Happy to be trudging here...

Every once in a while, a piece of the puzzle clunks into place, and I am less confused than I was the moment before.  Let me begin at the beginning.  I am in recovery, in AA.  I just celebrated 23 years of sobriety.  That is a big deal, yes, but it is not really my accomplishment, not by myself, anyway.  I have had 6 sponsors, a multitude of sponsees (most of whom did not stay sober, some of whom are dead), and a huge fellowship of folks who walk the happy road of destiny with me.  Oh, and a great and wondrous Higher Power that has soothed my feathers over and over again, most recently after I bent my car on my way home, in the dark, in the rain - we (the dogs and I) got home safely, and after a few $$$, everything is fine, again.  Every so often I wonder why this recovery thing works so well.  After all, I tried to stop drinking, over and over again.  Stopping was easy, after humiliating myself.  Again.  Staying stopped was impossible till I got serious and sought help.  And today, at what was probably my 6,000th meeting, more or less, I got the answer.  The speaker talked about staying in the center of the "herd".  Now, I took sociology in my recent return to college.  I know that human DNA is less dissimilar than penguin DNA.  Penguins all look alike.  That must mean that external characteristics like body-type, skin color, etc. are negligible in the grand scheme of things.  What is most important is what is going on beneath our appearances.  And humans are not geared to form herds, not outside their ethnicity, that is.  Thinking about it, that is why we cannot seem to all come together as one race, and continue to sit on our little islands and shoot at each other.  We do not trust those who LOOK different.  Except in AA.  No boundaries there between the folks.  Nothing, not race, age, creed, political or sexual persuasion, social position, income (or lack thereof), NOTHING separates us.  We are the herd that can provide the buffer from the cruel, cruel world we all knew and drank about.  Someone in the herd has been there, done that, no matter what is happening for me.  And gotten through it sober.  It is precious beyond words.  It all boils down to the singleness of purpose we all adhere to, to help the alcoholic who stills suffers.  That includes myself.  Wow.  Lucky, lucky, lucky.

The cheesecake debacle...

I am rather fluffy at the moment.  It happens.  My weight goes up and down, according to how invested I am in looking good rather than feeling good.  After all, hormones are dialed down to simmer, addictions to fun things like tobacco and alcohol are in abeyance, food is my only comfort these days.  Not that I cannot moderate.  I do.  But, once in a while, it all goes to hell.  On Wednesday, the day before the holiday, I toodled over to Costco for one of those enormous (and cheap) cheesecakes.  I got the strawberry, my least favorite, figuring I would eat less of it at the feast the next day.  On the way home, it shot off the backseat and landed on its side, broke it all to hell (inside the container, nothing was lost).  Well, hell.  I would have to go back to get another one.  And this one, well I could donate it to the Alkathon, where folks don't care what the food looks like, no, not at all.  Except when I got it home, I opened it and had a nice fat slice.  Well, I could donate HALF of the cheesecake.  In the end, I got a really chichi lemon torte at Whole Foods, which was much more up the alley of the crowd that would be eating it, invested as they are in CUISINE.  And the cheesecake never left my fridge.  I overdosed the first day, cut big swaths with lots of whipped cream.  So, I whittled each slice down, though I was eating two or three slices a day, sprinkled with walnuts, too.  It totally disappeared after breakfast this Wednesday.  Man, I miss that cheesecake.  And even though it wasn't my fave, I got to like it just fine.  Am now fluffier, for sure.  And it was worth it.  Into each life, let a little (or a lot of) cheesecake fall.

Your personality is showing!

