Girl Interrupted

"All the stock I had was a white girl's education and a face that enchanted the men of both races.

Starvation danced with me." 
 Fenton Johnson

So...what's next?

Ten years ago I worked as an Administrative Assistant in the Career Services Department at New England School of Law. I helped the third year law students with their resumes; I helped the first and second year students schedule interviews with on-campus recruiters; and I helped my office mates by bringing them Dunkin's and keeping both their calendars and their knowledge of Lost up-to-date.  

I loved my job.

I lived in a house in Dorchester with my best friend Maggie and her twin daughters, Catarina and Monica. On Friday nights, we stayed up late watching Sister Sister, Full House and whatever movies we had rented from Blockbuster. 

I loved our home.

My friends and I spent weekends eating veggie nachos at The Blarney Stone or getting drunk off our asses at Hong Kong, before settling in at Good Times to watch the Pats play the Colts, the Steelers or any other marquee matchup of the day. 

I loved my life.

And then, on a dare, I signed up for Match.com, met Lorenzo, and the rest is history.

That was ten years ago.

I haven't worked outside of the home since.

Because my new job was to take care of Lorenzo and Amira and in so doing, I managed to forget all about me.

This story's not original, you've heard it a million times before, but it's MY story and it's the one I'm currently examining in an effort to determine what comes next.

Because I need to make sure that no matter where my life takes me, I never again put my own dreams on the back burner for so long that I start to forget ever having had a dream in the first place.

When we first met, Lorenzo was a teacher and though he cared about his students, he had become increasingly disheartened by school policy. When he got the opportunity to join the fire department he jumped at the chance and I watched my self-described "lazy as fuck" boyfriend work his ass off to earn his place on the squad.

I was SO proud of him.

And that's what I want for myself. 

To find something I can be proud of and passionate about. 

I want to wake up every morning, excited to start my day.

I want the world to be a richer place because I am in it.

I have a couple of ideas so far.

I'll let you know how it all pans out.

Change of Address

"The journey of a thousand miles begins with one step."

Or with slime, Lao Tzu.

Sometimes the journey begins with slime.

I'm not sure how things go down at your house, but at the Brewington/Douglas residence, not a day goes by in which I'm not having a slime-related argument with my 9 year old.

"Amira, stop playing with that slime and come and eat!"

"Amira, stop using all of my Tupperware on slime!"

"Amira, turn off the slime videos, pick up a book, and read!"

Today was no exception.  

As I sat in our dining room-cum-bedroom reading a book, Amira sat beside me, playing with what I thought was a rubber ball. I was wrong. Mere seconds after picking it up, Amira poked a hole into this toy and watched helplessly as green slime oozed all over our bed sheets.

"Whoops, sorrrryyyyyy!" she exclaimed, stifling a small giggle as I lifted my head up to Jesus, closed my eyes for a moment and took a deep breath before answering her. "It's ok, it's ok" I muttered. "But get up so I can change these sheets."

After stripping the sheets off of the futon, I realized that the slime had seeped right through the thin mattress that Amira and I have been sleeping on for the past 21 months.

But instead of flipping the mattress over, or allowing it to air dry, I dragged it from its wooden frame and let it lie on the floor.

And then I did something that shocked me as much as it shocked Amira.

After examining the frame for less than a minute, I adjusted the screws and folded the futon back into a reclining position.

Amira stared at the now sofa in shock.

"Mama, what are you doing?"

 "It's time, Babe. It's time to go back to our bedrooms and our big, comfy beds."

"What!?" She exclaimed. "But Mama..."

"And if you're not ready to go back to your own room yet, that's okay, you can sleep in my room with me. But we can't sleep in the dining room anymore, Amira, because it's time."

I let the rest of that sentence go unsaid as we both knew what I meant. Time to unhitch ourselves from the fantasy of our lives ever going back to "normal". Time to accept reality and start moving forward again. And for a first step, we didn't have that far to go. Just a few feet down the hall to my bedroom, which is where I sit right now, listening to Amira snoring peacefully beside me.

And believing that we may actually have a chance at getting through this thing after all.

