dress attempt three

A little redesign, trying to get the pleats to lay better by starting out with wider straps, and also eliminating the wrap effect.

dress attempt two

This is just attempt one trimmed and sewn, so no major changes of improvements. 

dress attempt one

It's been a minute.

     It's been 5 years since I posted anything here. Longer since I posted anything of substance. Last you all knew, I was happily married to Tom, Ryan was probably in high school, I had 2 young sons, and I think we may have just bought the house. My mother's death was a fresh wound but other than that life was good.  And for most of the time since, it has been good. 

     During covid my oldest son let us know that she was actually my youngest daughter and Rose has thrived since. She's entering her senior year in high school next month. Danny will be a junior and despite a freshman year riddled with health problems and surgery (hyperemesis and eventual gall bladder removal), he's doing great. And they both love the cool new substitute science teacher, mostly because it's their sister.   I hear all of this on Tuesdays, which is when they come over for pizza and cards, although it's rare for all 3 to actually show up.

     Tom and I split 3 years ago. I couldn't convince myself that things were good anymore and he refused to see a problem until it was too late. We tried couple's counseling and although it helped tremendously,  it was too late. But I've moved on and I'm currently working in a plastics factory and engaged to a wonderful man named Mike, who was a friend before any of this crap started. We rent a 4 bedroom house together, although 2 of the rooms sit furnished and empty most of the time, as the kids prefer to stay at their dad's with their computers and online lives. I miss them so much but I refuse to guilt them with it. The fourth bedroom is my sewing room and I absolutely love it. I've made I dont know how many quilts and quilt tops and my current project is trying to teach myself enough tailoring to design and make my wedding dress. 

     And that's why I've started the blog back up. I want to track my progress. I'll be uploading pictures and hopefully when I'm done, I'll have my perfect dress, or at least something I'm not embarrassed to wear. Wish me luck!

Stay At Home Moms

I'd like to point out that there's a difference between a housewife and a stay at home mom. Just like there's a difference between a housekeeper and a nanny.  That said, I've been a SAHM for 18 years. I'm glad I have the time to run errands, clean, do the laundry, because that stuff has to be done anyway and lord knows it often falls more on the mom than the dad. Not always because of gender roles, often it's because the woman has higher standards for how things should be done.  But I also realize that I haven't paid into social security for 18 years, which will hurt when I file for it. And I have no 401k or pension. I have a huge gap in my employment history and am not up to date with what most jobs require. (This is why alimony exists, btw.) I don't know if I'll ever be able to work a real job again. My kids have issues I have to take them to appointments for, the school calls me a couple times a month to go pick up someone because they're sick, and it's not always possible to schedule everything after 4pm. I have to be here to get my kids to school and drive them home in the afternoon, the weekend is the only time I really get to spend with my family due to my husband's late work hours and the kids' homework and activities. So I'd need a job from 8:30-2:30, weekdays only, that doesn't mind me leaving for sick kids or appointments. With no experience, training, or even work history required. I spend the time my kids are in karate class at a bar act the street from the dojo, having the only adult conversation I ever get with anyone other than my husband. But honestly, I love my life. Even when I'm in a mood or feel depressed I recognize that I have a wonderful family that I not only love but also like, a strong and happy marriage of 18 years, a nice house, and we're not only financially stable but also have a decent savings built up. And I think part of what helps my marriage be strong and happy is that I don't have a bunch of work stress, I don't have resentment from splitting housework, and I don't need to worry about losing a job or making my kid sit in the nurse's office for a day when the school calls me that one needs to come home. And I do have a job, just not a paid one. I clean the house my way and the family knows to stay out of my way and where to put the dirty dishes, laundry, mending, etc. I know which stores have the cheaper things so when I do the shopping I save money by going to 3 or 4 places, because I have the time to do that. I have my systems to keep the house running smoothly and keep track of everyone's obligations. I'm a housekeeper, a nanny, a chauffeur, a personal shopper, a therapist, and an executive assistant. All for free. And my husband appreciates this. In fact, I have more life insurance than he does because if he dies we get survivor's benefits and his 401k but if I die he gets little to none of that, plus he has to quit his job and find one where he's not leaving at 5am and getting home at 7pm.

