The other weekend my surrogate mother called me a Goody Two Shoes. Ordained minister aside, I suspect she was drunk. Why else would she call me that?

We were at the neighborhood pool – her neighborhood pool, not mine. We frequently use her pool during the summer, even though we aren’t residents. That’s right! We show up without Susan the Surrogate Mother and pretend to be Susan in order to gain access.

Would a goody two shoes lie like that? I don’t think so. I even have my children in on the lies. I coach them about whose name is what, and that I am actually Susan and, oh my god, DO NOT let it slip that my name is Heather. Instead it is Susan. Repeat after me: MY MOM’S NAME IS SUSAN or they will THROW US OUT OF THE POOL.

This is what you call teaching your children secret agent skills. I don’t think Susan knows the first thing about teaching secret agent skills to children.

On this particular pool recon, a kink appeared in our secret agent field training exercise when Susan came to the pool two hours after we get there. I quickly draw my children over to me in the water, opposite side of the Pool Gestapo.

“Ok, boys,” I whisper, “Susan is on her way here. When you see her, DO NOT yell out her name, even though you’ll be excited to see her. Remember, I AM SUSAN BERENT! Do not blow our cover!”

“Ok, Mom! Err, I mean ok, Susan!”

Susan gets there and I tell her the instructions I gave the boys, expecting her to be overwhelmed by the sheer brilliance of my mastermind planning skills.

“Yeah, or you could just pretend you’re my daughter visiting from out of town and you’re named after me.”

Gesh, it’s like she thinks she’s more experienced in lying to the Pool Police than I am and knows how to make this less complicated. Hello? This is our second summer stealing this pool! I know what I’m doing, and the more complicated you make your lies the more befuddled the other side becomes. It’s in the secret agent training manual.

The second thing I did once Susan arrived at the pool was oh-so-casually walk over to the Pool Police and report that the addition to our party, please note it in the pool log so you can charge MY club account properly. After all, liars just aren’t honest about those kinds of things! Who would suspect me of being stealing pool privileges if I’m honest about the number of our party?

And that’s when Susan called me a Goody Two Shoes – for FOLLOWING THE RULES by reporting the actual number of people in my party. What she doesn’t understand is it was only about staying in character and making the lie real.

Come on, nothing else in my life points to me being a goody two shoes. Look at me, I attended college, got engaged my senior year, married just weeks after graduation (with honors!), bought a house, waited an appropriate number of married years before having children (none out of wedlock for me!), quit my job to stay home, bought a minivan, joined the PTA, put my husband’s career first and learned to bake the best chocolate chip cookies ever.

That doesn’t sound anything like a goody two shoes, does it? DOES IT?!

Fucking hell, it does. EXACTLY. The only way I could sound more goody two shoes is if I did volunteer work and stayed away from drugs.

That’s it, I’m screwed.

And if that moment of depersonalization isn’t enough, I’ve been talking with Megan about my blog. I’m at a crossroads with it and Megan is trying to help me. While discussing potential blog name changes, she said she comes to my blog expecting to find me either a) funny or b) pissed off.

Attention everyone! Megan has spoken, so my new blog name must be FuckYouAssholeLOL.com.

I had no idea I come across as pissed off. I’d like to know what the fuck Megan means by that!!! Oh, that’s probably what she means by that – the F bomb and the exclamation points. Shit! Oops, I mean, crap. (Did that sound less angry?)

My point to all of this is I can’t see myself. I don’t know if I’ve ever seen myself. I have this idea in my head of who I am, but I’m getting a hunch it’s loosely based on reality. Very loosely. I guess this is why whenever I’m asked to write a bio of myself I get very flustered and mentally flounder for ways to describe who and what I am.

Pissed off, fired up, whichever I’m described. Maybe feisty? I could live with feisty. Except I like to imagine myself being level-headed and rational, and the antonym of impulsive, whatever it is. That word. I’d like to imagine myself that way, if I knew the word.

I don’t want to be a goody two shoes. I want to be a radical mother with absolutely no intentions of getting a tattoo (ew, trashy), but willing to smoke a menthol to prove a point. What point I don’t know, but some point, damn it.

So far the only adjective that fits both my idea of Heather and the outside world’s idea of Heather is funny. Yes, I see it. Except I’d like to imagine myself more of a refined, cerebral comic. As someone who actually deserves to have a humor article published in an intellectual magazine and not as a “diamond in the rough.” But I am rough. I like to cuss. A lot. Shit. Fuck. Damn. See?

How does one go about reconciling oneself with oneself?

I was once told I would never be described as refined. Maybe I should reconcile with that. I don’t know what to wear to country club weddings or how to process the sight of men in seersucker suits. (They actually exist, and not just in Southern novels. I couldn’t help but stare.) But I can belt out the most authentic yee-haw when your four-wheel drive truck slip-slides around in a muddy field. Yet if you were to see me pull out of my suburban driveway in my minivan and Gap jeans, you wouldn’t know that about me either.

I’ve spent weeks now trying to define myself and subsequently rebrand my blog through this new found clarity of self. So basically I’ve wasted a lot of time recently. I’m no closer to anything, except maybe schizophrenia, which is what happens when you take yourself too seriously or listen to Glenn Beck.