Long, long ago, while I was married to husband no. 3, the Republican three-piece suit, I was endeavoring to find out what the hell was wrong with me.  There I was, with every little thing I thought I wanted (okay, I wanted a 35 mm camera, and he gave me a lousy 110), a four bedroom house, a swimming pool, bunches of kids, German cars, even a dog, and I was miserable.  So I read a lot of self-help psychological books, searching for the neuroses that was my own, hoping I could find my way out of my own darkness.  Of course, it didn't help things much that, eventually, I would throw up my hands and just get drunk, scream, swear, and throw things, like wine glasses.  Very satisfying sound when a wine glass hits the wall,  you know.  And one day, I came on an answer.  My problem was, ta-dah, my HUSBAND.  He had narcissistic personality disorder, which made him a cold, nasty son of a bitch.  And, really bad news, persons with personality disorders hardly ever change, because they don't believe there is anything wrong with them.  My husband, for instance, would just tell me I was crazy.  I believed him.  Things I heard him say were never said in his universe.  I was too sensitive, paranoid, looney-tunes.  Of course he was right, I had married HIM.  Later, I realized he was just my mother in a different package.  And today, I was reading that mental health folks are still struggling with a means to treat personality disorders.  They are the ugly stepsisters of the DSM-IV, defying all efforts to bring to light a therapy, even difficult to diagnose.  Well, gee, folks.  Why don't we start with a definition of a HEALTHY personality.  Deviant behavior has to start somewhere, right?  There must be platform from which to deviate.  Personally, I never saw an emotionally healthy individual in my home as a child, or in my subsequent homes that I tried to make.  Currently, I live alone.  No models to mental health here, either.  Dogs are even squirrely.  It would be nice to know what standard I am not measuring up to at any given moment. 

Identity crisis! Send inspiration!

Growing old is very like growing up.  You have ideas about what will be, and then life just runs over you like a steamroller, and nothing you planned happens.  I expected that at this age, an august 68, I would have a life partner to look back on years of holidays and summers and vacations and children blooming into parents themselves, and a couple of grandchildren to bounce around.  Not happening here.  Three strikes and the husbands are all out.  One is dead.  I didn't do it, really.  But the other two have been married to their current spouses (both two away from me) for many moons now.  And I live here, in a tiny, rather funky little yellow house, with two obnoxious small dogs and the yard of shame out front, now happily knee-deep in leaves.  My friends teach me that I am okay in most respects.  Some are silly 60, giggling like 12 year olds.  I didn't giggle then, certainly not starting now.  Some are cranky and spend every moment arguing for their limitations, certain that they can never be happy in their circumstances, not ever.  Some are very, very spiritual, constantly working on improving their spirits.  Now, those I admire, sort of.  Somehow, though, even their aspects seem out of balance.  Moi, I am just trying to float to the surface after a long, long, long time bottom feeding.  My aspect is healing, an eternal process because the wounds live at the core of my persona.  They scab over, but are capable of being ripped open in a blink and actively bleed again.  When I heal, and please, HP, let it be soon, who will I be?  There is the art.  Thank HP for the art.  The moments I spend painting are those when I feel closest to my spirit and closest to the Divine.  Compassion.  That is my keyword right now - for myself, for my friends and their wonky little selves, even for my aged mother.  And let HP send me a grandchild or two, and I will settle in and just be OLD.  Old is good.  Vertical trumps horizontal any day.

She's loose among the general population!

Okay, now on track again.  Antidepressants.  Check.  Weekly therapy sessions.  Check.  Psychological tomes.  Check.  Riding the big waves at the moment.  Yes, I feel better, less numb, more like there is an end to the heavy depression that engulfed me and left me all limp and wimpy.  Dear therapist says I fell out of my power.  I just felt I got run over one too many times by life steamrolling by.  Usually, I can dodge the traffic.  My step got slowed by wedding, death, illness, more death, even more death, dental nightmares, more death, etc.  Pow!  Take that!  No time to even get up from the mat.  So, here it is, another stinking holiday.  Thank HP for the Alkathon, marathon meetings 24 hours around the clock, where we recovering folks can get a dose of sanity before entering the family crucible.  I sat there last night with my sponsor, and noticed that the guy in front of me had an interesting neck - 2 diagonal lines left, 2 right, so he had a diamond right in the middle of the back of his neck.  Fascinating.  And the gal in front of me was leaning on her chair, and part of her bulged and hung over the back of the chair.  Oh, dear, where are the eyes in the back of my head to assure me that was not happening to ME?  I know about bra overflow and little pillows that can pooch out over the back, and do my best to tuck those suckers in before leaving the house.  Also carefully check the back of my head to be sure the bedhead is tamed and I don't go out looking like an escaped mental patient.  Careful observation of others is my secret.  At the moment, I am debating whether to wear my full length faux fur to the upcoming celebration.  These are rather conservative folks, my daughter included.  Darling son would love the audaciousness, such a jewel.  There are few occasions when I think the COAT is appropriate, and so I have only worn it twice so far, last winter.  First was to a performance at the local performing arts center.  When I sat down, the lady next to me commented to her friend "oh, look, I get to sit next to the COAT!"  And the second occasion was a rare dinner at a local restaurant, and I got stopped on the way out by a woman who thought it was real.  It's a doozie, the COAT.  And yes, I think I will wear it.  It will be cold on the way home, and I love the softness of it against my cheek.  Not like I can disappear in a crowd, anyway.  I have always stood out, whether I was trying to or not.  And the payoff of getting old is being as outrageous as one can be.  Really, on a scale of one to ten, I have not even hit five yet.  Time to up the ante.