My Secrets To A Happy Marriage

Disclaimer: these are things that keep my marriage strong. Your marriage is between you and your spouse and you need to do things that work for you. 

Commitment, which unfortunately includes putting up with stuff you might not put up with from someone you weren't married to. When old married couples say, "we fixed things when they broke rather than throw them away," that means they put up with stuff long enough to find a compromise or resolution.  

Communication. No one can read minds. Reading between the lines, picking up on signals, taking hints, or "if you loved me, I wouldn't have to tell you," all lead to disaster. Just blurt shit out. "I don't like when you..." "I need ... from you." "I want to ..."

Honesty. If a marriage is going to last, you can't lie a lot. For one thing, you'll trip up and get caught. But for another, you'll resent feeling like you have to lie. They're not your parent, they're your partner. If the consequences of doing something aren't worth it, just don't do it. 

Politeness. Don't be rude just because you're in your own house. It's a shared home and it's theirs too. Say please and thank you. Try to minimize burps and farts. Warn them when you've destroyed the bathroom (and light a candle). 

Compliment them. Their outfit, the dinner they made, their new haircut. And if there's nothing particular right now to compliment, just tell them how lucky you are to have them. If they're struggling, compliment them more. For one thing, it's nice to hear compliments. But for another, positive motivation works much better than negative motivation. "I noticed you cleaned the kitchen, it looks really good," will get the kitchen cleaned more than, "Could you clean the kitchen more, it's filthy." 

Trust. Make a conscious decision to trust the person. Most suspicions come from personal insecurities rather than actual suspicious behavior. Let him have female friends. Let her have male friends. If someone else flirts with your partner, trust your partner. Or if you must say something to the flirter, try, "I saw you talking to my spouse. I can't blame you for flirting -- believe me I see why you would -- but there's no point. (S)he's married and we don't have an open marriage."  And set realistic boundaries. In a lifelong marriage they WILL find someone else attractive, probably lots of people. It's unreasonable to expect them not to. It is reasonable to expect them not to act on it, and not to tell you about it, and to try to be discreet. But if you have a beautiful friend he's going to know they're beautiful. You can either hassle your partner and drive them away or decide to trust them. If they're going to cheat, they're going to cheat. Being suspicious and jealous and forbidding friendships has never kept someone from cheating. But it has pushed people to it.

things I love, for me

1. Neil Hillborn poetry

2. Skinny jeans, but not cropped or ankle. I like long jeans.

3. Ac/dc. I like almost every song they've done. 

4. Snug ankle socks. In winter, snug crew socks. Thick ones.

5. That one style Victoria Secret bra, in beige and black and red. Beige for every day. Black for when the straps will show. Red to be a hint for Tom.

6. Basil plants. I always love having a renewable source of basil

7. Massage! Gift certificates for massage are WONDERFUL!!!!

8. Tattoos

9. Getting my hair done 

10. John Sandford books

11. Clear sodas

12. Coors Light Draft

13. Nailhead trim 

14. Garden gnomes, but the British kind with faces, not the Swedish ones with just a hat and a nose

15. Long sleeved, ankle length, cotton nightgowns. The grandma kind with lace trim and ruffles

16. Houseplants

17. Writing long comments on Reddit and Quora

18. Journaling

19. Ramones tee shirts

20. 3/4 length sleeves

21. The kind of shirts that the lady on the cop show who the cops go to talk to and she's working in her garden and stands up, takes off her gardening gloves, and wipes her hands on her pants before asking them why they're there wears. (Oddly specific, I know.) 

22. Watching TV with Tom and he lays down with his head in my lap

23. Mail order weed gummies 

gender studies

Gender is not sex and sex is not gender. Basically, sex is the role that a body would play in reproduction, to fertilize or to be fertilized. This is how we can say that male seahorses are the ones who get pregnant, because pregnancy is unrelated to sex as a biological concept the female seahorse carries the eggs, the male carries the sperm, it's just that the male carries the fertilized eggs to term. To be blunt, SHE ejaculates into HIM.  So, that's what sex is, and not everyone falls into those 2 categories. Basic, that is to say simplistic and incomplete, biology tells us that there are 2 sex chromosomes, X and Y. Females have XX and males have XY. Simple right? Well, usually.

