.

We want to stain and epoxy the basement floor. 

We want to repaint the house trim, and put window boxes under the windows, and, and and…

We want to… We want to… We want to….

We want to have Friday night movie nights with our boys.

We want summer camping trips. 

We want to visit the coast, and bring chicken soup to sick friends, and teach the boys how to swim, and take the dogs on long hikes in the Oregon forests.  We want to ride horses, and fly kites.

We want to buy an old car and fix it up in our basement and sell it for money.

We want to enjoy this house as a home which brings us joy, instead of letting it become a never-ending series of DIY projects that leave me exhausted and snapping at my children. 

So…. We take it one small project  at a time.  So what if we’re roasting marshmallows in an asymmetrical hole I dug in the ground with a shovel, rather than the gorgeous fireplace on the deck of my dreams?  We’re roasting marshmallows, and we’re inviting friends over, and we’re making memories. 

And maybe it feels like forever before I’ll ever have my dream pantry, but when a friend needed a place to stay this past summer, I was able to open my home and give her a place to crash.

And you know what?   If another friend knocked on my door this evening and wanted to stay the night, my home would be open to them, too, cat vomit and all.   

I think that’s my favorite part of all about owning my own home – it’s being able to share, and give back to others, even if my home or my life isn’t perfect.  And maybe I’m not as carefree and adventurous as I was in my youth, but there’s something nice about being stable enough to help support others when they need a hand.

It’s probably going to take us years before we finish all of the projects we’re dreaming about.  Heck, maybe we’ll never get it done… but that’s okay.  I don’t want to put real-life on hold, even if it does mean pushing back the dream of a perfect living room.  Besides, even if this place isn’t the perfect house, it’s still a home. My home.  And that makes it perfect to me.

But seriously, I can’t wait until the downstairs is freshly painted so I can enjoy the sight of my kids scrubbing walls. 

The Bean stepped out of the bedroom in his business clothes, expensive wool coat fitting neatly over tailored pants and crisp, laundered shirt.

He didn’t look good – he looked gooooooood.

Me?  I looked…. awake.  Yes, awake.  That was about the highest compliment that could be applied to me.  I’d stayed up too late and been woken up several times during the night, so I had huge rings under my eyes and my hair was… well, let’s just say I wasn’t going to be doing a Pantene Pro-V commercial any time soon.

It was partially my fault – instead of getting up when The Bean started his morning shower I’d lingered in bed, trying to trade coffee-before-children for a few more minutes of sleep…. but that dream was soon broken by the sound of raised voices, fighting, and angry child-hooves clomping down the stairs.

It’s my pillow.  Leave it alone.  Don’t touch me!  Go away.  DON’T TOUCH ME.  I’m gonna hit you, you… you, baby.  DON’T CALL ME BABY.  You’re a BABY!  DOOOOON’T!!…. 

Crap.  They hadn’t even made it down the stairs yet and I could already tell it was a Changeling Morning.

I hated Changeling Mornings.  Usually the boys woke up in decent moods, but it was obvious to anyone with ears that last night faeries had snuck into my house and stolen my boys,  replacing them with angry, hateful, demon changeling children.  It wasn’t the first time it had happened, and I knew from experience it would take all morning and after naps before I managed to wrestle my well-behaved children back from Fairyland.

Look, maybe I don’t actually believe that…. but sometimes it’s just easier to lie to yourself.  The boys I’d kissed goodnight had been cute, sweet, and well-behaved.

The creatures that stomped down those stairs were NOT cute, or sweet, and they were definitely not anything I wanted to take credit for raising.  It seemed fair to blame the faeries.  Stupid faeries.

Although Squid and DragonMonkey are normally best of friends, by the time they made it to the bottom of the stairs I had to meet them in the kitchen and physically separate them to prevent bloodshed.

It only went downhill from there.

They didn’t like each other, they didn’t like the cartoons that were on TV, they didn’t like the breakfast I served and refused to eat it.  They didn’t like the fact I reminded them I wasn’t a short order cook and that it was eggs or “nothing”, and honestly, “nothing” was easier to wash up after, so I didn’t mind at all if that’s what they wanted.

They didn’t like the way their brother’s foot was on THEIR side of the couch.  They didn’t like the way the cat got up and left the room and refused to sit on their laps.  They didn’t like the way the milk tasted.  They didn’t like the way the orange juice spilled on the table.  They didn’t like the way I was ignoring them and fiddling with the coffee maker.  And by golly, their brother’s foot was STILL on their side of the couch, and they DEFINITELY didn’t like that!

By the time The Bean walked out of the bedroom with his Calvin Klein dress shirt, ironed pants and fancy cologne… well, even though it’d been less than 20 minutes, I was already a frazzled, sweaty, grumpy mess.

When I saw how good he looked and smelled, I lapsed – not for the first or even the last time –  into an internal argument.  I felt fat.  And gross.  Why hadn’t I set my alarm early enough to sneak in a shower before him?  Why hadn’t I bothered to put on cute pajamas last night?  If I was still going to be wearing pajamas by the time The Bean left for work, all freshly-showered and fancy-looking,  at the very least I should be in cute pajamas.  Nobody can feel good about themselves in grey, stretched-out Walmart sweat pants, complete with elastic on the ankles.  Couldn’t I have dragged my lazy behind out of bed five minutes earlier and tossed on jeans and maybe a bra?  It’s just jeans and a bra, Becky.  How long would it have taken you?

The Bean leaned in for a kiss, and I ducked it.  Gross. I hadn’t brushed my teeth yet *OR* had a sip of coffee.  There was no way I’m letting him anywhere near my mouth.  Forget coffee – I hadn’t even peed yet.  Such was the nature of Changeling Mornings.  Thank heaven’s they’re rare, or I’d be tempted to join the Merchant Marines and just send postcards, or something.

