Thursday, October 1, 2015

When Your Child Goes to College: The Heartbreak We're Expected to Get Over in a Weekend.



It started senior year. A sudden awareness of the time being reduced to "months left"..."weeks left". I kept it to myself, this mental hourglass. Last back-to-school shop. Last Halloween. Last Spring Break. Then it was May. Last day of making her coffee, packing her school lunch. Was she aware too? We never talked about it.

June brought a flurry of graduation and senior week events...parties and beach trips with her friends - sunburns and late nights out...the separation was starting already and no one had asked me to sign off on it. I told myself we still had "all summer". But it was different. She was home to sleep, but not much more. I let curfews and questions kind of slip away because she was an adult now, and it was only a matter of weeks (days?) until she answered to no one but herself.

Those August days leading up to move-in weekend I kept my mind busy with lists and purchases: mattress toppers, bulletin boards, desk lamps, bed risers. Meal plans, bank accounts, passwords, parking passes. Every now and then, when no one was home, it would consume me like those waves in the surf that you realize at the last second you misjudged. I would crumple to the couch and cry with an anguish that I hadn't ever even heard in my voice. She was leaving me. My baby was really leaving.

The day of the drive up I was fine - it was exciting and nostalgic, evoking memories of my own freshman year. Our little foursome unloaded the car and moved her stuff in, one family unit among thousands of others, all performing identical tasks, all feeling identical feelings.

Hours later, when it became apparent that the girls' room was "done" with unpacking and decorating, and it was "Time", we offered to take our goodbye outside to give each family some privacy.  I looked over at her roommate's mom and saw the tears beginning to fill her eyes, and impulsively hugged her. Tightly.  We probably stayed that way for a full minute, two total strangers crying on each others' shoulder. The dads chuckled and the girls rolled their eyes. "Oh my God, Mom..." For that minute, this stranger knew me better than anyone else in the world.

Down in the courtyard, my daughter hugged her little sister, then her dad, then me. She had a meeting to get to. She wasn't sad, or scared, or heartbroken. She was ready.

On the walk back to the car, there were many moms in sunglasses. Dads walking purposefully, nothing to see here..we got this. Younger siblings who weren't quite sure what kind of change this would bring for them.

The worst moment came when we returned home. Walking through the door without her made it all real. I climbed the stairs to her bedroom, which was still disheveled from her final pack.. took the pillow she'd slept on, hugged it to my chest and sank to the floor.

I feel somehow that it's disrespectful to parents who've actually lost children to describe the utter heartbreak and grief of that moment. But it was real...and all-consuming.

"You should be happy for her!" friends admonished. Of course I was. "She'll be back for Thanksgiving," others said. Yes, she would. But an 18-year chapter of my life had abruptly ended in less than a day. It was time for her to start her own life. And then I realized the thing I was grieving most:  She'll always be everything to me, but I'll stop being everything to her.

And that is motherhood. And I just need a little time.





Sunday, October 13, 2013

Happy "Dress Like a Slut Day"


Oh joy.

It's that time of year again...

Cider! Pumpkins! Candy! Ho's!

WELL.  Apparently toddling around on stripper heels as a "sexy" nurse/cop/referee/cheerleader/devil/angel/football player/firefighter/pirate has been DONE. 2003 called: It wants it's "sexy" back.

Any slut-for-a-night knows you have to be original to stand out in a sea of bimbos. 

Think outside the box!   

How about: Sexy Micky Mouse?


Sexy Girl Scout? That's not inappropriate at all.

Sexy Dinosaur!


Sexy Pizza Slice!!

Sexy Cheeseburger!

Really the possibilities are endless.

I am proposing the following ideas to some costume companies for 2014 (PATENT PENDING don't even try it.)

* Sexy hermit crab

* Sexy leaf

* Sexy parking ticket

* Sexy gummy worm

* Sexy tongue depressor

* Sexy Post-it note

* Sexy this thing:




Or hell, just show up naked with an apple and a rubber snake. "Eve". Just saved you $39.95.

Thursday, April 18, 2013

Kindles Are For Porn


Ladies! Let's talk smut.

OK, so by now we've all read the entire Fifty Shades Trilogy , freaked out our husbands/significant others with our jump-started libidos, dropped out of Book Club, and are looking around for our next fix like "NOW what." (husbands/significant others: "Yeah! NOW what.")

Fifty Shades is a gateway drug, my friends. There is a whole universe of competent-to-poorly written erotica out there, waiting to be consumed, like thousands of little dime bags, but with more ripped biceps and heavy breathing. 

However: Just as the alcoholic needs the paper bag, you can't go broadcasting at the travel soccer games that you're reading His Forbidden Submissive, or Beg For It .

You, my friend, need a Kindle .

The Kindle e-books are cheaper than regular books, and you just download them straight from Amazon. No embarrassing book store checkout, no hiding the books from the family (and yes, there is a pass lock, 4 characters, I suggest P-O-R-N).

So below I've listed some of my faves, highly recommended.

And final tip: When someone notices your Kindle and asks "What are you reading?" your answer is this:

"Oh- it's 'Proof of Heaven' - it's a true story of a well-respected neurosurgeon who recounts his near-death experience while in a coma. It's on The New York Times Bestsellers List. It's really interesting."

See? Look at you- intellectual, spiritual, open-minded.

And horny. Let's not forget horny.