Poor Heather, she can’t be the perfect embodiment of fire and ice, of revolution and peace, of impulse and temperance. Boo-hoo-hoo.

Just shut up and get over yourself already.

Hmm. Maybe FuckYouAssholeLOL.com is the way to go.

*******************************************************

Comments are closed this time. Apparently I just want to embody Stacey Anymommy.

Look, I’m having a terrible case of, well, not writers block. It’s more like can’t give a damn block. Who cares about writing and blogging? There are jobs to be done, sun to soak up, flowers to plant, and kids to revel in. I find myself less and less in my own head and more and more in the moment. Warning: this “present in the moment” bullshit doesn’t bode well for a blogger. Fodder will flitter into your head, then flitter right out. But, who cares, right?

Megan and I talked about this lingering problem of mine, but what we discovered (that it probably is caused by a low inventory in my liquor cabinet) isn’t the point. Megan asked me a completely unrelated question during our phone call.

“So, what does Payton think of the oil spill?”

I didn’t know what to tell her.

Not because I’m not aware of my kids, or of what Payton thinks of this environmental mess. Come on, the kid who is highly opinionated on all (and I do mean ALL) things environmental? The one who wants to buy a bullhorn so he can organize a neighborhood march and yell “PLANT MURDERER!” to the construction crews as they transform yet another section of woods into the barren, mindless bliss that is a suburban yard.

Surely Payton has thoughts on the oil spill!

He has amazingly adult thoughts on the oil spill. And by that, I mean he’s speechless too, just like us adults.

What can you say about something like this?

Of course, there are people saying things about it. Of course there are! And it’s so funny! I can hear the brown pelicans and great blue herons laughing it up RIGHT NOW!

Just like I’m sure the citizens of Louisiana and Mississippi laughed it up at the Hurricane Katrina jokes.

And the Haitians laugh at the earthquake jokes.

Let’s say a toxic chemical contaminated an entire city’s drinking water and kept contaminating it for weeks and weeks, with no end in sight. I’m sure the people in that city would laugh at the jokes too, wouldn’t they?

Listen to me. I sound like a old hag whose disappointment with life has turned her bitter and caused an early demise to her sense of humor. Gah. I should stop considering my blog a humor blog.

I guess even my sarcasm and cynicism has its limit. And even though I believe in the healing power of laughter, I can’t find it in me to laugh at a sea turtle’s expense, or a baby manatee’s, or even a bull shark, no matter how witty and humorous the tweet. But something close to 100,000 people can. Gah, indeed.

I don’t want to debase BP either. At least not yet. I don’t want to believe they are immoral, uncaring people. Goddamn, so much is riding on them being caring people, on them being just as horrified at the loss of life and ecological disaster as the rest of us. I want to believe they are doing everything humanly possible to stop this oil leak.

Don’t mistake a fundamental belief in good people as naiveté. I know BP did something wrong somewhere. They cut one corner too many, or maybe five too many. Maybe a hundred. They pressured a contractor to work too fast, to ignore one safeguard too many. Their contractor didn’t stand by principle and caved to the pressure, knowing it was wrong. Something. A lot of things. Obviously it went wrong somewhere.

There are businesses that are culpable, alright. I’m sure we’ll make them pay, one way or another. Money, of course. Social media spankings, another.  Hell, let’s get real American with these Brits and tar and feather them. It’ll be like the good ol’ days!

But what about our own culpability? Yours and mine. You didn’t think we were exempt from accountability for this, did you?

Look at this picture of Wally and the boys at the beach. Click on it to enlarge if you need to. Look along the horizon. Do you see the four tiny gray dots? Those are oil rigs. That’s just a small sample of the number you can see from our coast in Alabama.

They’re unsightly, yes. Probably dangerous. Ocean oil rigs carry inherent danger, so yes, dangerous too.

And it’s all in the American name of the cheapest possible gas price.

Oh yes, we’re accountable too. Who is making the demands for the product?

But it’s much easier to blame someone else and laugh at snarky tweets than own it. It makes it that much easier to dismiss the part you and I have played in this. Why do we need to be a part of the solution when we didn’t cause the problem, right?

I don’t know what is going to come from this disaster, but I want to believe it will be something good. (Again, it’s my Jedi training in a fundamental belief of good over evil.)

Could it be that this, combined with the Great Recession, can change the trajectory of our American society? We begin to turn inwards for happiness, not outwards in consumerism. That it will finally push us to look for a truly viable alternative source of energy.

That, little by little, you and I change our mindset: one drop, then another, until the ripple reaches every shore.

One reusable water bottle replaces 24 plastic bottles, which contain oil. Imagine if the 99,000 Twitter followers of that satirical BP Public Relations put some action behind their laughing and made that change? One reusable shopping bag replaces 5 plastic bags, which contain oil. One smaller car replaces an SUV.

One by one, then two by two. It’s no accident that numbers are infinite.

We can be a part of the solution, every single day. It’s easier than you think. But first, we have to change how we believe.

I believe in good.

I hope for the future.

I’ve become the person in traffic scowling at the other car with the loud bass. I crankily roll up my window and give them the stink eye. On top of that, I’ve become an avid fan of NPR, mostly Krista Tippet’s Speaking of Faith.