Dan Brown was right!!!

Anyone else heard about this little bitty scrap of papyrus that is rocking the world at the moment?  Seems - are you ready - Jesus had a wife!  And she was one of his disciples!  None other than Mary Magdelene, purported by previous chroniclers to be of the sleaziest profession, a prostitute!  Now, it occurs to me that the only way I know anything is from what I am told.  The Catholics seem to know (not think but KNOW) that Jesus was celibate, a true goody-two-shoes of a man-god, who glowed in the dark and regularly levitated.  I think that is not true, and have thought that for a while, ever since I got sober and became capable of independent thought.  And damned if I wasn't right!  I now think that there is, in the Vatican archives, scads of such truth that is being suppressed to the benefit of the Church.  After all, the Catholics (and a lot of other so-called Christian dogmas) have a lock on their parishioners (and their pocketbooks).  Without benefit of the sacraments, these poor folks will be toasted extra-crispy in the afterworld.  Or, even worse, float around in Limbo nothingness.  Forever.  Ah, but open your wallet every Sunday, and every Holy Day of Obligation, and there are scads of those, and voila!  Grace will rain on you and you get to be a goody-two-shoes, too!  Except goody-two-shoesdom is BORING.  I would rather be a practicing human being, one who occasionally gets caught in the Mixmaster of my own mind and ego, and screw up.  Luckily, I usually recognize that moment of error, and have some tools to clean up my messes.  And work toward not doing it again.  Of course, I think it is easier to be a Catholic if you are of the male (heterosexual) persuasion to begin with.  And, since I am violently female, I am discounted by the Church, banned from channeling Jesus directly, relegated to always be kind of dirty around the edges.  Funny how THAT is up at the moment, too.  Pious (male) Republicans blatantly putting half the human race beneath the other.  That has been going on for 3,000 freaking years!  And I cannot blame just the male half of the race for that.  A lot of women buy their wholesale disdain.  Really, folks.  Let's all just get real, and call a spade a spade.  What incites hatred and suppression in men?  Why, FEAR, of course.  These great big guys are terrified of women, as if we are going to sap them of their power.  Really, like they have any, anyway.  Men only have the power we have given to them.  Turn my back and walk away, and they are just bags of hot air, after all.  Nice that they now have such an apt spokesperson running for President, isn't it.

The thing about dogs...

I have two dogs.  They are not the same two dogs I had 14 years ago.  One of those is dead, my sweet Boo boy, dearest animal ever.  Broke my heart.  Just went through the anniversary of the day I had to hold him as he breathed his last breath.  I cried, my friend who went with me cried, the vet cried.  The other dog, Beany, now lives with my ex.  He was mine to begin with, as in I bought him.  But he always belonged to the man, and when we split, he went home with him, not me.  So Boo and I settled into coupledom here in the little yellow house, till he got kind of poochy and droopy, so I got him a puppy.  I got all kinds of flack from folks around me.  Why didn't I adopt a shelter dog?  How could I order one online?  You're going to get a sick puppy, they told me.  Well, I knew what I wanted, and the odds of a shelter having that were slim to none, I am old and don't have that many years left so I deserve to have what I want, and I got Pickle online so I could have exactly what I wanted when I wanted her.  She is napping under the computer desk at the moment, sweet little Pekingese lady, all blond and glamorous.  She came from Missouri, and my friend who accompanied me on the Pickle pickup party will never forget the experience.  She came with papers, a vet certificate, and a bag of food.  Perfectly healthy pup.  And, when Boo died three years later, I waited seven months for the worst of the pain to subside, and did not order up another little black Pekingese, though that was tempting.  No, I got a black and white Shipoo, shihtzu poodle mix, Punkin, mostly known as the Punk.  He is smallish, like 10 lbs, fluffy like a shihtzu but with a little longer nose, adorable.  Also perfectly healthy pup.  And my friend, who got a puppy from a litter her dear friend whelped, is dealing with parvo.  Lord, I feel so grateful.  Professional breeders like the ones I dealt with know that they can get puppy shots from the local feed store and give them without benefit of a vet.  The only vaccination that requires a vet is rabies, and that is so the prevailing government can get you to license your pets.  So, puppyfind.com is a deal, really.  Even when your puppy comes from Missouri and has to change planes in Texas. 