Postmortem

Dear Lorenzo,

It's 6:37 p.m. Saturday evening and I just finished a lackluster dinner of grilled tofu and marinated mushroom salad. Amira is sitting in the dining room watching My Babysitter's A Vampire on Netflix and outside, Spring appears to have FINALLY come out of hibernation. At almost 7 p.m., darkness has not yet descended down upon us. Temperatures are no longer frigid, children have shed their Winter gear and are playing at Schreiber in light jackets and gym shoes at long last. Winter is over and on Tuesday, I will sign Amira up for Summer camp through the Parks District website.

We will never again spend endless hours in the Highlander, making the trek from Chicago, to Atlanta, to Boston and back home to Chicago again. And Amira and I won't do what we did during the past two Summers since you've been gone. We will not hop on a plane to Boston just as soon as school lets out. I will not park myself on my mother's couch, or my best friend's couch, numbing myself with television and Chinese take-out.

I am ready to start making a life for myself without you.

By the time I was in junior high I knew that I would never get married. It wasn't just my parents's perfectly pleasant divorce that had brought me to that conclusion. (If two people who were such great friends couldn't make a marriage work, I figured I wouldn't have a shot in hell either. ) It was...the absolute certainty in what I wanted out of life that made marriage so undesirable to me. My goal was to be beholden to no one. If I wanted to move to California at 25, I could do so (and I did). If I wanted to vacation in Mexico, or Jamaica, or Timbukfuckingtu, no one would be there to stand in my way. My only limits would be the restraints of my wallet and my imagination, not the guilt trip laid on me by a husband and house full of children.

I had a pretty fucked up view of relationships.

Falling in love with you came as a complete (and not entirely welcome) surprise. After our first conversation, I knew immediately that my time was up; I was head over heels for you before we even met in person. As far as I was concerned, I was screwed; my dreams of a life spent in solitary leisure now over.

We were opposites in many, many ways. While I dreamed of travelling the world (or at least the Caribbean) with my girlfriends and a carry-on filled with little more than sunscreen and chick lit, you dreamed of a wife and a bevy of babies, flat screen tv's in every corner of your house, an elaborate surveillance system and a white picket fence protecting all you held most dear.

But...in spite of (or maybe because of, who knows?) our many differences, we fell in love.  I don't think either of us truly realized just how different we were until Amira was born and the realities of parenthood set it. What I do know is that we loved each other. And though neither of us was perfect we truly, truly tried to make it work.

We both compromised A LOT. Not happily and I regret that now. I wish with all my heart I'd been able to give you everything you wanted, with as cheerful a heart as I could muster, in as cheerful a manner as you deserved. I resented you a lot of the time, Babe. I resented how much of myself I lost in trying to please you. I gave up WAY too much of myself (we both did) in an attempt to make us happy and one of my biggest fears is that...you weren't. And what sucks the most about that is that no matter how much I may have resented you, if I had the chance, I'd do it ALL over again. I'd roll the dice and take another chance on us cuz YOU were the only man I'd ever met who was worth all the compromise. I pray you felt the same way about me.

I'm moving on now, Lorenzo. Not because I want to but because you're gone and I don't have a choice.  I'm moving on now, not to another man (that thought is still so fucking depressing to me) but to another LIFE.

For all my complaints and resentment, the truth of the matter is, you kept me safe in a lot of different ways. But now it's up to me to venture forth and figure out who I am again without you calling so many of the shots. And I'm ready.

I hope, I pray, that you knew how much I loved you, how much I love you still. You used to always tell me that you knew but...I wish I'd done a better job of SHOWING you just how much you meant to me. I let motherhood get in our way A LOT. I was wrong for that and I hope you can forgive me. I hope you know that I truly didn't know any better. I hope you know that I feel blessed to have gotten to share eight years of my life with you. I hope you know I'd do it all over again.

Get Up

"I know you're down, but when you gonna get up?"

Amel Larrieux 

NOW.

Finally, the answer is now.

My 8 year-old daughter's schedule is more jam-packed than mine has ever been.  In addition to school she takes theater classes, two hours a day, four days a week.  On Saturday mornings she takes hip-hop and on Saturday afternoons, improv.  In a few weeks she'll return to swimming on Sundays and her hectic schedule won't get any lighter until school ends and theater camp begins.

Amira wouldn't have it any other way.

When she first started taking theater I told her that if her grades slipped, she wouldn't be able to continue these after school activities. 

She got all A's.

The only time she misses a class is when her asthma flares up and she can't get out of bed. She works her ass off because she LOVES what she's doing and it shows.