This new love NRP/hate rap music trait could be a sign of old age. What can I say, I’ve hit the crest of youth and am now on the downhill side. I swear my boobs are sagging a tad bit more than they did a year ago, and I’m sure it’s rap music’s fault.

No, really, the only thing I have against other cars’ bass noise is that it hurts my ears. It makes me want get out of the car and eat rubber hoses off of the radiator, actually. It’s right up there with nails on a chalkboard for me.

And I wonder where my oldest son got his hearing sensitivity? Only, like everything else (including my fantastic looks) he inherited it to the Nth power.

Yesterday I was in the car, listening to Krista’s show. The featured show just so happened to be on autism. I almost didn’t listen to it. As you know, my personal perspective on some of these characteristics doesn’t line up with the autistic perspective.

To be completely honest with you, dear reader, I usually find myself frustrated to the point of anger when I hear the “other” side. I know it’s not politically correct to admit to that, so thank god this isn’t a political (or correct!) blog.

I don’t understand this about myself. I mean, you’d think after months of listening to NPR it would make me more sophisticated, right? Everyone’s voice on NRP is so calm and soothing, what’s there to get angry about?!?!

So I told myself I’ve grown as a person and will be able to listen to people speak of these characteristics as limiting without getting upset.

Hahahahahaha!

No.

I couldn’t listen to the entire show. I guess it’s like a Democrat listening to a Republican, or watching skanky reality TV shows: the differing perspectives spark anger and frustration. But here I am, talking about the show anyway, half heard. I’m kind of an awesome amateur journalist like that.

In the show, Krista mentions somewhere around 10% of people on the autistic spectrum show unusual gifts or abilities in music, math, etc. But, because of autistic characteristics (sensory issues, etc.), they are hindered from applying their gifts productively.

And this is where the fear gets me.

If I don’t teach Payton to handle his atypical characteristics in a typical fashion, he will be hindered from applying his gifts productively! It will be all my fault! The historical blaming the mother is COMPLETELY RIGHT, OMFG!

Tomorrow we’re renewing Payton’s IEP for next year and I planned to go back to letting nature take its own course and reduce his social skills work. What am I thinking?! Do you want him productive, Heather? Or crazy? Fuck Mother Nature, what does she know?!

Doubt feeds on fear. Or maybe fear feeds on doubt, I don’t know, it’s possible I’m getting in over my own philosophical head. But my point is that what once seemed clear and right for my son now seems murky and completely wrong.

The example on the show supporting this idea of hindered productivity was pianist Glenn Gould. Krista states he hated applause, being watched, dressing up for concerts, and shaking hands. She then says he quit publically performing at the age of 32.

Perhaps it’s unintentional, but listening to the show, it seemed to imply Gould stopped performing at a young age because of these “autistic” like characteristics. Maybe he did, maybe he didn’t. It doesn’t really matter.

After he stopped public performances, Krista tells us Gould recorded (in a studio, alone) his most famous and best-selling classical album of all time.

My mind naturally wondered…

How was his gift hindered by his “autistic” characteristics? Didn’t he go on to do his most famous work? Wasn’t he then able to reach more people through the album than he ever could through public performance?

From my perspective, it appears as if everything worked out, as it should.

I fail to see how my son is limited by his unique characteristics, from these traits that set him apart from the typical, and for this specific example, how his sensory sensitivity hinders his gifts.

And maybe I can’t see it because he isn’t autistic, because he does dance this DSM IV-declared line between normal and abnormal.

Or maybe the label doesn’t matter at all and we should stop talking in terms of limitations and hindrance when it comes to these types of people. What is a personal limitation other than what we declare it to be?

Maybe my son isn’t and will not be limited in life by these characteristics because I do fail to see it. There’s that old saying “seeing is believing,” but for some reason I suspect the opposite may be just as true, if not truer.

Believing is seeing.

I believe he was given these unique characteristics because they are somehow meant to serve him in a positive way.

I find a way to extract myself from the mentality of fear and limitation that our mass media and society appears to feed on, almost to the point of gluttony in today’s information age. It’s sometimes overwhelming and not altogether easy to do so. I’m not perfect in it. I try, fall down, get up and try again. Repeat. Repeat.

But I practice believing good will come of these traits.

One day I know we’ll see it.

Note: I have more to say on this show, and another of Krista’s shows. But after two weeks of full-time hours under fluorescent light, the sunshine is calling my name.

For those of you who come to my blog for lighthearted humor over marital laundry rules or comebacks to anti-feminist Super Bowl commercials, I’m sorry, this post is not for you. Or maybe it is. Who am I to say you won’t click away from this entry without gaining something from it?

But as I sit down to write this, I’m thinking of the other moms of quirky kids who read my blog; all three or four of you. Or maybe there are more (I hope) of you lurking, which is FINE. (Although my blogging ego loves a comment so if you ever feel inspired to say hey, I’m out here too, go for it.)

I have no other way of connecting to other parents like me than here. Even though I live in a city with a greater area population of more than half a million people, it’s as if I am walking among foreigners, speaking a language they don’t understand.

