jensanity’s blog

The other day I had what I think is the most ludicrous fight that my husband and I have ever had.  (For that matter, it was the most ludicrous fight I've ever had with anyone.)  It all started because I committed the awful offense of being asleep. 

Some background: my husband is a much earlier riser than I am--and worse, he's a morning person.  I'm most definitely NOT a morning person--in fact, in college I'd curse and yell and scream at anyone who tried to wake me up, like my sweet college boyfriend and roommate.  To make it worse, I'd usually asked them to help me get up.  To make it even worse, I never had any memory of the horrible, soul-shriveling words I hurled at them prior to 9 a.m.  I've gotten a lot better since college, and my lifestyle usually doesn't allow me to sleep late, but still, I like to sleep in on the weekend, ya know?  Although seeping in these days is really a relative term, since I am almost always up by eight a.m., but my hubby likes to get up around six no matter what the day.  It's barbaric. 

He's also a psychiatrist and periodically trots out the psychobabble during arguments.  I've learned to spout it back to him, and we are both therapy people, so we usually have very reasoned fights where voices don't get raised but emotions are dealt with fairly logically and rationally.  If that fails, we either bring it up in our pro-active couples counseling, or with our individual therapists.  This has worked really well for us, and I believe has helped us strengthen and enhance our relationship in many ways.  But it does mean we usually have logical fights that, to the outside observer, would probably be pretty funny to hear.  What it doesn't mean is that either one of us is typically totally illogical.  I say typically, because this fight was illogical, irrational, and just plain nuts!

So, back to the story.  It was the weekend.  I was really looking forward to sleeping in, what with not being a morning person, and having been up actually pretty late on Friday night.  However, that Saturday morning, as usual, my husband was up early.  Usually he doesn't bug me and just lets me sleep.  But that morning he decided he'd get snuggly.  At 6:45 a.m.  I was half-awake, grumpy as all hell, and trying to ignore the world around me until at least 8 a.m. 

Then he actually touched me.

I'm not talking about a normal, "hey, how are you" pat on the arm, or even a "wow, you look so sexy with sleep in your eyes and morning breath" kind of caress.  This was a light, tickly touch right on the side of my stomach.  [This is the place where I am the MOST ticklish.  And I am VERY ticklish.] 

At this point, I should also add that I have a horrible phobia of spiders, especially spiders coming near me when I am asleep and least able to defend myself from their inherent creepiness.

So yes, you can see where this is going.  Fear of spiders + me being mostly asleep and very grumpy + sneaky, tickly sneak attack of husband hands = me shrieking at the top of my lungs, jumping frantically out of bed, wiping at my clothes, trying desperately not to kill anyone except the spider I thought was on me.

My husband however did NOT see it this way, nor did he see it with his normal, logical stance.  This led to a huge argument that went something like this:

Hubby: "I can't believe you reacted like that!  I was just trying to snuggle with you!"

Me: "YOU SCARED THE HELL OUT OF ME!  I thought it was a spider!"

Hubby: "Under the covers?"

Me: "Hell yes, under the covers!  How was I supposed to know that was you?  Why didn't you touch me normally, instead of all tickly like that??"

Hubby: "I *WAS* trying to touch you normally!  It's not my fault you freaked out!"

Me: [trying to calm down, doing deep breathing to slow the pounding of my heart down]  "But you really freaked me out!  I was asleep!  You know how ticklish I am!"

Hubby:  "I think your unconscious hates me!"

Me: "Wha???"

Hubby: "Seriously, your unconscious hates me!  Every time I try to touch you, you scream and freak out!"

Me: "Are you serious?  I do NOT freak out every time you touch me!  I was alseep!  I thought you were a spider!  You KNOW how scared I am of spiders, and you know that I'm not a morning person.  Besides, my unconscious does NOT hate you!  I should know!"

Hubby: "It does too!  You hate me touching you!  Not your conscious you, or even your subconscious you, but your UNCONSCIOUS you really does hate me!"