I glanced in desperation at the coffee maker, willing it to brew faster.  C’mon, baby.   Brew that coffee. Mama needs her fix.

The Bean grabbed the brown paper bag off the counter, peeking inside at the lunch I just finished making for him.  “So, what’s on the agenda today?”

“Huh?”  I glanced up, eyes half wild.   It’s 7:20 in the morning.  How can I feel so overwhelmed when it’s only 7:20 in the morning?  Aren’t mornings my happy time of day?

The Bean missed the crazed look in my eyes – he was too busy grabbing the coffee pot which had just finished brewing and pouring himself a nice, big to-go mug.  Briefly, I considered stabbing him.  Coffee thief.  I’d married a dirty, rotten, low-down, no-account coffee thief.

He passed the carafe over in my direction, oblivious to the fact I was trying to set fire to him with my eyeballs.  “What’s on the agenda for you guys today?  Are you and the boys just gonna hang out at the house, or are you doing anything?”

Even though I knew he didn’t mean it like my heart was interpreting, it didn’t matter.  I felt something snap inside me.  PING!  DANGER, WILL ROBINSON.  THERE GOES THE LAST REMAINING SHREDS OF BECKY’S SANITY.  DANGER.  DANGER.  “Yup.  We’re just gonna hang out, and do nothing, and be lazy all day today.”

The Bean is many things, but intuitive he is not.  “That sounds nice,” he said in a pleasant, distracted tone as he leaned in for a goodbye kiss.

“It’ll be totally relaxing,” I said, giving him my cheek and turning away before he could see that my smile had turned predatory.

Now, before I finish throwing The Bean totally under the bus (and then backing up before running over him again) – I don’t blame him for what his words did to my heart.  In fact, when he finally made it home from work that night, hours after the boys had gone to bed, I made a point of sitting down and having an honest discussion with him and explaining how his innocent questions in the morning were hurting my feelings.

“What are you guys going to do today?”
“Do you have anything planned, or are you just going to take it easy?”
“You guys gonna do anything today?”
“Got anything lined up on your schedule today?”

He meant those questions well – he was just making conversation as he headed out the door.  In fact,  as soon as he knew how it hurt me he apologized, told me how much he appreciated me, and hasn’t done it a single time since.

Still.

Some mornings I resent him his quiet accounting job, with his non-wrinkled clothes, sexy business outfit, and fresh-from-the-shower cleanliness.  And on that Changeling Day, when  he asked me what we were doing while I was frazzled and overwhelmed, and already out of patience, all I heard was, “Are you actually going to do something today, or are you going to sit around the house like Peg Bundy and eat bonbons?”

I know that’s not how he meant it, but that’s how it felt, and as soon as the door shut behind him, I made a decision.

They say that moms don’t get vacation days…well, I was gonna take one anyways.  Yup.

It was 7:30 in the morning and I  was calling in “sick”.

We’ve all heard that joke about the dad coming home to the house in complete disarray, and then asking his wife, “What happened here today?”  She’s sitting in the bathtub, reading a book, and she answers, “You know how you come home every day from work and ask me what it is I do all day?  Well, today I didn’t do it.”

Well, ladies and gentleman: I did it.

I literally lived out one of the oldest Internet jokes I know.  And while the clean up as terrible…. it was ridiculously fun.  I’m not saying everyone should do this, but… DUDE.  EVERYONE SHOULD TRY THIS, at least one day out of your life.  It was actually good timing for it to happen, too.  I’d just finished cleaning the house the night before, so it’d been spotless when I’d gone to sleep.  It made for very lovely before-and-after pictures.

In the interest of honesty, I didn’t realize I was going to be letting my kids trash the house so I didn’t take the “before” pictures until two days later,  after we’d cleaned everything back up.  Still, you’ll just have to trust me – I’m not lying.  This is what the house looked like at 6:30 in the morning on the day I called in “sick”.  If anything, it was actually a little bit tidier.  (I’m tidy but very grubby person – I don’t care if there is three inches of grime on everything, provided there’s nothing sitting out on the counters.)

Now to explain the rules:  I didn’t encourage the boys to be bad, and I didn’t let them know I was taking the day off- that seemed like cheating. My goal was just to let them do whatever they wanted to do, within reason.

So…. I sat in a chair and played on the internet all day.  I read blogs. I worked on my story.  I tried to figure out Twitter.  I watched Marco Polo on Netflix and I reread a few of my favorite books.

What did the boys do?

Well… well, they did everything.  They jumped on the sofas.  They invented a game where they could leap off the kitchen table and into the living room.  They pretended to cook.  They watched whatever tv they they wanted, and they played as many video games as they wanted. In fact, they entertained themselves however they wanted.  They played “smash the eggshells” on the counter.  They played tag with the dogs, and had a lego fight and a pillow fight and…. and they thought it was the best day ever.  I let them eat whatever the heck they wanted, and I only intervened when it looked like there was going to be bloodshed or death.  Other than that, I let them police themselves.

As far as timing, they woke up at 6:30 in the morning,  I let them skip naps (at 3 and 6 they’re not napping very much anyways), and I stepped back into my parenting shoes at 7:30 in the evening to put them in pajamas, help them brush their teeth, and then sent them to bed so I could take pictures.

Anyways, without further ado, may I present to you:

And this is what the bathroom looked like after me not touching it all day:

I wish I’d taken better pictures of the sink – it was covered in green toothpaste.  I mean, when you have to brush your teeth, there’s no better way to do it than to pour half the toothpaste down the sink, am I right?