If I spoke in terms of sensory integration disorder, pervasive development disorder, social impairment, Aspergers, disorder, dysfunction, disorder, disorder, I would speak a language recognized by many different support groups and networks where I live.

But since I speak of giftedness, creativity, multiple intelligences, higher meaning, introversion, and intuition, my words tumble to the ground, seen but not heard, and then swiftly erased by the herd as it stampedes around me.

Oh no, my alien dialect done spooked the herd!

I know there has to be other moms here like me, others I could relate to and share and vent with. But I think we’ve been trained by society to keep our mouths shut. The strange looks that imply you’re in denial, the blank look that says okaaaayyy, the heated disagreements with professionals, the number of times we have to defend our kid, only to do it again and again and again.

I rarely share my perspectives on raising a quirky kid to people in real life any more. Hell, I rarely share that my kid is somehow different than typical. I can’t share his uncommon gifts without appearing to brag. I can’t share his unique challenges without being put under the microscope.

I don’t suppose parents like me were ever really able to talk about these things much, though now with the hysteria over any deviation in childhood development, it feels harder. I wish I could go back and take away every discussion I had with a doctor about his out-of-control temper as a toddler, his hypersensitive hearing, his hypersensitive touch, his appearance of social withdrawal, his obsession with hot wheels/Thomas the Train/sharks/marine science. Would their ignorance be my bliss?

Even though I have learned all of those traits are characteristics of gifted children and have gained a new (and different) understanding of how those traits actually work together for the gifted child’s higher good, my hours and hours of research, my self-taught knowledge doesn’t matter. At least to professionals. All they see is what they are trained to see – disease and dysfunction.

I don’t want to defend again (and again and again) how my son doesn’t have Aspergers, or sensory integration, or ADHD, or what the fuck ever the media wants to obsess over that week.

There are a select few people in real life, maybe two or three, that I’ll share the special parenting challenges I face, bounce off my ideas, ask for advice, or even just vent to.

For the rest, I try to pretend to be your average parent.

So I continue building a reservoir inside myself. Hope springs eternal, so they say. For me, it springs internal. I retreat into myself, my home, and my select few people.

I slowly build a collection of books that support my beliefs so I can turn to them and remind myself yet again I am on the right path when the outside world tells me I’m not. Not that it matters to Them that I’ve done my research. That hasn’t changed. But it matters to me, so I do it. I read, collect, read again, collect some more.

Instead of vibrators with beads and knobby shafts, I have a nightstand drawer devoted to print-outs and pamphlets and tidbits of information I’ve gleaned here and there on raising gifted kids. The contents literally spill over when I open it.

That drawer, my bookcase reaffirms my path and helps me carry on. These things are my rosary beads, this blog is my confessional, and my few confidants my ministers.

It is very much like a religion – faith is the only thing that gets me through.

Note: I have NO idea where this came from. I sat down to write a post on when to fire your doctor. And this came out instead. Weird, this little, insecure Heather. I seriously considered not letting her see the public light of day, because really, who is that voice?! Not me! Oh, no, no, no. I don’t have such self-pity moments! (ahem) But then I wonder, if I did let her out, would the light help her heal?

So the latest mommy blogger angst that has everyone gnashing their teeth while girdling their loins is about PR and blog ethics. Or is it free products and FTC regulation? Or liars and soothsayers? Hell, there’s even something about the energy crisis in there. I keep hearing about a blackout so I’m a bit confused.

I admit I haven’t closely followed this most recent knicker bunching because, frankly, I become bored reading about it. I mean, my husband works in advertising and PR so you have no idea how much of this I already pretend to listen to every night at the dinner table. My talent for feigning interest is reserved for my husband. You can’t accuse me of having my priorities mixed up.

Maybe this makes me an uninformed blogger, maybe it makes me a blogger with just enough of a life outside the computer to say – can we all get over ourselves a little? I’m not really sure which.

I’m confident my blog will survive the energy crisis blackout, but I’m not sure if it will survive if I go against some popular mommy bloggers by not mindlessly agreeing to a sidebar badge proclaiming my integrity.

Obviously this bugs me – this idea of having to publicly declare my honesty. The way I see it, if I have to visually assure you in my sidebar of my integrity, then it’s a lost cause.

The only person who needs to feel secure in my integrity is myself and I don’t need a badge to remind me. As long as I feel secure in my honesty so will you, my lovely reader, and we can all click away from my blog happy and aesthetically pleased by the uncluttered sidebar.

So no, no badges saying I’m not a two-faced lying whore who uses her keyboard to perform dishonest consumer mind-control tricks. Besides, my karma and charisma are so forceful I don’t need one.

The one time I did come face-to-face with a PR rep interested in mommy bloggers, I was a little tipsy during a blog conference cocktail party and I just had to tell him all about the benefits and usage of silicone menstrual cups.

When the inebriated conversation was over, he asked (perhaps jokingly) that I not mention their company on my blog. So now I can only say I don’t pack Fiddle Freddie Sack Cakes in my kids’ lunch boxes because they contain high fructose corn syrup.

People, learn from me. This is how you build good blog karma and avoid unnecessary sidebar badges. Talk about your period to perfect strangers while drunk. PR people won’t touch you and your integrity will be as safe as a virgin’s hymen in a nunnery.