Me: [rolling eyes]  "This is when I don't like being married to a psychiatrist!"

Hubby: "I really think this is a problem!  I think we should talk about this in our couples therapy!"

Me: "Ok, I think that's a great idea!  Because my unconscious does NOT hate you!  I was freaked out because you touched me in the place I am the most ticklish, and I was asleep, and I thought you were a SPIDER!  There's nothing unconscious about that!"

Hubby: "So why do you freak out every time I touch you if it's not your unconscious hating me?"

Me, to self: "Is he really serious?"  To hubby: "Are you serious?????"

Hubby: "Yes."

Me: "Ok, I'll bring this up with my therapist, and we will talk about it in our couples therapy.  I really don't think my unconscious hates you but if you're this worried about it, we'll address it!!!"

HUbby: "NO!  Don't do that!  [sheepish]  I don't actually think your unconscious hates me.  But it really hurt my feelings that you reacted that way."

So there you have it.  The weirdest, most surreal fight I've ever had with anyone in my whole life! 

I was just searching the Vox stock photos for any interesting pictures of what humiliation might look like, and came across this one.  It was just too cute not to post!

 

I have unfortunately been away from my Vox for a while, due to things like Spring Break, spring cleaning, and mostly having people in my writing space.  It's not that I don't want my hubby or daughter to read my blog, but I just don't want them to read my blog!  This is MY space and I only write when I have the house to myself.  So, being as how the house has been full and life has been busy, I've had to take a hiatus.  However, during that hiatus, many things happened that will become (eventually) posts here.  So...here I go with the first one.

I was visiting my sisters over Spring Break and we were talking about the family stories that become family legends.  Every family has them, and every family trots these stories out at major family events.  (Remember the time that Uncle So and So was so drunk he fell off the chair at the wedding reception??)  Well, being as how my sisters and I have all been genetically endowed with blonde hair, and have had occasional idiot moments to justify our having said blonde hair, we got on that subject while we were hanging out.  What came up was one of my most blonde moments EVER.  I will tell you all the story now, but only if you promise to post your favorite blonde jokes in your comments as well.  (My fav: Why did the blonde climb over the glass wall?  To see what was on the other side, of course!

Now, without further ado, my own series of unfortunate (very blonde) events for your reading pleasure.

It was a dark and stormy night about five years ago.  (Ok, so it was a Sunday night, and it wasn't particularly stormy, but it was dark.)  It was about 9 p.m. on an early spring evening, and I had just closed the windows because it was cooling off after a very warm day.  I was tired and wanted to let the dogs out one more time, then go to bed.  So I called the two dogs, Madeleine (my beloved 7 year old german shepherd-golden retriever mix who was smart and sweet and well-trained) and Gracie, the new 2 year old foster golden retriever I'd only had for two days. 

Gracie was a character.  She was sweet-natured like most goldens,  but she was one of the most stubborn animals I've ever met.  If she didn't want to do something, there was no amount of coaxing, bribing, or food rewarding that you could do to make her cooperate.  I however was just learning this, and foolishly assumed she'd be like my well-behaved, well-trained dog.  Blonde mistake #1.

So I let them out.  I didn't think it through, but followed my usual protocol of letting my dog go down the stairs of our apartment building, out into the yard.  Madeleine always did what she needed to do and came right back up again.  Gracie, however, didn't know about this rule, so while I had the foresight to go downstairs with the dogs, and to let them out the front instead of into the back parking area, I only had the foresight to bring ONE leash.  And since I couldn't find my regular keys, I grabbed the single spare key I kept by the door.  Blonde mistake #2.