O frabjous day!

I am morbidly afraid of dentists, mostly because, every time I visit one, they do painful and invasive procedures inside my head.  And also, I was molested by a dentist when I was 9 years old.  Many times.  Why, you may ask?  I didn't have the kind of mother one could go to with a problem like this.  I thought she would blame me, since I was the one who made her mad so that she had to beat me with a hardwood yardstick across my bare behind.  And I would rather endure the indignity of an asshole dentist than beard my mother in her den of rage.  So, I always put off going until I cannot bear the pain any longer.  This process of reconstructing my much neglected teeth began last year, and I found a dentist who is gentle and not condescending or shaming and we are together saving what we can.  Surprising to note that I will die with most of my teeth after all.  Yay.  A couple of days ago, a tooth on the other side from the current excavation work began to ache.  Crap.  But, knowing that if I try to muscle through it might very well get infected like its sister before it, and not only be horrible to correct, it would be horribly expensive, too.  I quickquick made an appointment.  And SURPRISE!!! It is not the teeth that are aching at all.  I told the dentist that it ached all the way up to my eyeball, and he said that is good news.  He tapped on the two possibilities.  No pain.  So what I thought was a toothache was really sinus pain.  A trip to Safeway for some Benadryl proved his theory.  Take two, no pain.  Breathing better, too.  Nevertheless, I am committed to getting one of those crowned babies recrowned, as the margin is no longer flush, and there is a pocket between the teeth you could put your fist through, an open invitation to nastiness happening.  That is a good deal.  Only $1,300, instead of the $7,000 I spent on the bottom babies for root canals, crowns, and extraction and a bridge.  Just another rudeness about aging.  However, teeth are a wonderful thing.  Yes, I love my teeth.  Just want them to love me back and not ACHE!

Awkward.

Once in a while, the Universe gives me little giggle moments.  Like the time I got to date my high school sweetheart as an adult, between our respective marriages, and found that he was a horse's rear end.  Whew.  Big bullet dodged there.  And the time my husband's new wife came over to talk to me about their marriage, told me all about their rather sterile sex life and the squabbles about the kids.  Validation, you can't beat it with a stick.  And, since I was sober at the time, I didn't give her any info about our sex life, which was obviously much more passionate and satisfying.  I smiled for a week after that little interlude.  So, this weekend, my ex wildman artist showed up at our home group AA meeting with his new squeeze in tow.  I had heard through the grapevine that she was movie star beautiful and a talented musician to boot.  Well, I don't know where that person got his information, perhaps from the one photo on Facebook that was taken at a decent distance, and the others I had seen showed a kind of frayed little person sitting at her white baby grand, creased decollete, frizzy hair, etc.  Face to face, she was a pruney, rather terrified person.  Well, we alcoholics are pretty gregarious and fearless, several women pounced on her to welcome her, she was probably pretty dazed and confused before I was introduced to her.  I shook her limp-fish hand, said how nice to meet her, and was promptly distracted by a friend, which I decided later made me seem kind of rude, so, after watching her squirm in her seat next to her guy, I apologized as I was leaving, shook that rubbery hand again, and exited quickly as we were giving a friend a surprise luncheon after the meeting.  I got to see how not-well I am as I kind of gloated about the fact that I am looking so much more youthful and fit than she was, though I am sure I am the older one.  And that only happened because I had troubled skin into my fifties, doctored for it regularly, religiously used moisturizer and sunscreen, and have a genetic predisposition to look younger than I actually am.  All very fortuitous to be sure.  We are bound to be thrown together soon at an annual art auction, very chichi, so I am glad the ice has been broken, and perhaps I will get to  know her and find that my first impression was entirely wrong.  And don't you know, if it wasn't, I will not be all that unhappy, either.  If he couldn't see fit to pine away forever, next best thing is a wimpy, wrinkled girlfriend.  Oh, that must be my evil twin talking, again.