For people with Turner Syndrome, there is only one and it is X. Babies are born with external female genitalia but have no ovaries and therefore do not grow breasts or menstruate.  For people with Klinefelter Syndrome, there are 3 sex chromosomes, XXY. These babies are born appearing to be male but do not develop normally. Manifestations of Klinefelter Syndrome include undersized testicles, faint or non-existent body and facial hair, abnormally soft skin, and breast development. Five alpha-reductase 2 deficiency occurs when an XY fetus does not respond to testosterone in the womb and therefore appears to be female at birth, but upon puberty does respond to testosterone and develops as any other male. So you have a baby girl and then 13 years later she grows chest hair, her voice drops, and her clitoris grows into as much of a penis as it can at that point. Chimerism is when 2 eggs are fertilized but one embryo is absorbed by the other, giving the resulting baby 2 separate sets of DNA which can manifest as a child of ambiguous sex. In this case some of the body's cells will be XX and some will be XY. If all of the genitals have the same sex, this could go unnoticed forever. You may end up with one ovary that appears to be an undescended testicle, or one undescended testicle that is presumed to be an ovary. Since people rarely get DNA tested, especially against other parts of themselves, no one knows how common chimerism is.  

Then we have XY embryos who are simply immune to testosterone altogether. They are born appearing female and develop as such. They don't have a uterus and their gonads aren't really testicles or ovaries, but that's rarely noticed until they fail to menstruate and even then they're often just considered women born without a uterus. They are very feminine in appearance because while most women have some level of testosterone, these don't, or at least they don't respond to it. 

So that's what sex is, and some of the ways it's not as cut and dried as basic (incomplete) biology classes would have had us believe. But what about gender? Gender is the masculine and feminine, it is the manifestation of sex for most of us but even that is a spectrum. From "sensitive" boys to tomboys, and from macho men to girly girls, we all express gender in our own ways. Because we are who we are, and what we consider to be manly or womanly changes with religion, culture, environment, tradition, and all sorts of other influences. Hair length, clothing, names, all of it is societal. At one point not too long ago voting, owning property, wearing pants, and going to war were all considered masculine, but women do these things every day now and no one bats an eye. A hundred and fifty years ago a doctor named Leslie or Robin with short hair and pants would have OBVIOUSLY been a man. But gender changes with time, because it's not a biological constant.

Friday Night Crockpot Potato Soup

Ingredients:

1 quart of chicken stock, homemade is best but a carton will work

1/2 packet of dry onion soup mix or one small minced onion

1 can of Campbell's Cream of Bacon soup

1 package frozen Southern style hash browns

2/3 cup sour cream

8oz shredded smoked Gouda cheese OR 8oz shredded Gouda cheese and 1 tsp liquid smoke

4 cloves of garlic, smashed

1 tsp table salt

1/2 tsp black pepper

4oz beer, the darker the better

Cumin to taste

Directions:

1. In a large crockpot mix chicken stock, onion or soup mix, cream of bacon soup, beer, garlic and salt and pepper. 

2. Add frozen potatoes and stir until wet.

3. Cook on low for the day or high for 3 hours and low for one.

4. When the soup is ready to eat, add the sour cream.

5. With a stick blender, blend to desired consistency.

6. Fold in the cheese.

7. Season to taste with cumin and add more smoke if needed.

*Feel free to garnish with chives, spring onions, or crumbled bacon

If necessary you can thin this with chicken stock or thicken it with instant mashed potatoes, but be aware that it will thicken on it's own while cooling.

It all just sucks so much

I can keep my shit together, pounds and pounds of outward pressure held together with string, 99% of the time. But the 1% of the time when it spills into someone else's radar I'm suddenly a mess who needs to get her shit together or get the fuck out.  I get it, nobody wants to see my breakdowns. I don’t want to see my breakdowns. But 3 hours of some lady crying,, or asleep in an emotional coma, within your range of vision isn't shit.  Trust me. I live with this and if you didn't trip over a corpse, you didn't see shit.