I was ready to record my video job application for the Island Reef Job two weeks ago. I wrote a kick ass script. And rewrote it. Again and again, until it was perfect.

I checked out the competition, watching a few dozen video applications, which caused me to promptly fell asleep. Clearly my video would kick their ass.

I saw people showing off their buff, sleek bodies in swimsuits, as if I were jealous cared. And talking like they are all sorts of more qualified than me with their exotic world travels and EMT/Lifeguard experience.  Finally, I was like, to hell with y’all! You should be scared of me!

Thanks to my marine biology prodigy, I know if a cone snail stings you (if you can call it a sting. It’s more like a tiny harpoon injection) you’re pretty much dead before you even know you’ve been hit. What good is an EMT for that?

I’m all about prevention. I know what one looks like and can instruct you to STAY THE HELL AWAY FROM IT, even though its shell is oh-so-pretty.

What’s more, I know what a blue-ring octopus looks like (it will kill you), a sea snake (kill you!), and a box jelly fish (super kill you!) – all of which are found around Australia. My preventative message is you should pretty much stay the hell out of Australian waters.

Which brings me to the point of this whole post.

I won’t be applying for this dream job.

(can you hear the collective sigh of relief from the competition?)

We were in the car, heading down to Dauphin Island to the aquarium to film my “I got the smarts” segment of the application, when Payton burst into tears.

“I can’t leave Gabby!” (Gabby is his 4-year-old calico cat)

“What are you talking about?”

“We can’t move to Australia for six months! I can’t leave Gabby! Who will take care of our cats? Who will take care of my fish tank? waaaahhhhhh! I just want to visit on vacation, not live there! Waaaaahhhh!”

I swear to god, I need to move to Hollywood instead and have Payton kick Freddie Highmore’s ass at the Oscars because, dramatically speaking, he could.

“But Payton, Grandma would take care of our cats for six months.”

This? Is a total lie. Grandma travels on her job and is gone for two weeks at a time. My sister is mean and cruel to animals, no way would she take them. My dad, well, let’s just say my sister got it from somewhere.

What would we do with our pets?

Parker has never been on board with the idea of entering this contest, bursting out in tears himself every time I mentioned it. Have you ever seen Robert Redford’s famous blue eyes cry a torrent of anguished tears? No? Then you cannot understand my plight.

And then there is Wally’s job. He finally has the job he always wanted and is actually in charge of people. He can’t just up and take a six month leave of absence. He would have to quit, which would mean we’d have to sell our house and then move away from Mobile because there isn’t another agency of the same level here.

So we’d have to move away from the coast with no guarantee we’d relocate along another coast. That means leaving behind the Sea Lab, which has some of the most awesome people who help us support Payton’s gift with marine science.

How many other places would let an eight year old be a docent?

I’m pretty sure this is how life goes on, each day just like another. Dreams sound so wonderful when you talk about them, but then reality (that term is used loosely, as always on this blog) creeps in in the way of children who don’t want to go, spouse careers, and marine biology opportunities that are already in your lap.

Life’s a gamble, so they say. But I keep finding myself playing the safe hand and I’m not sure if I like that.

So I ask myself, what does it mean to live?

Does it mean having exotic adventures? World travel? Eating snails in France?

Or does it mean being present and aware, no matter where you are, even if it’s Alabama?

I’m not sure I know the answer, but there is such a thing as being too comfortable no matter where you are.

It’s time to get uncomfortable. I feel the need for a new adventure, even if it isn’t a chance to move across the world to live on a tropical island for six months.

I’m going to make Wally call about getting his vasectomy reversed.

(I didn’t specify who would be uncomfortable.)

I watched the inauguration on Tuesday.  For an apoliticalist like myself, that’s a testament to my boredom to just how big of a historic moment this inauguration was.  It’s such a testament, in fact, that I hope you are sitting down and prepared to be amazed at my forthcoming political commentary and analysis of President Obama’s inaugural address.

This is what I heard President Obama say:

“Blah, blah, blah, pretty words, blah, blah, blah……We will restore science to its rightful place…”

Now, that right there? Got my attention.  Seems like Obama got himself elected on this idea of change and I hope I can interpret that part of his address to mean he will change the No Child Left Behind Act because is there is anything in this country that does more to displace science than that act of legislation?

Can we put science back in its rightful place while future generations spend almost half of their school day on Language Arts and Reading, and science lessons happen maybe every other week?

I don’t think so.

That needs to change if science is to be restored to its rightful place.  And I’m sure President Obama is going to get on that change straightaway because politicians who make it all the way to the White House are never known for speaking pretty, but empty words.  (i.e. “No new taxes”)

Moving on with the address, President Obama had this to say:

“Blah, blah, blah, more pretty words, blah, blah, great metaphor, blah, blah, PEACE, PEACE, PEACE.”

I picked up on a common thread towards the end of his speech and it seems that PEACE is something he’s excited about.

Yay! Me, too!

Yesterday, as I sat in the school parking lot, waiting for school to dismiss, a big-honking Tahoe parked in the spot right beside me.  The mom in the Tahoe had such a friendly attitude of sharing.  She wanted to share her radio with me because she had it SO DAMN LOUD that I could hear it word-for-word through her rolled-up windows and my own.