The country mouse goes to town...

I like being in my own element - my suburban city where denim rules, my little yellow house in the neighborhood that is surrounded by the city but not of it, so that my neighbors have chickens and goats, and a goddamned rooster that starts his thready little crowing around 3 AM every day.  And today, off I went to that lalaland to the south known as Marin County.  Now, it is not really more urban - the cities down there are smaller than mine, but, somehow, it is just more trendy, more au courant, more MORE.  The occasions was my daughter's sister-in-law's baby shower.  They have registries now for baby showers.  All the things on this darling girl's registry were 1. expensive 2. impractical 3. designed to within an inch of their lives.  Really, $30 for little pants (black and white, for a GIRL), that she will grow out of by the second wearing.  Not doing that.  So I chose my own gift.  Like, don't tell ME what to do.  I got her the manual, a book on What to Expect in the First Year.  And some little undershirts with long sleeves and mitties, that she can wear home from the hospital and not scratch her face.  And four of the most adorable glove puppets, a litter of little dogs, that I encased in pink tissue like little roses peeking out of the box.  She loved them.  And I did a painting just to reproduce it on the card, a pelican and her chick.  Not expensive.  Not chic.  But fun and funny.  Things have changed.  When I had my babies, I bought a second hand crib and painted it.  Or I borrowed a crib from an in-law.  Our strollers were rickety little things that folded up to the size of an umbrella.  I bought my little girl PINK clothes.  Well, things have changed, for sure.  And did I mention that this festive occasion was held in the magnificent garden of this amazing house in Tiburon that overlooks the whole of San Francisco and Sausalito?  I could see both bridges and lots of tiny sailboats.  Beautiful.  Way over the head of this country mouse.  I was happy to come home to the fur people and my tiny abode.  Think I'll get myself some flowers tomorrow.  Elegance on a budget, from Trader Joe's.

It's not me, it's you...

I used to firmly believe that, if it weren't for other people, I would be just fine.  Parents, husbands, friends, bosses - they all existed for the singular reason of putting me down, making me less-than, hurting me.  Okay, kind of self-centered.  Yeah.  Therapy helped me see the wounds, and lordy, if I was anything, it was wounded.  Then came recovery, and the focus became MY PART.  Not sure I liked that part of the Program.  Who was I if not a victim of the very universe I inhabited?  And that became the most empowering place to stand in my consciousness, knowing that  if I look down and see that I am standing in a pile of shit, it didn't crawl up there by itself.  I stepped in it.  Again.  The empowering part is, that if I have a part in the problem, I have a part in the solution, too.  I can sweep up my side of the street, and decide if I want further engagement at that address or not.  I can talk my alternatives over with others.  And I can take steps, either to leave or begin again at a new level of understanding.  Unfortunately, there are some folks that I don't feel I can walk away from.  Like my family - my remaining parent, my siblings, my children.  There, I use all my practices - acceptance, kindness, restraint of tongue and pen, compassion, detachment.  That last one is a must for me.  I cannot fix anyone else, though, God knows, I would if I could.  Hell, I couldn't even fix myself.  I had to rely on my community of fellow AAs and a loving Higher Power to just get sober.  So, Higher Power and I are praying for those other folks out there, the one I am not in charge of, any more.  Huge relief.

Mercury in retrogade. Help!!!