Let’s continue on with the tour.

Once your back is to the bathroom, you are standing at the base of the stairs.

It’s a weird little area that serves no purpose – eventually I want to cut a hole in the wall and into the laundry room that’s behind it, and frame in an area to create a pantry… but that’s a project for another day… err, year.  Meanwhile, I found an Ikea Billy bookcase for $5 at a garage sale and lugged it home.  It used to be a food pantry but it was too cluttered-looking for my tastes so it became a makeshift linen closet (our home is big but it has almost zero storage.)

Anyways, as you can see, it’s not very tidy to begin with (ignore the cocoa stains on the wall… they’re not there… that’s just your imagination….), and it actually survived the rampage of the children fairly well.

If you stand in front of the bag on the floor with your back to the bathroom, you get a view of the kitchen:

And, the after:

I feel like I should say something about the quality of these pictures – originally, I never planned to post these pictures on the blog so I just snapped them with my cell phone and continued on.  My original plan was to write an email to the Bean, explaining why I was so hurt, and show him what the majority of my daily agenda consisted of so he could understand what a great big, horrible jerk he was….

But then I remembered I was an adult, and the Bean was an adult, and maybe I should just use my words.  And whodathunk, using my words actually worked.  Gasp.  Shock.

Anyways, if I’d known I was gonna use the pics in a post one day, I would have taken better photos. My bad.

Continuing on.

Left side of the kitchen:

(The little window sill area is filled with medicine bottles because that’s one of the times I intervened.  Sorry, children.  No hospital trips to go get your stomach pumped.  Not today.  I’m having a “sick” day.  Try again tomorrow.)

You can see the play room at the end of the kitchen exploded:

This is not as tidy as it was, but eh.  Close enough.

I kind of expected worse in the playroom – usually they dump out the drawers looking for stuff.   Also, to clear my good parenting name – I am not the one that picks up the toys.  I make the boys pick up their own dang toys…which, as far as I can tell from their traumatized reaction makes me the Queen of Darkness, but oh well.   I’ve been called worse things.  

 You know how it is- when you get the call to peel some bananas, well, 

you better answer that call and peel some bananas!

The right side of the kitchen (which divides the living room from the kitchen) fared the worst.  This is the one part of the house we’re pretty anal about keeping clean, because the second it gets dirty, the whole house looks dirty:

Isn’t it so peaceful, when it’s clean?

Kids can’t stand to see clean, peaceful counters.  It’s like waving a red flag at a bull.

Here’s what it looked like after one 8-hour shift of no parental intervention:

Here’s the before/after from another angle:

 Bad babies.  Very bad babies.

Here’s the little entryway to the kitchen:

I was originally planning on doing the pictures side-by-side like that, but I haven’t gotten anything set up on my new Mac yet (new as in brand-new-to-me), and fiddling with it on free picture collage programs was just making me grumpy.  Anyways, sorry for the weird angles.

Here’s the view from our kitchen table back to the kitchen:

Last, but not least, our little living room:

After

There were kid-droppings all over the rest of the house, but at that point I figured I had enough photographic evidence to make my point so I quit taking pictures.

Look, I’m not trying to idolize stay-at-home moms vs working moms, or moms vs dads, or working parent vs stay at home parent, or anything like that.  I’ve actually done both sides of the equation:  I worked 25-30 hours a week until the DragonMonkey was a year and a half, at which point I got a corporate job and went full time (45-50 hours a week) until we moved to Oregon…. at which point I “just” stayed home with the boys until last May…. at which point I started working again (I’ve since dropped down to only one job outside of the house – woohoo!)….

In other words – back and forth, back and forth.  I feel like I have a pretty good handle on both sides of the fence and the pros and cons of both lifestyles, at least how it pertains to me.

Which one’s harder?

Well, they both suck.  And rock.  I know it sounds like a cop-out, but it’s not.  Both sides of the equation have it REALLY hard – and I think it depends on your personality which you’ll find easier.   For me, I found being a “business office 50 hour/week mom” the most stressful.  When I was the Executive Assistant I had to plan in advance for anything – grocery store trips, doctor visits, playdates, etc – all of them had to be planned 2-3 days in advance, and I just suck at that sort of thing.

That said, while I was working outside of the home…. well, it definitely had its benefits.  It was quieter.  When I did work nobody ran along behind me and un-did it.  And the best part?  Nobody ever asked me what I did during the day.   Oh, sure, I was accountable to my boss, but I’m talking about friends and family.  I never once got dressed for work and as I headed out the door had someone say, “So, do you have any plans for the day, or are you just going to hang out?”

Unfortunately, as a stay-at-home mom…. I do get asked that question a lot.  I know people are just making small talk, but in the back of my mind I always feel like I need to be able to spit out an exhausting list of organic, brain-enhancing playdates and activities in order to feel like I’m “earning” the right to be a stay-at-home mom.

Don’t get me wrong –  I’m not saying that people should stop asking me what I’m up to.  I mean, who needs another “FIFTEEN THINGS YOU SHOULD NEVER ASK STAY-AT-HOME-MOMS – #6 WILL SURPRISE YOU!” type of a list to remember?  I certainly don’t.

It’s just…. I feel like if I answered, “What are you guys up to, today?” with “I am going to accomplish absolutely nothing, all day long, and work very hard at it.  In fact, my Sisyphus-style failure will absolutely exhaust me.  If I slave all day the house will only be as clean as when the day started, and if I play all my parenting cards juuust right I will have made a microscopic, completely invisible movement in the direction of raising my boys to be kind, strong, men of integrity…. which sounds nice, but I wont’ be able to see it.  I’ll just be telling them the same 10 things over and over again, all day long.  Honestly, when you’re living day-to-day with kids it’s impossible to measure any progress.  So, today my goal is just to keep them from stepping on the dog and/or hurting each other’s feelings, or watching too much TV, or jumping on the sofa.  In other words, I’m not doing anything of value, whatsoever, because even though I’m exhausted at the end of each day it’s impossible to see progress when you have no perspective….