The Irony of Middle Age

1. Losing weight easily is now more worrisome than thrilling.

2. My "happy pills" bottle in my purse is now just for digestive problems. Pepto, Imodium, Gas-X, you get the picture.

3. The natural highlights I wanted when I was young have finally come in, in white.

4. I finally learned how to walk in heels and now my ankles are weak.

5. It took me a decade to lose the baby weight enough to go out without Spanx, but now I need shapewear for my upper arms.

6. The saying about women hitting their sexual peak in their 40s has come true, but I seem to have hit my 'getting tired at 8pm' peak at the same time.

7. I can finally afford to buy drugs but the only ones I seem to want are ibuprofen and digestive pills.

8. I've finally grown into my looks, at an age where I feel ridiculous if I dress sexy.

9. I can now afford cute hoodies and sweaters but all I can wear are cardigans and flannels because hot flashes.

10. I finally figured out how to style my hair / what the best cut is for my hair, and it's changing in texture and I have to use women's Rogaine at the roots.

...to be continued 

I broke my little girl's heart

I have a 12 year old daughter. A beautiful, spunky, smart, strong, determined daughter. And she has a penis, which is nobody's business but hers yet is relevant to this story.

Last weekend we went school clothes shopping across the river because Iowa has an annual sales tax free weekend. This will be her first year in junior high and her first year wearing girl clothes to school. She was SO EXCITED to pick out her new wardrobe. Gold shoes, pink sneakers, flip flops with flowers, and so many dresses. I loved watching her develop her own style because until now its been UnderArmor t shirts and warm up pants. Just to go shopping she wore a dress and a pair of gold glitter high tops. She looked beautiful and her happiness was contagious. 

Our last stop was Target, where we needed camis and jeans. And right there, by the jeans, were the Harry Potter shirts. She found two she loved -- a grey tee with a Hermione Granger quote on it and a red and white tie dye hoodie with a matching scrunchie. She's been a huge Harry Potter fan since she was a little boy. Something about the kid who never quite fit in becoming magical and being looked up to struck a chord in my little girl. And she wanted these tops. And we could afford these tops. So I laid them across the pile in the cart and then made a difficult decision. I told her that if we bought them, JK Rowling would get some of the money, probably only a few pe nies, but some money nonetheless. She smiled and said okay. Then I told her that it might be a little complicated because JK Rowling had recently been making a lot of statements against transgender women, specifically that they aren't real women and that they hurt the feminist cause. And my daughter's face fell. I explained that an author's personal thoughts didn't change what they'd written and that I, for one, was not about to let such ignorance and stupidity take Harry Potter away from me, but that I wasn't sure if we should give her any money. I asked my daughter what she wanted to do. She told me to put the tops back. I said I would still buy them for her and they'd still look good on her and that none of this had anything to do with Harry or Hermione or anyone else in the stories, but she said no. She didn't want to support anyone who thought she wasn't real, who thought she was bad for other girls and women, and who said she couldn't be a feminist.  She said she was done with JK Rowling forever.

I suppose I could have just not told her anything about Rowling's statements or opinions. I could have bought the shirts and let her proudly wear them to school. I'm sure that's what a lot of parents are doing and it would have saved my kid some heartache.  But she deserved to know. She deserved to know that by getting the shirts we would be lining the pockets of a woman who spreads hate directed, in a very real sense, at her. She already knew that we don't eat Chik Fil A, we don't shop at Hobby Lobby, and we don't get our pizza from Papa John's, and I wanted her to decide if she wanted to do the same with Harry Potter merchandise. 

I wonder if Jo Rowling knows that she makes kids like my daughter cry. I wonder if she realizes that for some, all of the strong female character role models in the world can't make up for the hateful example she herself sets. And I wonder if she sees that in this world, she's a Dursley. She's the one looking down on the different sisters and nephews just because she doesn't understand their magic.