Tuesday, November 15, 2011

Amazon So Doesn't Care About My Writer's Block




















Holy mother.

I TOTALLY forgot my blog was available on Kindle and Amazon was CHARGING .99 cents for it.

Apparently, they've been sending out apology emails to subscribers and offering them their money back. And booted me out of the Amazon Kindle family of offerings.

Awkward.

But guess what. I got a job. (!!!!!!!)  I know. I'm totally an executive right now. No, I'm not...but I wear heels and lipgloss and curse at people while I'm driving. So same thing.

Here's what I've learned my first week:

Things to Say When You're Getting Coffee to-go in the Morning at the Wawa:

"Another day, another dollar.."

"Is it Friday yet? hahahahaha"

"Workin' hard? Or hardly workin'?"

"Take this job and shove it - Am I right?"

"Are you gonna finish that pretzel?"



Things That Have Not Changed Since I Last Worked in 1997

Adding smiley faces or hearts to your "possession labels" in the office fridge so you don't seem like a selfish OCD bitch.

Minimum of 6 trial-and-error passes to figure out a double sided copy.

Do we, or do we not, get Columbus Day off.



Things I Have No Time For Now That I Work

Texting

Visiting my own Facebook page

Anybody else's laundry besides mine

Front step decoration and maintenance:
















"Back off, I'm workin' for The Man."

Sunday, July 17, 2011

Harry Potter Recap. Sort Of.










My account of the entire Harry Potter series... don't hold me to this. I don't really pay attention.

So. There are 23 Harry Potter books that were made into 18 movies. J.K. Rowling wrote them all on a napkin while she was on the Amtrak. All the movie titles are called "Harry Potter and..." except the 15th one, "Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Lightening Thief."

Ok. Basically, if you're a wizard you go to a special school because you're weird and you'd be bullied at public school, and probably turn someone into a burrito and then the school would get sued.

The main thing you need to know is that Harry should totally be with Hermoine but for some random reason she ends up with Ron, who's a ginger, so that doesn't even make sense.

The Bad Guy's named Valdemort and even though he has a snake nose, I've seen scarier.

Um....there are lots of potions/owls/candles/snakes/goblins and spiders.

Everybody defends themselves with wands. I don't really know why they don't use their wands to conjure up guns, I think that'd be more useful against giant spider attacks.

Harry is the only person with a normal name, and that is why he is the most powerful. Everybody else is named like Hingus Puddingfoot.

There is a good amount of running.

The greatest mystery is why nobody is talkin' about THIS dude, who was smokin' hot.


OK, maybe that's related to my lingering Adam Ant crush.





*****SPOILER ALERT!!!!!!!!******


Harry lives, Voldemort dies.

If I missed something, leave a comment.

Monday, May 23, 2011

Rapture a Success!














Well this is awkward.

Sorry you all didn't make it this go-round....this is not the turnout we were expecting.

I'm lookin' at a lotta uneaten Chex Mix and Propel.

But I figure as long as they have wifi up here I can still blog and give you a little "insider information".


THINGS YOU FIND OUT IN HEAVEN:

• all the missing socks are here. They were too good for that world.

• Yes, there is a totally separate bug heaven.

• They're still working on fixing hail.

• Satan and the DMV have had a longstanding partnership, as suspected.

• Hundreds of thousands of people have died from mixing soda and Pop Rocks.

• Michael Jackson? not here.

 and finally....

• Yes, He sees everything you do.
Yes, even that.
 No, he doesn't think you're a pervert.
Except that one time.
You might wanna lay off that.

Thursday, April 14, 2011

LOL I Almost Took An Anti-Nuclear Radiation Pill Instead of a Multivitamin













That was funny.

We've all done it, we've all done it, I know :)

So, yeah, my armageddon kit is coming together nicely... thanks for asking...and it's kinda nice not having a DEADLINE ...Hello ...Y2K.. hahaha... that was a lotta pressure.

and embarrassing.

But you know what? It was good practice...I discovered some very interesting websites. And learned a lot of things.

Namely, all you really need to survive in a post-apocalyptic world is sprouts.







True. And a gun.

Sprouts, a gun and probably some vodka.

I might've made that last one up.

So here's a picture of what I have so far...I know, no gun...but the empty bottles double as weapons.




Tuesday, March 22, 2011

Oh, SkyMall...Why Didn't I Think Of That.

(Editor's note: Yes-I'm pretending that I haven't had writer's block for 3 months...just go with it.)


So we all know that I hate flying.....what with all the crashing and the dying and whatnot.

And it's super-awesome that besides having to worry about engine trouble and de-icing the wings and electrical failure and hijacking (remember hijacking? Like, regular....take-us-to-Cuba hijacking?) I now have to add underwear bombers and birds to the list.

(Birds? Really? What kind of dumb-ass flock of birds gets sucked into a plane engine.)

Anyway. There is one awesome thing about planes..aside from how crazy-cute Captain Morgan looks in mini size....


SkyMall Magazine.

Seriously, I think I need to look into a subscription...because I don't fly that often...and how could I sleep at night knowing I might be missing out on products like



SkyRest




















Steak monogrammer,
(available in any combination
of letters or just "D-BAG")









"Garden Yeti"












Garden Zombie











"Napping flat on your face" pillow









Stress relieving head massager.
Literally says "use it at your desk at work".











Because in this economy your job is totally safe if you're rockin' a space helmet.

Sunday, January 9, 2011

I Blame Facebook

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