Wait!  Where are you going?  Come back!  I mean… I mean… I mean, uh….we’re going to the park! And then to the library tomorrow for a sensory activity.  Want to put your kid in the stroller and walk with us?”

Anyways, if you ever wanted to know what it is that stay-at-home parents do all day… well, now you know.  Sometimes it feels like 95% of our job is that we keep messes from happening.

Now, if you’ll excuse me…. the kitchen has exploded. Again.  I need to go clean it.  Again.

But that’s okay, and do you know why?

Because I’m not alone.  So, hi-five to all you other dads and moms out there, rolling your eyes to the heavens in frustration as you chase after another mess your kids just made.  I mean, not to go all Avatar/Na’vi on you, but I see you.  You’re doing a great job, and if you ever want to prove to someone “what you do with your day”, well, I let my kids destroy my house and took pictures of it, so you can refer them to this blog post to prove how hard you work all day long.

And I did it just for you.

Yeah, no.  I’m lying.  I did it because I was in a pissy mood and was being all passive-aggressive with my husband, and because once I started it I really enjoyed being lazy all day, but eh.  It sounds better if I say I did it for you, so let’s just pretend, okay?

So, have you guys ever seen this?

• One playdate, a thorough house straightening, three games of tags, two hours playing in the yard, and a skipped nap session, I’ve finally worn the boys down so they’re nice and quiet.

  No, I haven’t.  I threw them out in the yard because I’m exhausted.  How?  How is it possible to be hyperactive so many hours in a row, without a single break?  Do they have little secret bags of sugar stashed beneath their mattresses?  And why did my swimming pass have to expire this week?

• Somewhere along the way Artemis got the idea she’s not allowed on the couch if we’re not home.  I have no idea why she decided that – we don’t care at all.  Nevertheless, she invented her own rule, and she always sleeps in her dog bed when we leave the house.

  I just walked in the door after JUST leaving (forgot something – no surprise), and as I walked up the front porch steps I saw something jump off the couch and dart at high-speed into the bedroom.  I walked into my house – no Artemis.  I passed a hand over the couch cushion – Yup.  Toasty warm.  I peeked in my bedroom, and Artemis was curled up on her dog bed, sound “asleep”.  As I entered the room she raised her head, opened her eyes slowly, blinked sleepily at me, yawned, and then curled back up to go back to “sleep, like the “good dog” that she is.

  Dude.  My dog’s a better Hollywood actor than most actors in Hollywood.

• Heeeere, wallet, wallet, wallet.  C’meeeere, little wallet, wallet, wallet.  It’s okay.  Don’t be shy.  You can come out now.
• “Knock, knock.”
  “Who’s there?”
  “Snowman.”
  “Snowman who?”
  “Snowman….PRIVACY POOP!  HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! HAHAHAHAHAHA!  PRIVACY POOP! HAHAHAHAHAAHA!”

  Sigh.  We have reached the age of really, really, really inept joke creation.

• “Oh, no!  OH, NO!  Very bad word!  Very, very, VERY bad word!”  The most generically boring cussing ever, courtesy of DragonMonkey.
• “Why I have to dry my own self off with a towel after a shower?  Why I have to button my own pants?  Why I have to go get my own apple out of the fridge?  Mama, why I have to do *eeeeeverything*?”  DragonMonkey is rapidly becoming the poster child for the #FirstWorldProblems movement.

   

• “Go put on pants, Squid.”
  “No.”
  “Excuse me, young man?”
  “No, thank you.”
  “No, wait… I mean… <SIGH>.  Go put on pants.”
  “Not need pants.”
  “Yes, you need pants.  People wear pants, Squid.  Go put some on.”
  “No.  Nobody not need ’em.  No pants.”
  Well, alrighty then.
• I went to a kid’s party yesterday.  The other moms brought crustless organic spinach quiches, a variety of dairy and gluten-free cookies, organic plantain chips, kale and blueberry infused craisin salads……
  Me?  I brought day old cookies and a half-eaten bag of Frito’s.  One of these days I’m going to get my crap together.  One of these days……
• I’d like to take a moment to thank my two beautiful children for their calm, beatific behavior at today’s PNER convention.  It made for a peaceful, relaxing Saturday.  Also, I’d like to thank both my overactive imagination and my ability to repress painful memories for helping me to get past the rough times.

February

• “Can I marry someone?”
  “Uh, sure Squid. When you’re older.  Do you have anyone in mind?”
  “Yeah.  Mrs. Dawn’s babies.”
  “Mrs. Dawn with the three girls?  Which one?”
  “All of them.  Can I marry all of them?”
  “…..I’m not sure how having three wives is gonna work out for you, Squid.”
  “Maybe just two of them.  I just want two of them.”
  “Which two?”
  “Just the two of them.”
  “You just want to marry the twins?”
  “Yeah.”
  “Maybe we should put a pin in this idea, and revisit when you’re older.”
  “Okay.  Can I have some cheese puffs?”
  “Now that we can do.”
• “DON’T GO PEE OUT THERE NAKED.  Squid, you don’t go pee naked.  Everyone see you.  What you were thinking ’bout, peeing in the front yard?”
  “Nuthin’.  DragonMonkey, I just pee.  Let me in.”
  Good morning from the Beans.
• Today’s parenting goals have been lowered from “nurtured and instructed with love and patience” to “alive, and preferably not bleeding too much”.
• “Heeeey!  Look, Mama!  I finded Captain America!”
  “Sweetie, that’s Jesus.”
  “This is JESUS?!”
  “Well, it’s a figurine of him.”
  “Oh.”
  And then……
  “I’m going to squish Jesus.  I’m going to squish Jesus with my trains.”
• Your interesting fact for the day:  For every dollar a man makes, a woman makes 77 cents.  Except when women choose the same career path as men.  Then they make $1.05.
• Sigh.  The kids renamed Artemis.  She’s now named “Sniffie”, and they become angry whenever we refer to her by her “old name”.  It’s been such a long day that I don’t even care.  Come here, Sniffie.  Let’s go change the boys into pajamas and pray they go to sleep like good little boys.