I am a Gemini, ruled by that infinitesimal ribbon world that bakes in its inner orbit and flits by every so often to wreak havoc in my otherwise pedantic life.  It gets worse.  I am also a DOUBLE Gemini, since that is also my rising sign.  So, I am doubly screwed.  Now, I live alone.  But, seeing as I am a Gemini, I am never lonely, since my Gemini twin lives beside me.  She is not evil, my twin.  Rather, she is indecisive and pessimistic.  She is the one that laughs heartily whenever I being a new painting.  "You'll never be able to do that!", she exclaims.  And as I persist, she pouts.  Most of the time I prove her wrong.  Most of the time I get something I can deem worthy, even if it is not my original idea.  And did I mention that my twin is critical?  Oh, it is like living with my mother AND my ex-husband at the same time.  Luckily, I am much bigger than she, and louder, too.  And, luckily, I have some recovery and can soothe that part of me.  She is really only two years old, my twin.  I can keep her happy with a buttered ear of corn or a nice Dvorak symphony.  She will settle right down.  But, if she is unhappy, watch out.  She was uber-unhappy last week, when pretty much every plan we had didn't happen.  And our cell phone locked itself up and Samsung said we were going to have to call Virgin Mobile, which is like hanging yourself, an inch of rope at a time.  (Luckily, when we took the battery out to find the registration number, it unlocked when we put it back in.)  Then the garbage company to which we pay an exorbitant amount  just plain ignored our yard waste bin, necessitating another phone call, mostly spent on hold.  Hassle hassle!  And the program that has been sending me annoying pop-up reminders for six months, that I finally agreed to renew, refused to load.  And when it did load (after turning off the computer and turning it back on again, a guaranteed remedy), it cleaned out all my history in my game file and I had to play for HOURS before I got my Hoyle bucks to buy back my mahjong tile sets and fancy cards.  Both my entities were pretty flummoxed here.  So, being extra careful out there.  One does not mess around with Mercury.

It works if you work it...

You know, I did many, many years of therapy:  women's group therapy, mixed group therapy, one on one with a woman, one on one with a man, conflict resolution (my personal fave), and family therapy (bombed, totally, no one else there with me).  And through the process, I got to lift up the rocks and look at the slimy things beneath them.  Only thing was, once I did that, there were no tools to deal with the muck.  All I could do was put the rock back.  But recovery and the steps worked really well.  Probably the most significant steps for me were four and five, the "fearless and thorough moral inventory" that I shared with my sponsor, a fellow AA who was far from shocked, since it was pretty much her story, too.  The resentment part was the most fun.  I got to see that, though I denigrate my narcissistic mother for gunny-sacking my faults back to the cradle, I still hang on to a lot of her barbs, too.  Like the time she flew all the way to Honolulu to see my first baby only to tell me he was "funny-looking".  My son is now 43.  Perhaps it is time to let that go?  You think?  This book I am reading tells me that this is typical behavior for an NPD person.  It was important to her that I know that her children were far prettier than mine.  How sad is that, anyway?  The important result of doing the steps (three times all the way through now, and many times piecemeal when stuff is up, and really, every day) is that I got to see MY part.  I have never said anything to my mother about her behavior.  Oh, wait, I take that back.  When she criticized my children for not calling her at Christmas, I remarked that it could be a reflection of all the birthday cards she never sent them.  And I found that she quieted right down.  Now that she is 91, and due to ride that big Greyhound in the sky soon (oh, please make it SOON), perhaps I can let her have it?  In a kind and constructive way, of course.  Not wanting any more stinky karma here. 

The sweet smell of validation...