Well, predictably, things went horribly wrong the moment I let them out the door.  Madeleine went one way and Gracie went the other way.  Both started trotting down the sidewalk at a good clip, heading for the street--where there was a car rapidly bearing down upon them.  I panicked, and thought wildly, "WHICH DOG SHOULD I SAVE???  I love Madeleine so much, but darn it, Gracie doesn't belong to me!"  I figured then that if I hollered with enough panic in my voice, Madeleine would come to me (despite the 'come' command not being her strong point) and I should try to grab Gracie while I could.  Well, like previously mentioned, Gracie didn't do what Gracie didn't want to do.  So I had to pretty much tackle her out there on the grass next to the street, and struggle to get the leash on.  The leash that was in the same had as the spare key, I might add. 

Whew, crisis averted--Gracie was on the leash and Madeleine was by my side.  I walked Gracie up and down outside my windows because my daughter was asleep in the front room and I didn't want to leave her too alone.  (So we walked.  For 20 minutes.  As I was quickly learning, Gracie did not "produce on command" and took her own sweet time!)  Finally I was ready to take the dogs back in, so we opened the building door and headed upstairs to the apartment.  That was when I realized...Blonde moment #3...that I no longer had the key!  And since I'd been parading up and down the sidewalk, I had NO idea where I'd dropped it.

I panicked.  My daughter was asleep inside.  I had two dogs and one leash.  Both dogs would bolt if the door to the building was opened.  I tried to calm down and think.  I knocked on the neighbors' doors--no one in the whole building was home.  (6 apartments, Sunday night, not one other person home.  Go figure!)  Panicked some more.  Tried to calm down again and think logically.  First thought: I can just wake my daughter up by pounding on the door!  Her room was right off the living room, so she was at most about 15 feet from the door.  So I pounded.  And screamed.  And pounded and screamed.  And she didn't move.  At all.  (In fact, after I finally did get back into the apartment, she was still asleep in the same position I'd tucked her into!)

Next thought: I guess I'm going to have to humiliate myself and go ask a neighbor I haven't met!  I did in fact find a nice guy in the building next door who let me in and let me use his phone and phone book to call the local police on their non-emergency number.  Then I went to wait for the cops.

One officer showed up in minutes and began trying to pick the lock.  I was thoroughly humiliated by this point, and was just praying that he'd be able to get me in quickly.  But as I lived in an old building, it was not as easy to pick my door as I guess it could have been.  (And I was actually thankful for this later!)  So meanwhile, I'm trying to make small talk and feeling like I wished I could just melt into the floor, and I hear sirens.  Big sirens.  Like someone had a house on fire sirens.  So I say to the cop, "Wow, something big must have happened!  I wonder what those sirens are for!"  And he replies, "Oh, by the way, the fire department will probably come because your daughter is locked inside."  To which I stammered, "Oh, you don't think THAT'S them, do you?" He reassuringly replied, "Nah, they wouldn't put on their sirens for something like this."

But of course, it WAS them.  They screeched to a halt in front of my building, sirens going and lights flashing, and hopped out.  Soon my cop friend was joined by two burly firefighters wearing shorts and firefighter boots and jackets.  (It had been a really warm day.)  They asked if there were any windows open, to which I replied no, that I had most efficiently closed them before locking myself out.  They went off to double check.  (In retrospect, I probably would have done the same thing, but I was pissed they didn't believe me!)  Meanwhile, the cop was still picking away.  Firefighters come back, proceed to help the cop, and finally, after about 30 minutes, three men, and much humiliation on my part, they managed to take my lock apart, take the whole lock off the door, and get me back into my apartment.  I have never been so thankful to get home in my life!  And at that point, I was so relieved I thought the ordeal was over.  Blonde mistake #4.