March

• To be fair, “Whatever you do, don’t turn on the hose or get dirty” does sound an awful lot like “Wheee!  Do you know what makes mud?  Water does!  You should make lots of mud!  Frolic in it!  Hoo-ray!”
• “WHAT IN THE HEL—I MEAN, HECK?  NO. NO. ABSOLUTELY NOT.  You do NOT pee in the basement.  I don’t…. I don’t even….WHY IN THE WORLD WOULD YOU THINK IT’S OKAY TO PEE IN OUR BASEMENT?  are you freakin’ kidding me?  WHY?!”
  “Dada not pee in bafroom.  He pee outside all the time.”
  “I guarantee you, your father does not go piss in the basement when he has to take a leak.”
  “Piss?”
  “Don’t say that.  That’s a bad word.”
  “I not supposed to say ‘piss’?”
  “Squid, quit saying it!  Just…. DON’T EVER PEE IN THE BASEMENT, EVER AGAIN,
  OR SO HELP ME…. Just…. Just DON’T.

  Bean?  Is there something we should talk about?

• Dear children,

  Please don’t stand on the front porch and scream “HI!  HI!  HIHIHIHIHIHI!” every time you see our neighbors.  We’re making a bad enough impression as it is – please give them their privacy and do not act like a pack of chihuahuas that bark every time they see a stranger.

  Your loving mother,
  “Ma”

• “I cleaning my face.”
  “Awww.  That’s sweet.  I love you, Squid.  You’re a cute kid.”
  “I cleaning my face with spit.  See?”
  “Oh.  Oh, wow.  That’s really disgusting.  I take it back – you’re not cute at all. Please don’t touch me.”
• The worst part about growing up is how rarely adults seem to carry around a guitar.  If someone had told me how rare sing-alongs were once you hit your 30s, I might have objected a little more strongly.

April

• Dear Squid, I’m sorry. I hear the “moth-eaten, ragged home haircut” look is in.
• Today is my sixth wedding anniversary.  The Bean came home early from work, and as I pulled into the driveway he walked on to the porch and smiled down at me.

  I ignored him, and slammed the door to my car a little too hard.

  “Are you okay?”

  I ignored him some more.

  “What’s wrong?”

  I made sure both boys had their backs to me as they ran to greet their dad, double-checked that they couldn’t see, and then, like the mature, sweet, loving mother that I am, I flipped off my beloved, sweet-tempered, totally well-behaved youngest son and stomped past everyone and went into the house…..where I found a dozen beautiful roses and a handwritten card with a note so sweet it made me cry.

  I’m sorry, Bean.  I promise I’ll do better next year.

• Dontcha just hate Mondays?  Dontcha just hate Mondays where all you want to do is make some quesadillas for lunch, and while you’re distracted both of your boys pee all over the family dog?
  Yeah.  me too.
• “Mama, you look just like a pwincess.”
  “Awww.  Awww, Squid, thank you.”
  “You look so pwetty.  Just like a pwincess.”
  “Awww, thank you!  Squid, that’s so sweet.  It makes me feel good.”
  “Except…. except you wearing gwasses.”
  “Uh, yes.  Yes, I am.”
  “Ewww. Pwincesses don’t wear gwasses.”
  “What do you mean, ‘ewww’?  Princesses can wear glasses if they need to.  There’s nothing wrong with glasses.”
  “Ewww.  Pwincesses NOT WEAR GWASSES.  You need to take your gwasses off.”
  “Squid, I can’t see without them.  My glasses stay on.”
  “You not look like a pwincess then.  Pwincesses not wear gwasses.”

  And then he gave a heavy, disappointed sigh as he wandered off, leaving me sitting there on the couch with my lukewarm coffee, unattractive glasses, and crushed ego.

• Abracadabra.  ABRACADABRA.  ABRACAAAADAAAAABRAAAAAA.
  Accio healthy dinner?
  Sigh.  I’ve tried every pronunciation I can think of, with every magical flourish I’ve ever read of, and yet no matter how hard I try, Friday night dinner is not cooking itself on the stove.  Apparently it is NOT the thought that counts.

May

• Heeeeere, wallet, wallet, wallet.  C’mere, little wallet.  Heeeeeere, recently-replaced-because-I-lost-the-other-one Visa card, Visa card, Visa card.  Also, heeeeere, car keys, car keys, car keys. Where’d you go, little car keys?
  Some days I really, really, REALLY hate my brain.
• “I love…. I love to kiss girls.”  Things you are not ready to hear from your three year old.
• Mosquitoes, my old nemesis.  We meet again.  And again.  And again.  And again.  Sigh.
• “No, no, no – it’s a compliment.  I said your room DIDN’T smell like old people.  You know that smell… kind of stale?  And.. mediciney?  Yeah, yours doesn’t smell like that anymore, so you’re good.”
  This concludes today’s episode of “Things You’re Not Supposed To Say When You’re a Caregiver”… also known as, “Compliments That Backfired Horribly.”
• “Ohhhhh, shit.”
  “WHAT?!  Did I just hear what I think I heard, Squid?”
  “No!!!  I not do it!”
  “Is that so?  If you didn’t do anything, then how do you know to deny something?”
  “…… I not do it!”
  “Did you just say something very bad, Squid?”
  “No!  I not do it! Grandma say shit!  Not me!”
• Crunchy rice: it’s what for dinner!
• Dear Caspian – I liked that toe, you clumsy oaf.