At 8 years old, she has more passion for life than I have ever had.

She has determination, focus and drive.

I lost my way a long, long time ago.

My passions, my interests were never cultivated.  Not by me or anybody else. Simply put, life was different back then. Our parents worked their asses off to make sure we had food, clothes, and a home. If we were healthy, happy, well-educated kids then they had done their jobs.

And my mother and father? They damn sure did theirs. I couldn't have asked for a happier childhood but...at 43 years old...as a single mom who is currently doing little more than surviving...I want more.

The way my daughter feels about acting and dancing is how I want to feel everyday.

I don't know where the answers lie but I know where they are not.

On my couch.

I'm finally ready to get up.

 

Sick And Tired

I am sick and tired of being sick and tired.

I feel like crap.

Not every day, not every other day, but often enough that it's become a real problem for me.

I take antidepressants to make it through the day.

I take sleeping pills to make it through the night.

There are days in which I still have trouble getting off of the couch.

There are days in which I barely eat.

There are days in which I eat everything in sight.

I believe that there's a lot of shame surrounding the grieving process. It's human nature to want to protect the people we care about and so those of us who are truly in the depths of despair don't talk about it. We don't share with people what we're going through. We suffer in silence.

We suffer.

I don't want to suffer anymore. That's a big part of why I started this blog. Writing has always been therapeutic for me and I truly believe that we're only as sick as our secrets. 

I refuse to be sick anymore.

As my daughter would say, this blog is about to get real.  :-)

Another Goodbye

I lost a friend today although, admittedly, friend is much too strong of a word to describe our relationship. What lies between friend and acquaintance? I'm not sure; all I know is that he was one of us. One of the good guys. And this is the only way I know to say goodbye.

Two weeks ago a parent at my daughter's school suffered a massive heart attack. A parent I've talked to every single school day for the past 4 years. A parent who stood beside me on the playground as we watched our children run and climb and wrestle each other into the dirt. A parent who always had a kind word for those around him. A parent who never failed to make me smile. 

I prayed for him every day for the past two weeks. I prayed that his wife would never know the pain that I'm experiencing. I prayed that his children would have much longer with their father than my daughter had with hers. I prayed that he would make a miraculous recovery and that in a few short weeks he'd be back on the playground, talking to Blythe and I about what tattoos we want him to design for us. Unfortunately, my prayers and the prayers of countless others did not come to fruition. 

When she is ready, I will offer my support to his wife. I will offer to pick up her son from school, to cook dinner for her family, and to sit with her when she doesn't want to be alone. I will give her my copy of Option B, by Sheryl Sandberg, and tell her how much it helped me. I will give her the name and number of my therapist if she wants it. I will let her know that she can call or text me day and night.

As so many others have done for me, I will let her know that I am here.

Fall

Dear Lorenzo:

It's finally Fall.

Last week we were hit with a heatwave.  It was hot enough for us to keep the windows closed and the air conditioner on all day.  Hot enough for me to sleep under just one comforter instead of the three you always complained about. Hot enough that I began to seriously wonder whether or not I was going through the Change.

But after a week of that hellfire, Fall has finally arrived. Football season is back in full swing, Halloween decorations abound, and pumpkin flavored everything has invaded both Dunkins and Starbucks.

You loved Fall; it was your favorite season. I hated Fall because it seemed little more than a precursor to the cold. I remember the first time you came to visit me; it was Fall 2007 and you refused to sleep under my many blankets and comforters. "How can you sleep like this?" You asked. "I can't sleep any other way" I replied but you ignored my pleas and threw all but one blanket on the floor. "Don't worry" you insisted, "I've got you, I'll keep you warm."

And that's what you did for almost 10 years.

I took Amira to hip hop class today. Afterwards, we went to lunch at the Chicago Diner, then to Target to get her the slime she's been begging for for the last three months. By the time we got home it was early evening and when I went to grab my robe from the radiator where I'd last flung it, I was shocked to see that the heat was on. Apparently, the temperature in my bedroom had dipped so low that the heat had automatically kicked on. In lieu of the baggy shorts I wore all summer long, I'm currently wearing one of your old Bob Marley shirts, pajama pants, winter socks and my robe. In a moment, I'll make myself a cup of warm tea before getting more blankets for my bed.

Fall has just begun and I'm already feeling the cold.

I wish you were still here to keep me warm.