There was a talk show on at the time discussing the current mortgage crisis, and how banks are refusing to restructure the terms of loans of homeowners in trouble.  The people on the radio thought the banks should offer low interest rates for these about-to-default people.

I could go off on a tangent here of how I think I should be awarded with a lower interest rate just being smart enough to MORTGAGE ONLY WHAT I CAN AFFORD EVEN THOUGH LENDERS WANTED TO GIVE US ABOUT $50,000 MORE.  Don’t I deserve a low rate just for, like, having prodigious skills with a check register, a paycheck and calculator?

But I won’t go off on that tangent.  Insetad, we’re going to talk about titles.

The show had a caller all afire because a reporter somewhere didn’t use the title of “President” but called Barack Obama, um, Barack Obama.  (Because that’s his name.)

This caller had much to say about respect and earning that title and blah, blah, blah, misplaced righteous anger, blah, and every other President had been referred to with the title.

Suddenly, the show took a very, hmmm, let’s call it racial tone. I read the vibes of the radio waves that this caller was attempting to imply it’s because Obama is a black President, though I still say the man is both black and white, so what the fuck ever.

I wanted to tell this caller that during the Clinton/Bush debates of 1990whenever, that I disctinctly remember Bill Clinton referring to then President George H. W. Bush as “Mr. Bush” and not “Presdient Bush.”

100% true.  (and pretty impressive that a) I watched it, being all apolitical and b) that the alcohol hasn’t killed all my memory. I think this proves all the PSAs telling us alcohol kills brains cells are complete lies made up by the government.  I know you’re shocked to find out the government would actually lie to us citizens, but again, 100% true.)

But the host of this show, well, he said they would find out who this reporter was and “blow him up.”

Well fucking hell, that’s violent, I thought.  I wanted to roll down my window and yell at the mom, “Hey! Do you buy that blowing up shit? Isn’t that, like, totally fucked up?!  What would Jesus do?!”  But I didn’t because she had a preschooler with her and might not appreciate a vocabulary lesson from me.

But then, as the host kept talking about “blowing them up,” (because it was his most favorite solution) I figured out “blow them up” is some new slang for “rip a new one” or “snatch you baldheaded.”

But regardless, isn’t that taking it a bit far, blowing people up for not using the title “President” each and every time we talk about Barack Obama?

How does that fit into Obama’s message of peace?

We’re looking towards Obama to bring about change.  Something tells me we should be looking toward ourselves instead.

Do I have to get out of bed?

Do I really have to take a shower, dry my hair, put on make-up, and generally be presentable? Who really cares what I look like?

Do I really have to make breakfast for my kids? Again? Didn’t I do that yesterday, and the day before, and the day before that, and that, and that, that, that, that?

Look. There’s 10,000 loads of laundry that I really should get up and do. But I’d rather lie here on the couch. In these jogging pants. Without a shower. And no make-up.

Do I really have to parent my children? Can’t I just sit here and stare at them until they read the disciplinary thoughts in my head? Otherwise I’d have to get up and act on this misbehavior, and oh, the effort it takes to, you know, get up.

Good god, if I have to clean this kitchen one! more! damn! time!, I’m going to do things to myself with a steak knife that would give Edward a raging hard on.

These are but a few thoughts that have been running willy-nilly in my head lately. I sigh and huff at my kids more than I laugh and smile at them. I yell more than I should. I scream at the boys to shut up. Anger and frustration twist me into something I don’t want to recognize.

How long has this been going on? I don’t know exactly; long enough for me to notice them. Off and on, off and on they go, I’m sure much like they go off and on in other people’s mind.

Usually I’m quick to get over these thoughts since I’m just not the type to stay down long. But this time, they’re lingering and I don’t understand why.

Could I be *gasp* depressed? More than just the normal lows everyone goes though? Clinical depression does run in my family. This could be the start of it for me!

Certified insanity also runs in my family, but clearly we do not need to worry about me being insane. There are no signs whatsoever on this blog that I could be even the tiniest bit insane.

But depression? Is this its fingers creeping crawling into my mind?

For the first time in my life, I seriously began to wonder if heredity was out to get me.

My grandmother was clinically depressed. So much so that doctors recommended shock treatments as the solution. Though certainly, with “modern” medicine, these were a kinder and gentler shock treatment than years past.

Hahahaha! The shit doctors tell you! Electrical currents straight to the brain works wonders, and is kind and gentle! Ha ha!

What’s funnier is the speed in which we’re willing to believe them, even when they say crazy shit like let’s shoot electricity straight into your brain. Honestly, how are you to tell which one is insane? The one behind or in front of the desk?

What if all my grandmother really needed was to not be such a self-absorbed asshat?

The bug was put in my ear a few weeks ago that depression stems from too much self-absorption.  I’ve been pondering the idea since.

(Disclaimer: I am not dismissing someone else’s depression. I try not to freely mock other people’s pain, only my own. All I’m doing is raising the question that maybe there isn’t a history of clinical depression in my family. Maybe it’s a history of self-absorbed assholes instead.)