June

• The Iron Giant, followed by The Land Before Time, and after that they said they want to watch “That one movie with the balloons and the dog that talks” – in other word, the one movie with the most heart-wrenching 8 minutes in movie history.  Dear DragonMonkey and Squid, do you want me to do anything all day besides cry? Love, your mother.
• Today’s song of the day is apparently “I don’t have a penis now, a penis now, a penis now.  I don’t have a penis now, yeah, yeah, yeah“, sung in happy, joyful tones.

  It is weird, inappropriate and completely unsettling to hear, but I can’t seem to get them to quit.  They’re even mumbling it to themselves when they stand in the corner.

• I’m 32 years old.  How much longer do I have to wait before someone comes out with a “Raise, train, ride, and race your own Tauntaun” game?
• Microsoft Word spell check just tried to get me to switch out “your most recent investment” to “you’re most recent investment”.  I’m really, REALLY disturbed.
• “You gonna wear your clothes like that?”
  “Uh, yeah, I’m almost ready to go.  Just give me a second, DragonMonkey.”
  “Yeah, but… you gonna wear your clothes like that?”
  “Well, uh, yeah.”
  “………”
  “Why?  Is something wrong?”
  “Well, I just hope…. I just hope nobody sees your clothes like that.”
  “Oh, for goodness sakes. ARE YOU SERIOUS?”
  “Well, I just hope they not laugh at you….”
  “What is wrong with this outfit?  And why would I care if people laugh at me?”
  “Well, I just hope nobody sees….sees your bra….”
  “FINE.  FINE, DRAGONMONKEY.  I WILL GO PUT ON A TANK TOP WITH THICKER STRAPS SO NOBODY SEES THE BRA STRAPS.”
  And then I stomped out of the room in a huff to go put on something more decent, and less bra-strap-showy, and as I grumbled under my breath, I thought….wait a second.  Aren’t I supposed to be the parent?

July

• Dear mosquitoes of Oregon,

  According to the 2012 census there are 3.899 million people living in this glorious state.  Go suck on some of them for awhile.

  Love,
  The Dried-Out Husk Formerly Known As Becky

• “What do you want to be when you grow up, DragonMonkey?”
  “I want to live with you.”
  “No, I mean… you can be anything!  A cowboy, a police officer, the president, an astronaut – well, maybe not an astronaut with the way the space program’s going, but still.  Anything.  What do you want to be?”
  “I want to live with you.”
  “No, DragonMonkey, that doesn’t count.  I mean, you just can’t sit there and have your life’s ambition be to sit on my sofa the rest of your life.  You can be a soldier, or a hunter, or a businessman, or a chef, or ride horses, or drive garbage trucks, or anything!  What do you want to be?”
  “I don’t wanna leave.  I just wanna stay here and live with you.”
  “No, no… when you’re older!  When you’re a man, like Dada.”
  “I just wanna stay with you.  I don’t wanna go.  I just live with you, okay Mama?”
  “Here, let’s ask your brother.  Squid?  What do you want to be when you grow up?”
  “A gawbage truck.”
  “See, DragonMoney?  See how it works?  Squid wants to grow up and drive a garbage truck.  That sounds like a fun thing to–“
  “No, Ma.  A GAWBAGE TRUCK.”
  “Wait, so you’re telling me you don’t want to drive them, you want to BE a garbage truck?”
  “Yes, Ma.”
  “Nevermind.  I give up.  You can grow up and be a giant metal truck and you can grow a goatee and lounge on my sofa and play video games.”
  “What’s a goatee?”
  “Nevermind.  I need more coffee.”
• The truth is, you just can’t eat away your problems.  But, maaaaaan, today it is not for lack of trying.
• It’s such a nice, cool day.  I think it would be lovely weather to forget I’m wearing a sweatshirt before I pick a fight with Caspian that involves me running up and down a giant hill in 92 degrees.
• New favorite quote:  “Being home with kids all day is just the loneliest never-alone thing.  Like living in a cave filled with malfunctioning Teddy Ruxpins.”
• The Bean loves his car more than anyone I’ve ever met.  He washes and details it weekly, even in the dead of winter.  Nobody is allowed to eat or drink in it.  The boys are only allowed in there in a dire emergency…

  Which is why I’m having such a hard time not laughing at him while he’s on the phone with our insurance company, trying to to explain to them that he needs a new bumper.  Why does he need a new bumper?  Well, because on the way home tonight a raccoon fell from the sky and landed on his car.  I mean, it’s terrible, Bean.  We’re so lucky.  It could have been so much worse, and I’m so glad you’re okay, and I know how much your car means to you. I’m so, so sorry.  But…. Dude.  Your car is getting pelted by airborne animals magically falling from the sky.  It’s a teensy bit funny.