The two dogs, who the whole time had been just hanging around, flew back into the apartment.  Madeleine settled in her usual comfy spot while Gracie went to go get a drink.  (Since she'd been with me for only two days at that point, I hadn't yet learned of another one of her quirks, which was to drink a whole bowl of water, then promptly throw up the entire contents of her stomach.  She'd already done it once, but I figured it was just her adjusting to our food and the new surroundings.  Only much later did I see the pattern.)  Anyway, she chose that time to go suck down the whole bowl of water.  Satisfied, she wandered back into the living room where the three men were now trying to put the lock back together, while I was telling them over and over again how much I appreciated their help.  Gracie sidled up to one of the firefighters, who idly scratched her head.  She looked contented...but then quite suddenly, RAWLF, threw up the food she'd eaten earlier along with all of the water.  All. Over. The. Firefigter's. Boots.

Humiliation complete. 

I am sure those guys went back to their station houses and laughed and laughed for days!

The worst part?  I found the key on the grass in the morning right in front of our building.  The VERY worst part?  I was telling my mom about the evening on the phone the next day, and she said, "Well, why on earth didn't you call me?  I have your key right here!"  I had totally forgotten I'd given her a copy.

So there you have it, my most blonde moment ever. 

 

I love reading Yahoo first thing in the morning.  I always find some worthy tidbit to brighten my day, engage my mind, or freak me out.  Yesterday it was Caffeine Awareness Month.  Today it's a tale of one country invading another for absolutely no reason.

Oh no, you say, that sounds serious!  The last time something like that happened, Iraq descended into anarchy and civil war!  Wow, what are we in for next?!?! 

Because I can sense the anxiety levels rising all around the globe upon this announcement, let me reassure you that the US is not going to war again because of this.

(In fact, if I hadn't read this in Yahoo News, I would have thought that this was something written by The Onion.)  So, to reassure any anxious readers out there, I am going to post the Yahoo News article (originally from the AP) below:

Swiss accidentally invade Liechtenstein

Ok, HOW FUNNY IS THIS???  I can't stop laughing!  Let's analyze:

• The Swiss are pacifists and are always neutral in wars, yet invaded another country--even better, by mistake.
  

  Off to Invade Liechtenstein--don't worry, home by dinner
• Yet, no one noticed them even being there.  If the Swiss weren't so upstanding (and ready to admit their almost embarrasing accidental invasions to the world press), the fact that no one noticed they were there might make them even bolder next time.  They might accidentally get 1.5 miles in!  Think of the international non-outrage that would spark!
• Liechtenstein doesn't even have an army or marked borders, so in "she was wearing sexy clothes" logic, they were kinda almost asking to be invaded, no?
• Don't the Swiss Army knives (which I do believe originated with the Swiss Army) have compasses???
• And the best yet, the first paragraph which says, "What began as a routine training exercise almost ended in an embarrasing diplomatic incident".  It was only ALMOST embarrasing?  I'd think the fact that it's now international news makes it pretty darn embarrasing!!

I bet the Liechtenstiener authorities who received the call from the Swiss authorities probably were laughing too hard to say anything for a good long time.  And after they finished laughing they were probably so glad to have had such a good laugh at the expense of their very respectable and much larger neighbors that they probably thought, "Ok, we'll let them off the hook this time.  But if they do it again...we'll stop buying their chocolate!  And their watches!  That'll show them!"

I could go on and on.  Ya just can't make this stuff up!  I will be laughing about this for days.

So I have a burning question brought on by yesterday's caffeine research.  I read that the half life of caffeine is six hours.  So...reaching back to my high school math and chemistry (and that was a good long time ago), that would lead me to believe the following scenario is true:

8 a.m.  Drink coffee with 100 mg of caffeine in it.  Caffeine levels at 100 mg.

2 p.m.  Six hours later, no additional caffeine intake in the interim.  Caffeine levels at 50 mg.

8 p.m.  Another six hours have passed.  No additional caffeine intake.  Caffeine levels at 25 mg.

2 a.m.  Another six hours have passed.  No additional caffeine intake.  Caffeine levels at 12.5 mg.

8 a.m.  Assuming no additional caffeine intake, caffeine levels from the day before are at 6.25 mg.