 Ms. Rowling, in this story, you are the villain.

Recent News

Police have difficult time getting into the Chop! (Capitol Hill Occupied Protest area,  informally known as a no-police area.) SHOCKING!

Pancake syrup company decides that selling its product in a literally slave-shaped bottle is in poor taste. (Mrs. Butterworth's) SHOCKING!

Juneteenth is a holiday, as many privileged white people finally learn. Turns out the South didn't happily free all slaves upon hearing the Emancipation Proclamation. (Wait until they find out that Kentucky didn't ratify the 13th amendment until 1976!) SHOCKING!

White people who deny existence concept of unconscious racism are offended by Ubcle Ben's  company decision to remove black house slave mascot from product packaging. SHOCKING!

George Floyd Protests

I've known cops. I've dated a cop. I am not anti-lock. What I am, is anti anyone in a position of authority being on a power trip, whether it's a kindergarten teacher or an older sibling or a prison guard. I am not anti-kindergarten teacher, anti-older sibling, or anti-prison guard.

Right now there are protests, and riots, all over the country bringing attention to the FACT that black people are killed at a much higher rate than white people during what should be simple interactions with police. For what it's worth, I dont believe that the protesters are rioting, nor that the rioters are protesting. I think that anarchists, vandals, and thieves will use any excuse to hide in a crowd and do their thing. I do have one big question, though.

Why, during a time when police brutality is in the national spotlight and everyone has video cameras and access to upload on their person all the time, are there cops out there doing the horrible things that we see on the news every day now? Pulling a protester's mask off to pepper spray him from 6 inches away. Pepper spraying a child. Shooting a man in the face with a tear gas canister. Pulling people stuck in traffic out of their car and beating them. Knocking elderly men to the ground. Tear gassing people as they stand on their own porch. Smashing peaceful protesters' water bottles and milk jugs (for rinsing teargas out of the eyes) on the ground. Shooting members of the press with rubber bullets.

And they know they're on camera. They know there will be documented evidence of their behavior. And they keep upping the ante. Police fired tear gas and rubber bullets into a crowd of protesters who were lying on the ground with their arms up, posing no threat. Why? Why would they not even try to hide this behavior?

Novel Coronavirus Covid19

Day 1 of the quarantine. Spent the day with my kids. Drank 2 mimosas, put Bailey's in my coffee, and I am now at the bar. Trying to maintain 6ft social distance but the people seem to mock me. A man who lives with his elderly mother says "Bring it on; I'm young!" A woman wipes her hands all over my face and jacket while declaring this, "not even as bad as the flu." [I get flu shots annually.]  A man I barely know keeps crowding me with his dancing and laughing at my attempts to turtle my head into my coat. The morons are playing Men At Work because they believe it to be an Irish band. Happy St Patrick's Day to all who survive.

Day 3. Yesterday I went to a friend's house. We sat on opposite sides of the room and talked. It was nice that she humored me even though she doesn't isolate herself.  Today is my husband's birthday and I am debating whether or not to go buy him a cake and some ice cream. The gifts Danny bought for him are supposed to arrive today but who knows. Amazon is focusing on toilet paper and medical supplies so a t shirt that says "My wife is psycHOTic" may not make the cut.  

We all have cabin fever and while I want the kids to learn while they're out of school, they are turning feral and I fear they may bite if I try to hand them anything educational. Since the stores have no medical supplies,  I could succumb to infection and die. I'm still weighing my options.

Day 6.  I'm an atheist (though not anti theist), but a lot of my friends and loved ones are Christian,  and many are devout. I hadn't thought about it, but at the same time they are praying more than ever, they cannot attend church. I understand how this can cause them extra fear and stress, and fear and stress help no one during an emergency.  So, in an attempt to feel useful during this period in which I feel so helpless, and to bring a little comfort to my friends, today I spent the money I normally would have spent at the bar for the next week or so, on prepackaged communion to hand out to my churchgoing friends. Hopefully it arrives relatively soon. I have a few people in mind to gift a couple week's worth to, but I'm sure I can think of some more. I hope so. I've got a hundred plastic shot glasses of wine and crackers to unload. 