Now, I am 68 years old.  And I have done about 8 years of therapy in one or two year dollops, and 22 1/2 years of recovery in AA.  That's a heap of healing.  Yet, my wounds still are only scabbed over, and recent events sent me spiraling into active bleeding.  Again.  My father died.  I always knew he would predecease my mother, and I was lucky that he lived to be 91 before that happened.  Hard to grieve this man.  He never valued me, since I was female.  And neither did my mother, for the same reason.  Okay, they are from THAT generation, and I should get over it.  And here I am, flailing around in anger and angst.  Again.  You see, somewhere inside me there is this little kernel of hope that things will change.  Suddenly, my mother will remember that I was the only one who showed up, year after year, on her birthday, on Mother's day, on my father's birthday and Father's day, even on their anniversary until I spent an inordinate amount of my hard-gained $$$ on a special gift that she turned a contemptuous eye toward.  My little brothers (63 and 65) were not there.  Oh, nonono.  Yet they are golden.  I am past the point of thinking this is my fault.  But it is still my problem.  I cannot in good conscience walk away from my aged mother.  Perhaps I am still hoping there is a pony in all this shit?  Well, not exactly.  You see, I have to live with ME.  And I want to know in my heart of hearts that I am a good person.  My mother won't do that for me, but I can.  Recently, I bought a book for my Kindle (and if that isn't the niftiest little thing, just push a button and poof, instant literature) on narcissistic personality disorder.  I know all about this from a course in abnormal psych I took (only three years ago, I went back to college at 61, my mother said "how stupid"), that mother is one of those.  And this book says that it is common for an NPD mother to single out one child upon whom to spread her hatred and loathing.  And I am getting that my methods of dealing with her are truly fine.  Like, I give her three nasty barbs, then leave.  Sometimes she doesn't shoot at me.  That doesn't mean she had stopped.  I never visit unless I am well rested and spiritually fit.  And I don't tell her ANYTHING about myself.  It would just hand her ammunition.  I am pretty sure I will go to my grave still shredded inside by this woman.  And I know that I am such a different person because I had here horrible example before me all my life.  I care probably too much for other's feelings.  I let my children be who they were meant to be, even when that was not comfortable for me.  And I pray for this woman.  Somewhere, sometime, she was damaged, too.  She just chose to pass her pain on rather than walk through it.  So, while she sits in her tiny chair in her tiny house in her tiny town and rules the world, she is essentially weak and ineffectual.  Poor thing.

Nothing going on at the moment, but I expect chaos any time now.  Actually, I always expect chaos, having walked into it, tried to jump over it, had it drop on me like a meteorite from hell, most of my life.  Yes, I am wounded.  My childhood left me shredded and just wanting to know what love was, since it was decidedly absent in my otherwise Betty Crocker/Emily Post home life.  Thus began the years, decades, actually, of flailing about, redesigning myself with every new leap into the ooey gooey mess of pseudo-love.  Let's see.  I went from preppy Mademoiselle college student to baby wife in the jungle of LA with her first godawful employment at the phone company, in Watts, to battered woman/baby divorcee sleeping with anything that would stand still long enough (my Sex in the City phase), to young pseudo-intellectual wife married to much older pseudo-intellectual cold fish (and dead battery), to young single mother PWP princess (that's Parents Without Partners, otherwise known as a good excuse to screw other losers) bed-hopping around suburbia while working for the local Devil Wears Prada boss clone, to marriage with a Republican three piece suit where I was mom to three of his, one of mine, and one of ours, ranging in age from 14 to 0, and I worked, too, to booze-sodden three time loser, to sidekick of NRA RVing blue collar guy with season NFL tickets, to sitting in jail on Christmas (surprise!) because of drunken escapade, to new recovery, to wounded relationship with another sort-of-recovered old fart, to bohemian west county wild woman living on the edge of the world becoming an artist, to retired single woman returning to college, schlepping around campus in hoody and All-Stars mufti, to my current status of older than dirt gal in the little yellow house, working at being a professional artist and taking care of two sweet little dogs.  Phew!  Of course, none of this would have been necessary if my folks weren't my folks, and had let me be who I was supposed to be in the first place.  It all began because I was female.  Not okay.  And they gave me a masculine name, one that got me Be a Pilot brochures instead of Be a Stewardess.  One that got me enrolled in boy's gym in high school, that seething cauldron of embarrassment that was almost unbearable without being totally humiliated.  One that almost got me drafted!  Mother named her dogs Samantha, Amy, and Sarah.  Go figure.  So, here I am, scarred by life.  And, if you looked at it from the outside, it all looked idyllic.  We had a swimming pool when I was a kid.  I was not born into an Untouchable caste in New Delhi, or the DC ghetto.  I am not even black.  But I learned in a therapy group (lots and lots and lots of therapy here), pain is pain.  Recently, my father died.  Not a terrifically big deal - he was 91 and frail.  And it ripped off the scabs and sent me spiralling into the wounds.  Again.  And I am 68 freaking years old!  It never ends, this healing.  I do know, however, if one never touches the wound, one never knows where one is wounded, and one never heals.  At least I'm working on it.  Every freaking day.