If this is correct, this means that we start each day out with residual caffeine from whatever we've had the day before, and that just rapidly compounds.  For instance, to continue the example above:

8 a.m. on day 2: starting caffeine intake 6.25.  Additional coffee = 100 mg.  Total current caffeine at 106.25

2 p.m. on day 2: caffeine at 53.125 mg

8 p.m. on day 2: caffeine at 26.5625 mg

2 a.m. on day 2: caffeine at 13.28125

And so on.  And I admit, I'm a total Excel geek so I actually did model this.  Turns out that if this scenario continued just as above, after six days you'd pretty much equalize at levels only slightly higher than those of day 2.  So perhaps it's not the apocalyptic, earth-shattering problem I thought it was, but it still freaks me out that I've got residual caffeine left in me from perhaps even years of caffeine indulgences. 

And those binges--well, those stay with you for a long time too!  For example, over the weekend I went on a car trip.  I can't drive long distances without massive amounts of caffeine.  So I had like three 20 oz Diet Cokes on Friday on the way there, and again on Sunday on the way back, plus a higher than normal caffeination rate on Saturday while I was actually there.  Which means that today, five days after returning, I am sure I still have a lot of caffeine from the weekend doing the half-life shuffle out of my system.

Man, thinking about caffeine as a chemical rather than as part of something to enjoy really does kill the buzz.

Anyone want to challenge my logic and make my week by telling me that the half life of caffeine, instead of working like I modeled it above, actually does the simple 100 mg - 6 hours = 50 mg - 6 hours = ZERO?  Please?

I just learned from Yahoo that today, March 1st, starts Caffeine Awareness Month. 

I admit that my overactive imagination is having a ball trying to figure out what Caffeine Awareness Month would actually l ook like.  I think it'd probably look a lot like a dorm lounge during finals week, with everyone's hands wrapped around coffee mugs and eyes bugging from popping No-Doz.  We'd all just sit around, buzzing with all the caffeine, and say, "Dude, I am like TOTALLY aware of my caffeine now!"   But I'm not sure how many of us aren't already aware of caffeine and its effects.  I am usually plenty aware that it's the best drug I'm addicted to, and that I am seriously addicted to it.  However, in honor of Caffeine Awareness Month, I'll become more aware.  Sort of like the old "Of course I watch what I eat--I watch the fork move from the plate to my mouth" line, I'll be more aware of every single sip of that wonderful caffeinated elixir of life that I drink every morning.  (*grin*)  

That actually makes it sound like I'm a huge coffee junky or something, but the tame, boring truth is that I drink green tea.  Tazo Green Ginger tea, one 14 oz. cup every morning to be exact.  Yum.  I used to be a huge coffee addict, but over time it agrees with me less and less, and keeps me awake at night more and more.  I blame it on one reckless day of wanton espresso consumption when I was a manager for a coffee shop and had been working open to close for nearly a week since we were short employees.  I was so tired that I was afraid I'd fall asleep in the car on the way home, so another employee (who was in the midst of exams and also extremely tired) and I decided to do espresso shots.  Yep, shots, like you'd do with tequila. 

So, we brewed our espresso, lined up our shot glasses, and downed 'em.  We each made it through six shots in one hour.  I felt like every molecule in my body was vibrating at a frequency that could shatter glass--and I STILL fell asleep at a stoplight going home!  But I think that was the point at which my then 23 year-old body said, "ya know, we've been having a lot of fun together for years, and you've mostly respected me.  And while I really do enjoy the occasional cup of coffee, I think you might have just gone over the top with SIX espresso shots on top of your THREE grande triple lattes earlier.  I think I might just disrespect you when YOU least expect is and mix it up on you a bit so that in a few years I'll throw you for a loop and stop actually being able to digest the coffee.  I think, in return for your wanton excesses today, I'll make you throw up in a few years when you drink coffee.  Or give you some really uncomfortable stomach cramps.  And just for the heck of it, I'll throw in some "gastrointestinal distress"  BWAHAHAHAHA!" 