Day 13. I make stock. I collect chicken bones and carcasses, Thanksgiving turkey carcasses and necks, whatever I can find, and I freeze them until I have enough for a batch of stock. This averages out to about 3 rotisserie chicken carcasses, or 2 medium Thanksgiving turkeys, or just a hodge podge of whatever I have. Then I put the birds in my biggest stockpot (mine came in a set of 3) with half a bag of carrots cut in half, half a bunch of celery cut in half, an onion cut in quarters, and half a package of fresh parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme. Plus a head of garlic, crushed, 9 or 10 whole peppercorns, and enough water to cover it all. If I have raw meat/bones, I'll roast the veg and meat/bones first. I bring it to a boil, skim off the foam,  then bring to a low simmer and leave it alone for 24-48 hours. After that I strain it into my next largest stockpot and stick that into a cooler full of ice or, if possible, a snowbank, overnight. After that I just remove the layer of fat on top and ladle it into Ziplock quart freezer bags. My last batch made 9 quarts. I boil noodles in this when my family gets sick, I use this in my potato and cheese soups, and one batch usually lasts us a year. 

I like to make stock. It's easy, delicious, and it gives me a sense of accomplishment to see all of those bags of brown goodness in my freezer.  And it is brown. This isnt pale piss yellow broth from a can

 This has the flavor from the roasted meat still left on the bone, the herbs and veggies already in it. It's more soup than both. Its thicker than broth, too. But I do it because it makes me happy and, especially in this helpless, worrisome, scary time of quarantine,  it soothes me. So that's what i did last week. I started the stock on Sunday, Tom didn't make it home Monday at all and I cant lift it so it cooked until Tuesday evening,  then it sat in the cooler outside with one of the big bags of gas station ice until Thursday evening (he was out again overnight Wednesday), and then it was in the fridge until today when we bagged it up. (If you take it off the stove and put it straight into the fridge, it will cook everything in the fridge. You need to cool it first, hence the cooler of ice.) Tonight is pizza night but tomorrow I'll boil noodles in a couple quarts, just to taste test. Lol

I need to think like an 11 year old more often.

Last night I took Tommy, my 11 year old son, Xmas* shopping for his dad. I wasn't feeling well so I just threw on a long sleeve tee and the jeans I'd worn the day before and grabbed my coat to leave. I had no bra on and believe me, it's not a good look, and I didn't even have real shoes on, just a pair of dirty black Uggs. I just didn't care what I looked like, frankly. 

Then Tommy saw me and looked me up and down and furrowed his brow. He put his hands on my muffin top (which I'm kind of sensitive about, anyway) and told me to suck it in. I told him I can only suck in my belly, not my sides. (!!!) He looked at my chest and sighed, then told me to turn to the side and looked at my mama belly and my ratty old jeans. The look on his face said he did not approve of what he saw. I started to get defensive because I was not about to be told I was too embarrassing to to go shopping with at 7pm at a Walmart, and I wasn't very happy with him thinking he got preapproval of my outfits anyway.

Then he did something strange. He grabbed my left hand and checked my wedding ring and said, "I guess it's okay since you have that on. I was worried you'd leave it at home." And then I realized that he thought I looked too sexy to go out in public! I even asked him, "Are you saying that I might attract men and they need to be able to see that I'm married?" He looked at me like he thought I was crazy. "You sound like you're taking that as a compliment. Okay then, but I dont see how it's a good thing."

He saw me, whom he apparently thinks is pretty, in clothes he saw as flaunting my figure, and got concerned that I might attract too much male attention.

I know it sounds weird, but when he thought I looked dangerously good all dressed like a schlub, it made me feel really good. I need to stop thinking I look okay despite my flaws, and start thinking that they're not flaws and that I just look good, period.

*Did you know that when you write it with an X, you "take the Christ out of Christmas" and it becomes a secular holiday?