I think of my grandmother as I knew her, and she lived until I was 31 so, unlike my paternal grandmother who died when I was 8, I’ve the experience of an adult grandchild and I saw things a child wouldn’t.

Nanny never had any friends.  Not a one.  She didn’t socialized, never had a knitting group or the like. She never worked.   She didn’t volunteer her time to any programs or groups.  She stayed home, ran the household (which, hello?, I know is 1400 jobs within itself) and took a weekly outing to the grocery store.

No damn wonder she was depressed.

I think about the weeks where my emotional state was what could be called depressed.

What was I doing?

I was absorbed with myself.

There were no thoughts of others, even my children, other than the resentment of the work I had to do as a mother.

Either I had been sick, or the boys were sick, or there was testing and I missed three weeks in a row of working in Parker’s classroom.   Wally had taken the two most recent shifts at the Sea Lab.

It was all me, me, me.  Oh, and let’s not forget the poor, pitiful me; pitiful because my life pretty much sucked at the time.

Well, whose damn fault is that?

Now, I don’t think throwing myself into mindless busyness is necessarily the answer.  I’m sure underneath the depression there’s something needing to come up.  But I also don’t think sitting and wallowing in the depression is necessarily going to make it come up any faster.

Won’t the issue rise when the time is right for it it rise?

In the meantime, if giving my time to others (or projects, or whatever it I feel I could do, not out of guilt, but of the simple joy of giving) helps save me from a possible future of electric shock treatments, or even psychotropic medication, and gets me through to the right time for the bubble to rise, then why the hell not?

I mean, before doctors prescribe Lexapro, or whatever the current favored antidepressant medication is at the time, do they ask if the patient a self-absorbed jerk? Do they ask how much time you spend thinking of yourself compared to thinking of others?  Or what have you done for someone else lately?

Maybe they should?

I don’t know.  I just know once I heard that statement and began to think and give to others, I started to feel better.

That’s not to say the depressing feeling hasn’t crept back in. I know there’s something I need to deal with, and I think I have a good idea what it is, but I can’t force the answer to come to me right now.  I can’t force the magical solution, though I wish I could.

But in the meantime, I have some other people to think about.

I’m so sorry I left you hanging on Friday with the story of THE PHONE CALL. Right now, I wish I hadn’t posted on Friday because I myself am tired of the in-law story.

Le yawn.

But I hate to not follow through on something I started. It’s a pet peeve of mine, really, not following through on something I said I’d do, so I’ll try to write this in a way that doesn’t make you le yawn also. I’ll do us both a favor and shorten this to only the enlightened half of the conversation, leaving the sad part out for now.

And watch how I sneak religious talk in here. You know what they say about that and politics. Controversy and in-law angst all in one post!

While my conscience, aka Susan, uses the Paradoxical Commandments as a sort of compass while playing this human game, that’s not all my conscience is about.

Oh no! We could never ever live by one creed alone. That would be boring and dull and very dogmatic. We are the anti-Dogma (not to be confused with the anti-Christ.)

My conscience (or Susan) is a potpourri of wisdom. Not only do we pull from these Commandments (not to be confused with the Ten) and quantum physics, but we use pretty much any teaching that lends to the wisdom of humanity, and this can include The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People.

When faced with a sticky situation, Susan often advises me to seek first to understand, then be understood. Like the Paradoxical Commandments, I find this idea appealing, however, there are times (like these) when I must modify it.

Before I called my MIL, I made myself the strongest screwdriver in the history of the world. I knew this was a delicate phone call and I needed my wits but the nonchalant air one strong cocktail brings me.

Me: I’m confused. I don’t understand the problem with Parker’s birthday party.

Her: Problem? There’s no problem except the pond isn’t anywhere to hold a party. The bathroom there is awful, there’s no where to sit, it’s a complete mess out there, there’s no shelter, what if it rains? It’s an embarrassment, really.

Me: Really?

Her: I swear, I swear, I swear that’s all there is to that. It has nothing to do with anyone. I swear.

I’m paraphrasing, of course. Already, this post is too long for late November, the God-forsaken month known as NaBloPoMo. Who wants to read super long posts when your Google reader reaches out to choke you every single time you open it?

This quick into the phone call, I have two options:

A) I can give her the benefit of the doubt and believe that’s all there is to it.

Or?

B) I can look back at history and count the number of times she’s denied there was a problem when there really was one, and believe she’s a lying hag who hasn’t changed a bit.

If I choose A, I could feel warm and fuzzy on the inside. And isn’t that how good people feel on the inside, warm and fuzzy?

If I choose B, it fucks with all sorts of beliefs. This is where studying quantum physics mixed with spirituality gets fun because it makes you own your shit. You create your own reality and you know what that means? I’m creating this reality with my MIL for my human self.

Even Jesus talked quantum physics, but back then it was called Matthew 9:29 and not quantum physics. It is done unto you as you believe = create your own reality. Tada! Quantum physics straight from the Bible.

Honestly, I can’t understand the separation of science and religion? It’s right there in the book.

Choosing option B, I would fall back to the old idea that people can’t change. Do you know what that means? It means you and I can’t change either and we’re still the know-it-all asses we were in our early 20′s.