So, since about the age of 30, I've avoided coffee pretty regularly.  Every now and again I'll get the urge to have a cup o' joe because I still do love it.  Oh, how I Iove it.  But every single time I'm reminded why I can't enjoy it any more. 

The day after Thanksgiving 2006 my sister was brewing some organic fair trade coffee and it smelled so good.  I thought, "why not?  How bad could one cup of coffee be?  I haven't had any in nearly a year--I'll give it a shot."  (Oh, the hubris, the denial, the insanity...)  So I had a cup of coffee at 8 a.m.  It was strong.  It was delicious.  And I was up until 3 a.m. the next morning WIDE AWAKE.  Plus I had all of the other nasty side affects I'd conveniently forgotten about.  So, that's it.  Me and coffee--we're definitely broken up this time for good.  I will not get lured again by that particular bad boy.  But I know I'll be tempted and I know I'll be weak, especially when I start to fantazise again when I smell that delicious aroma! 

So now I drink very tame (but tasty) tea because I really am addicted to caffeine.  Me in the morning without caffeine is not a pretty sight--think Dawn of the Dead, corpses lying around rotting, me walking around going "unnnnhhh.  UNNNNHHHH!"  Me in the morning *with* caffeine--I'm all birds singing, butterflies flitting, blue skies, and dancing animals.  (Ok, so maybe I'm not quite like that.)  I am NOT a morning person, but me with caffeine makes it actually possible for me to talk to my husband and daughter in sentences rather than grunts.  It makes it possible for me to open my eyes while driving.  It makes it possible for me to remember the way to work or to the grocery store or to the school and not intentionally hit anyone with my car on the way there, just because they looked at me wrong.   In other words, it makes me human enough not to get divorced by my husband or abandoned by my daughter or sued by random strangers.  (True story: in college, I would ask my poor, poor, poor wonderful morning person boyfriend to wake me up in the morning.  He'd gamely try to wake me up, but in my I-am-really-SPECTACULARLY-not-a-morning-person-state I would scream obscenities at him and never realize I was doing it.  I wouldn't even WAKE UP to scream the obscenities at him--I'd just scream them at him while asleep and keep on sleepin'.  He finally told me what I was doing and I was appalled.  I think I was so mean when I was asleep that I made him cry a couple of times!  Amazing he didn't break up with me over that...he was a saint.  So that is how I know I am NOT a morning person and not fit for human company until I have some caffeine!)

So I am happy to see Caffeine Awareness Month.  I want more caffeine!  Unfortunately I think the powers that be mean that we should be more aware of the negative aspects of caffeination.  Like that our kids get too much caffeine, and that 90% of American adults are regular consumers of caffeine.  Like that there is caffeine in a lot of products that seem to be harmless: medicines; orange soda (and this is one of my personal pet peeves--like oranges have caffeine naturally?  Obviously they've added it so we get addicted and buy more of their product, duh, but they are targeting kids and that pisses me off!); chocolate, including chocolate milk, favorite beverage of all children and children-at-heart in my house; even decaf coffee, which also contains potential carcinogens (lovely!).

 The Yahoo feature had a lot of interesting info.  For instance, at http://www.caffeineawareness.org/quiz.htm I found the following tidbits:

• When caffeine enters your body, your pupils dilate, your heart beats faster, your muscles tighten, and blood vessels in your hands and feet constrict.  (There's a really interesting discussion of the chemical and biological reactions that cause this at this other website.)  Also, caffeine is very similar to cocaine, heroine, and methamphetamines in the way that your brain gets manipulated--they all make your body produce dopamine, which stimulates your brain's pleasure center.  This of course makes these things addictive.
• Caffeine consumption any time during the day is very likely to disrupt sleep.  Caffeine affects the ability of your nerves in your brain to take in a chemical which causes sleepiness.  (This explains why my last cup of coffee at 8 a.m. had me wide awake until 3 a.m...)  And apparently those of us who can't live without our caffeine are less likely to sleep deeply and well than those who aren't addicted.  I thought I didn't sleep deeply and well because of stress and sleeping patterns learned when my daughter was a baby, but turns out it could be my green tea after all...
• The most amazing fact I learned from the quiz was that the caffeine from a single cup of coffee (or caffeinated beverage) stays in your body for more than SIX hours!  Apparently caffeine has a half life of about six hours.  So if your morning 16 oz grande coffee has about 300 mg of caffeine in it, six hours later you will still have 150 mg of caffeine left in your body.  (In comparison, one 16 oz serving of Diet Coke has only about 70 mg of caffeine in it.)

I also found this way cool website (courtesy of Yahoo's article) that discusses all the ways in which our consumer culture is going caffeine crazy.  Some of these sound like  they were fueled by some serious late night, coffee drenched, gotta-come-up-with-a-cool-new-product-before-the-deadline-in-the-morning-so-let's-throw-out-crazy-ideas stress.  For instance, 7-11 is making a caffeinated slurpee with an extra shot of pure caffeine on the side!  And there's apparently going to be a new, more caffeinated version of Diet Pepsi, said to be targeted at Mountain-Dew-aholics who are growing concerned about their figures.  And just in case you aren't getting enough caffeine in your slurpees or sodas, you can now get caffeinated sunflower seeds.  Mmmm, just think what fun those could have added to your Super Bowl party!

I'm not sure after reading all of this whether I'm going to go drink a lot more caffeine, or quit tomorrow and suffer that agonizing, agonizing withdrawal headache.  I suppose I should ask my family for their input on this, too, since they are the ones who might suffer bodily harm as I detox and adjust to being a non-caffeinated morning person.  Unnnnnhhhh, UNNNNNHHHH!

A week and a half ago, my husband had an endoscopy to check for stomach issues and to take a biopsy for celiac disease.  It was quite a day!  (It was the same day I saw the Heidi Chronicles...)  Suffice it to say, I hope he doesn't have another procedure done for a long, long, long, long, long time.  He was quite a pill!  Although it was a very trying day, it is actually rather funny in retrospect.  Also, this should perhaps be read as a cautionary tale of trying to have conversations when one person has taken heavy amnesiac-type drugs (Versed, aka "loopy drugs") for the procedure and might still be a bit under their influence!  Here are the details...

He had to be at the hospital at 6:30 a.m. on a Saturday morning, so he got up really early and I dropped him off.  The hospital happens to be all of about a block and a half from our house, but it was bitterly cold so I thought I'd be nice and take him.  He directed me to the West entrance of the hospital, told me very clearly that this was the correct entrance, that he didn't want me to come with him (and anyway, since I could get there in about 2 minutes flat while walking, I could be "on call" from home very easily), gave me a kiss, and disappeared into the hospital.  We knew that the prep and waiting prior to the procedure would take a couple of hours, so I didn't expect to hear from him until around 10 a.m. or so, and went back home to bed.

Sure enough, at 9:55 a.m. the phone rang.  It was the recovery nurse, and she said my husband was nearly ready to go and did well during the procedure.  I told her I could be there in five minutes, but she said she still had to give him discharge papers and post-op instructions so I should aim for about 10:15 or 10:20.  I got to the East entrance of the hospital at 10:19 and he was waiting.  I helped him into the car, then asked the nurse if there were any instructions I needed to know to help with his recovery.  She indicated that she'd gone over everything with him and he had the written directions with him too, but that he should eat a light meal upon getting home, then gradually resume regular activity and eating throughout the day--with the noteable exception of driving or operating heavy machinery.  She also said that he'd specifically requested pancakes and she had ok'd a meal of pancakes.  I said I'd make them for him, no problem.  I thanked her, and away we went.