August

• I didn’t spill two glasses of water all over my stuff at the writer’s conference.  Nope.  Not me.  I just tripped and fell down the stairs while on my way to clean up after someone else spilled two glasses of water all over my stuff.
• Phew! I don’t stink.  For a bit there I thought I was struggling with terrible B.O.  It’s just cat pee all over my shirt.  What a relief.
• “No, I not need any underwear.  I just gonna let my penis dry out for a little bit.”  Well…..well, alrighty then.  I think I liked it better when they couldn’t talk.
• “When I grow up, and I gonna be a man, I not gonna have any kids.”
  “Really?  Why not, DragonMonkey?”
  “Well, they too noisy, and they put their dirty hands everywhere, and you have to wash them.  They make a racket – a big, loud racket, and I not want them to be noisy and get my house all messed up.”
  “Where the heck did you learn the term ‘make a racket’?  Wait… that’s not important.  So you don’t want kids because they might be noisy and make a mess?  You want to grow up and be childfree?”
  “Yeah, when I grow up and be a man.”
  “DRAGONMONKEY, I don’t think I’ve ever heard a more hypocritical statement in my life.  It’s, like, covered in layers and layers of hypocrisy.  It’s a hypocrisy lasagna.”
  “What, Mama?”
  “Nevermind. No.  I’ll accept and even admire childfree statements from anybody in this entire universe except for you.  After what you’re putting me through, you are not allowed to have any peace in our house.  You are going to grow up, get married, and have 14 children.  With food allergies.  And colic.  And oppositional defiant disorder.”
  “But I not want any little babies.  I just wanna grow up  with a quiet house. I gonna marry Vivianna, and we gonna have a quiet house.  A clean house.”
  “Nope.  Not allowed.”
• Men’s boxers.  Borrowed dress pants.  A nursing tank top.  Why, yes, it is time for me to do laundry.  How can you tell?

September

• One book survived the hard drive crash.  One did not.  That’s all the computer I can handle for one day.
• Home at 10:15 pm. Back on the road at 4:30 am.  Friends don’t let friends become public accountants.
• 7:30 in the morning and he has now reached the hysterical hiccup stage of crying…. because I won’t let him wear two popped collars to the second day of kindergarten.  Not only am I a failure as a parent (popped collars?  TWO OF THEM???), but it’s too early to start drinking.
• “Mom?  Do cows have meat inside of them?”
  “Yes, it’s beef.  Like hamburgers.”
  “Do chickens have meat in them?”
  “Sweetie, you know that answer already.  Chickens are made out of chicken.”
  “Do people have meat in them?”
  “….look! I found some cookies! Want a cookie?”
• “MOOOOOM!  DragonMonkey put his foot in my fan!”
  “He WHAT?”
  “No I didn’t, Squid.  I put my fingers in it.  HURRY, MOM!”
  “YOU PUT YOUR FINGERS IN THE FAN?!”
  “Yeah.  Come upstairs and look.”
  “Why?  Why would you do such a thing?”
  “Because he touched my fan.  And it’s HOT, so it’s MY FAN.  You should hurry.  I’m bleeding.”
  “…. you don’t sound like you’re bleeding.”
  “…..I’m not actually bleeding.”
  “Yeah, I didn’t think so.”
  “But it hurts.  HURRY, MOM.”
  “Well, I bet it hurts.  That’s kind of why we don’t put our fingers in fans.  You’re lucky the tip of it didn’t get chopped off.”
  “It does hurt.”
  “Well, I’m sure it does, but I’m not coming up there.  If you’re gonna be dumb enough to stick your fingers in a fan, that’s your problem.  I’m not climbing the stairs to your bedroom just because you’re dumb.  Close the door and go back to bed and don’t be dumb again.”
  “….okay, Mom.  G’night.”
  “Night, DragonMonkey.”
• Trying to figure out Twitter is like sitting all alone at a table in the school cafeteria, mumbling to yourself.  I mean, not that I would know anything about that.  I was totally the cool kid in school.  Everyone idolized me and admired my fashion sense.  I swear.
• DONE!  Beat every goal I had for the half marathon right out of the water, despite my iPod dying at mile five.  Not only did I cross the finish line, but I ran the entire time, and I came in at 3:15 when I originally hoped for 3:30.  The last three miles were the closest I’ve ever come to heat stroke, and everyone at the finish line was speaking…. Russian?  Wingdings?  They switched to English after I got the first five or six glasses of water in me.  Also, I didn’t cry from happiness like I normally do when I cross the finish line.  Nope.  Instead, I spent the first three miles crying from the beauty of it all.  Three. Miles. Of. Crying.  Races do weird things to me.

October

• One pound of Tillamook mild cheddar cheese.  Seven Taco Bell hard shelled tacos.  One loaf of Udi’s gluten-free bread.  Two apples.  One stick of butter.  Artemis, I hope your stomach hurts you.  Bad.  And for the record, I threw away your tennis ball.  Take that.
• Becky Bean:  Single-handedly making childfree citizens feel smugly content with their choices since 2008.
• I’ve traded in the Santa Anas for the Pineapple Express…. and for the record, that is an absolutely ridiculous name for a weather thingie, and I find it hard to take people seriously when they drop it in regular conversation.
• Listening to two 3 year olds have a conversation is even worse than being stuck behind the bar listening to two really drunk girls trying to convince each other that he didn’t deserve you, and you’re too good for him anyways.
• Holy crap.  I just picked up the DragonMonkey from school, and all of a sudden he can read.  My not-very-good Friday just got awesome.
• My parents took the boys for the evening so I planned a romantic night with The Bean. When the weather stole those plans we went out for dinner instead.  Now we are back at home.

  My makeup turned out just right, my hair is laying in shiny curls over my shoulder… I’m in my sexiest shirt and my best fitting jeans.  The lights are low, and I am lighting candles as the radio plays soft tunes from the 40s.  I approach the Bean, who looks up at me with hooded eyes.