A few of my favorite things

Long flannel nightgowns with lace at the collar
Thick heavy books that feel like you're eating them as you read
Poems by people who don't care what you think of them
Men who demand intelligence
Soft socks that don't dig in at the top
Crinkly quilts that get softer the more you use them
Cats that sleep next to you on the bed
Sleeping curled up like puppies
Thick hearty soup that warms to the core
Hot coffee/tea/cocoa/cider sipped slowly
Shoes that go with everything
Hot showers that never run cold
Big hugs from small children
Woodburning fireplaces
Pajamas with feet
Underwear that stays on the outside
Small chocolates while menstruating
Rainy weather
A soft chair
An oversized cardigan

Footy pajamas

Heavy blankets

A cat on my lap

Blowing my nose with tissues that have lotion in them

Cleaning my glasses with tissues that don't have lotion in them

Being able to tell the difference before smearing my glasses with lotion.

Crinkly beards

My tattoos

My tattoos were born when I was 13 years old.
A child with a pin and purloined ink, stabbing in secret for days, until I had . . .
a dot.

My tattoos came from different places, different people, different Mes.
My tattoos say "What was I thinking?"
Say "There was no purpose,"
Say teenage rebellion on permanent display.
My tattoos remind me "That was the boy I loved when I loved the wrong boy," 
"Don't wait to sober up in a shop of buzzing needles on your 21st birthday,"
"And never celebrate psych ward release with a haircut OR tattoo."

My tattoos are a scrapbook of bad decisions but also of who I was when I made them.
Of a hurt little girl trying to paint herself bad ass,
Of a death that never happened but still I mourned,
Of who I was and who I wanted to be.

My tattoos illustrate my life in chronological order.
The birth of my children,
the loves of my life,
the death of a parent.

So much ink stabbed into me,
violently engraved by sterile strangers' hands,
graffiti that will not wash off.

My tattoos are aging poorly, drooping, stretching, wrinkling, folding in upon themselves.
A dragon with cellulite,
a butterfly with shaving scars,
a fairy with stretch marks and all with a story or lesson I lived. 

No meaningful sleeves or spiritual back pieces,
just disconnected images from art books,
from flash posters,
from google
image
search.
None of them match because I was never the same person twice and still I'll get more
Because my scrapbook is not finished yet.

More children born,
more loves in my life,
more dead parents to immortalize on mortal canvas.
Ink will be my memory when my memory fades.
Pictures will remind me of my life when I forget my own name
and I have lived so much life to remember.

Who needs Borneo, anyway?

Beautiful, delicious, too much, not enough, those are opinions, not objective terms. I hate wine and lots of people love it. Neither they nor I are wrong because it's all a matter of personal taste. So the next time you want to start a sentence with, "I know I'm not beautiful but," or, "I'm not the sexiest but," just don't. Because for one thing, if you say that to people, they'll take your word for it, but also because you are beautiful and you are the sexiest. People find all kinds of things personally attractive and you are no less likely than anyone else to have attributes that will drive a percentage of the population crazy. There are folks who love weight, folks who don't give a shit about perfect skin, folks who hate thick hair because it gets all over everything. And their tastes are not invalid or abnormal, and they're not fetishes either. A guy who loves armpit hair, a round belly, or  frizzy hair is not a freak. He is a person with personal tastes just like anyone else. So say, "I know I'm not everyone's cup of tea but," and realize that no one is. Everyone looks hideous to someone and beautiful to someone else. Hell, I know I'm hot af because my husband tells me. Am I hot to everyone? Not by a long shot. I'm sure there are a few people in Borneo or wherever who would swipe left, but I don't have the time to worry about them. And neither do you!

Normality

I used to want to be normal but I could never quite pull it off. Too many subtleties to pick up on, nuances of accepted behavior I never really got. When I was really young and idealistic I thought that someday I'd meet someone with whom I could be normal. Where all of my coping skills like humor and hyperactivity and false affectations would just go away. And I did meet that guy, a couple times, but they didnt like an unfunny Chuck. They wanted someone who would entertain them, not depend on them. But when I met this last guy, he found me entertaining when I wasn't trying. All my social mistakes were just endearing quirks to him. So now we're abnormal together. And it doesn't suck anymore.