Now, I know I’ve changed over the years, so that puts a big fail whale in option B, unless we consider the unprovable but interesting quantum possibility of split universes and half dead cats in a box.

See, just like religion, quantum physics has many unanswered questions. And dear reader, I can hear your questions now…

Not all people are capable of change, right? You may have changed, but what if the in-laws haven’t? Or you may have both changed, but the change could be in different directions? Say, a direction to another semi-parallel universe?

Yes, dear reader, those are all valid questions. But I have a new question to add in the mix.

What if I’m the only one who has to change?

If nothing is real until it is observed, then me changing my observation will change the observed.

Wait. Was that all sorts of crazy that just farted out of my brain straight to the keyboard?

Oops, I’ve really fucked up now, letting you into the vast depths of my brain. Let’s back up so I can eat my words and then simplify them into something more sane-sounding.

What I’ve learned so far is that deep, deep down, I must wish to see less phone calls in the world. My MIL said they would call us back about Parker’s party, but we’ve yet to hear from them. There’s still time, I suppose, so I’ll keep holding my naive breath just a little longer.

P.S. I was completely sober the entire time I wrote this post.

P.P.S. That one sentence above is probably scarier than this entire post, isn’t it?

Have you heard about our new President? His name is Obama and apparently this is some kind of a historic moment for our country; one that will change history and supposedly unite our country once again.

I have just one question, though.

How in the hell do we expect one man to unite an entire nation when we can’t even unite with our own families?

Because, really? If you read the comments, there’s some serious non-united family crap going on.

There were many opinions (which I did ask for and you were kind, so thank you!) that I stay out of the in-law business and let Wally handle it. I have just one thing to say to that.

Boo!

People, it’s obvious I am all up Wally’s ass with this reunited-and-it-feels-so-good family mantra for the GOOD OF OUR COUNTRY! I’m making Obama’s job easier for him.

Right here? Right at this point in the story I started writing two weeks ago but didn’t finish? This is where my moral high horse bucks me off and I come *this close* to a landing face first in pile of bullshit.

I thought I was wrong, oh so wrong, to believe things could be different. I thought I would have to revert to using the word “ass-laws” again. But that’s putting it politely. I really thought things that included words like ‘motherfucking assholes’ and other curse words that start with a ‘c,’ which I won’t utter here.

What? As few as they are, I actually have some writing standards on my blog.

To make a long story as short as I can, I’ll forgo creative writing and tell it like it is:

Parker’s birthday is the week following Thanksgiving. Since our entire family, Wally’s sister included, would be gathered in the same town during Thanksgiving, we plan to have his birthday party while there. It would be the first opportunity my sister-in-law has ever had to attend one of her nephew’s birthdays.

My sister-in-law announced she would be too tired to attend. I love how these people predict the future, don’t you? They know an entire two weeks ahead how they are going to feel on a certain day. It’s amazing!

My father-in-law announced he didn’t want to attend. I don’t remember the reason except that it was total bullshit and I’m pretty sure it involved not wanting to be around my family. Because all my family has ever done to them is accept and love their son.

My mother-in-law actually wanted to come.

Wally and I are ever resourceful, so we worked around FIL’s excuses and asked to have Parker’s party out on their land, which has a stocked pond. We made the party a wienie roast/bonfire party. The boys love to spend time out on the pond and Parker was excited to have his party there.

Father-in-law says yes, we can do that, so we proceed with plans.

But then, a week later? He tells Wally we can’t have the party there. Again, there were bullshit reasons such as they didn’t do parties like this for Wally and his sister and being too tired from cleaning house. Again with the future predictions. It’s amazing! Clearly my in-laws are not familiar with the current over-the-top birthday parties of my generation and can’t appreciate how very toned down and simple this party is.

When Wally says, “Fine, we’ll move it to Heather’s sister’s house,” there is immediate balking on FIL’s part. Something about a road they won’t go down. I’m not really sure BECAUSE ALL I HEARD IN MY HEAD WERE MORE COLORFUL CURSE WORD COLLECTIONS!

I wanted to shoot my moral high horse in the head I was that angry. How dare these *insert colorful curse word collection here* treat not just Wally, but our son this way. HOW DARE THEY! WHAT KIND OF *more colorful curse word* GRANDPARENT DOESN’T WANT TO GO TO THEIR GRANDCHILD’S BIRTHDAY PARTY?

And worse? I thought I’d been a naive fool to believe it could be different. I thought this is the end of the relationship. Mostly, I thought that because that’s what Wally said over and over after that phone call.

Dear reader, this is where I was sorely tempted to follow the advice some of you gave. This is where I was ready to relinquish the idea that we could somehow mend this rift, and the spend the rest of my days resenting these people.

If I stacked up the reasons, I’d be well justified to do just that.

The only problem is that I actually do have a conscience and it’s name is Susan.

Susan frequently brings up the Paradoxical Commandments to me. (see her comment) Something about those commandments ring true, as least as true as things can get when you study quantum physics as part of your religion.

I reread those commandments, and then I did the exact opposite of what so many people tell me to do.

I stuck my nose right into the big pile of bullshit.

I called my mother-in-law.

It was the saddest yet most enlightening conversation I’ve had with her.

Stay tuned for the rest of the story.