  “You ready for this?” I speak low, barely above a whisper.  He nods at me, his eyes locked on mine.  “Take your shirt off,” I say.  The air between us is heated, steamy.  I hold my breath and look down at the man I married, and then I lean forward…..

  And try not to breathe as I smear gloppy Vick’s vapor rub all over his chest, the vaporizer on the floor between us fogging my glasses and overpowering the light perfume I applied earlier.  Eau de Menthol is the new “it” scent, right?

  Saturday night, 8pm, we’re not broke, no children, I’m not sleepy…. and the Bean has a bad cold.  Now I’m sitting on the edge of the tub, sulking.  DAGNABIT.

• “Never touch a downed power line, even with a stick.”  Word-for-word from Channel Two news that they just flashed across the screen.  Hey, Oregonians?  I’m a little concerned they had to emphasize the “EVEN with a stick.”  C’mon.  We can do better than this.
• Things that are edible:  Cinnamon rolls. Green curry.  Ice cream.  Tamales.  Misbehaving children.  Just sayin’.

November

• If you need me I’m “gone ridin’ “.   ON THE BEACH.  REPEAT:  I’M ABOUT TO RIDE A  HORSE ON THE BEACH.  I lied yesterday.  Being an adult rocks.
• You know how horses get all territorial and deliberately (however nonchalantly) pee on their hay, and then they can’t eat it, but man, they sure showed those other horses?  That’s what it’s like owning an immune system with Rheumatoid Arthritis.  You go, you bada@@ mofo.  You eat that knee.  Everyone’s totally going to respect you now.
• Things that are difficult;  Counting your hair.  Organic Chemistry.  Summertime ultra-marathons in the desert.  Trying to fatten up a super skinny dog when your other dog is a black Labrador.

• Anyone who doesn’t think that ADHD is a real thing has never sat bolt upright and thought, “CRAP, I have to give a speech tomorrow on writing – and not only did I completely forget to prepare, I have no idea where I even left my notes from that one conference.”  And then you think, “I should do this right now before I forget again.  Maybe my notes are in that notebook in my car?”  So you go to get your keys to unlock the car, except the normal keys have been lost for almost a week, and you’re stuck with that silly backup key that has no clip, so you keep having to stick it in your pocket…. Only when you go to get the key, it’s not there, but there is a giant wheel of Mexican cheese in your pocket.

  Have you been walking around town all morning with a giant unopened wheel of Queso Ranchero in your pocket?  Why, yes.  Yes, you have and now it’s getting warm and gross. Why is it even there?  I mean, obviously you put it there, but you have no memory of doing it.  You should put it in the fridge, but you wanted to make enchiladas today, and you need to double check that there’s salsa – crap, there isn’t.  You need to pick some up, except.  Double crap.  Where are those keys? You’ve been meaning to look for them, but you keep forgetting, and now you’re carting around your spare key, the one that only fits in your pocket and what the heck?  Why is there a giant package of cheese in your pocket?  That’s gross.

  That was 11:00 am.  It’s now 3pm.  I found an awesome estate sale with some really incredible stuff at great prices.  It was a bit embarrassing to reach into my jacket pocket for my debit card only to hand them cheese.  At least I found the Adderall pill I forgot to take tucked away in the lining of my other pocket, so I know I’m not suffering from early onset Alzheimer’s. I can’t decide if my memory is worse when I’m off my pills, because I’ve grown to rely on the chemical, or if it was always this bad and I didn’t know how good life could be.  I wish I’d broken down earlier in life and gotten help – who knew I could be s productive with the aid of a  tiny pill?  Seriously, though.  It’s 3pm and this cheese is gross.  I’m probably gonna have to toss it, except now my pocket feels kind of empty without the weight of it.  Also, I wish I knew where my keys were.

December

• “Hey, Mommy?”
  “Yeah, DragonMonkey?”
  “Mommy, I love you.”
  “Aww, thank you, sweetie.  I love you, too.”
  “HEY, MOMMY?”
  “Shh, not so loud, Squid.  Yes?”
  “I love…. I love….. Mommy, I love candles.”
  “….Okay, that’s nice.”
  “Yeah, I can blow them out!  I love candles.”
• On our way to cut down a Christmas tree.  We asked the boys what their favorite Christmas song was.  Their answer?  Halloween.  Halloween is their favorite Christmas song.
• I unloaded the box of ornaments…and found a wadded up breast pump shield.  What the….? So I immediately put it in the tree as an ornament, but The Bean found it and made me take it down 🙁
• I wish it was a thing to say “I need a book” in the same exhausted tones of someone saying “I need a drink”, and instead of looking confused everyone would understand exactly what you meant and would murmur, “First chapter’s on me” in sympathetic tones as they handed you a five.  I really wish this was a thing, don’t you?”
• Sometimes, when I’m feeling optimistic, I like to think of it not as a smoke alarm, but more of a gentle signal that it’s time to get creative and try a new recipe for dinner.
• You know how it is – when you wake up from a deep sleep at 1 am with the sudden urge to play tag, and then vomit, and then a rousing game of hide-and-go-seek, and then a pillow fight and bite war before nodding off at 3 or 4 in the morning?  No?  You don’t?  You mean it’s just my kids?
• Slet In Tow!  Slet In Tow! SLETIN WOT!  Sot Wi!
  I really wish the boys would quit rearranging the “Let It Snow” window clings. It’s feeling less like Christmas and more like we’re trying to speak Parseltongue.
• No, sons.  We do not open up presents at 2:30 am.  Go to bed before Mama eats you AND your presents.
• Watching my dogs express their affection for one another by licking each other’s eyeballs is slowly turning me into a cat person.