Once in the car, my husband proceeded to flip out because he couldn't find his pager.  He's a doctor so he has a cell phone, a pager, and a digital calendar/assistant and is ALWAYS misplacing one of these.  I stopped (we'd gotten all of about 25 feet) and he frantically looked through his bag of belongings, pockets, etc.  The pager was found in a pocket, all was well, and we continued our short journey home.  At that point I thought to myself, "boy, he must still be feeling the loopy drugs that they gave him!"

When we arrived home, I made him pancakes, ate with him, and sat down to watch tv with him.  He promptly fell asleep.  I sat with him while he slept for about an hour and a half, then decided to check e-mail.  Within 15 minutes of my going up to the computer, he came up and said, "You left me!  I could have died!  You were supposed to keep an eye on me!  Do you want me to DIE???"  To which I answered, "You were breathing, you were fine, and I've been here for ten minutes!", complete with full eye roll for emphasis. 

He quietly kept me company for a little while as I read news and played on the computer, then I asked him if he'd been waiting long when I picked him up.  [I should note at this point that I frequently have a hard time telling when he is joking or not, so I tend to take what he says very seriously.]  He said he'd been waiting for a very long time before I arrived and that the nurse said that I must be his ex-wife, since ex-wives were always late and good wives who were still married to their husbands were always early.  Then he added that I'd even dropped him off at the wrong entrance of the hospital so he'd had to walk FOREVER to get to the correct place and I should have known to drop him off at the East entrance instead of the West entrance.  (This despite the fact that he'd told me to go to the West entrance and was sure it was the correct one!)  I got a bit pissed off at this, especially since I'd been following his directions, the nurse's orders, and had even made him pancakes for breakfast.

We went downstairs again and I told him I was going to the play that night, and asked if he thought he'd be able to go or not.  He said he thought he'd rather stay home and watch movies, and by the way, could I drive him to Blockbuster to get some?  I said sure, and away we went.  But not until he located his pager again--with much drama yet again.  It went something like this:

Hubby: "Oh God, I lost my pager again!  It was in my bag of belongings from the hospital and NOW IT'S NOT THERE!"

Me: "Um, no, it was in your pocket in the car.  We had this same discussion when I picked you up.  Do you remember that?"

Hubby: "Uh, no.  But I remember putting my pager in the bag!  Are you sure it wasn't in the bag earlier?"

Me: "Yes, I clearly remember that.  We talked about it in the car, and I talked to the nurse when I picked you up too.  That's how I knew you wanted pancakes!  Did you know that?  I guess those were some pretty good loopy drugs, ha ha!  Did you look in every single one of your pockets, coat included?  Your pager is probably still there."

Hubby (panic in voice): "BUT THE PAGER ISN'T IN MY POCKETS!  I CHECKED!"

Me: "Think about where you've been.  You've only been on the couch and upstairs.  Check in the couch cushions and upstairs in the chair you were sitting in."

Hubby (running frantically upstairs): "OH!  It's up here.  I guess you were right--I must have taken it out of my pocket when I came up here.  I didn't remember that!"

Me: eye roll to self, big sigh, thinking that he's acting a bit like a child and those loopy drugs must really, really, really have been strong...

And off we went to Blockbuster.  Hubby took forever picking out three movies, then--despite my having told him I needed to get home to get ready for the play--decided to sign up for the Blockbuster video by mail club (aka their version of NetFlix).  Despite our having researched this previously and decided to sign up at home, he fell prey to the THREE Blockbuster employees tag-teaming him.  This was also despite my very clear statements that we didn't have time and that he was not supposed to make big decisions due to having had a procedure earlier and still being under the sway of the anesthesia drugs that they'd given him.  I came across as a major prissy uptight mother-person, while he came across as the cool "dude, let's get the movies" spontaneous type.  I just don't like to fall for the hard sell, especially on a time crunch.  But he went for it, and I did try to voice my objections.  One of his worries, which I mentioned to him, had been that NetFlix has a much higher number of titles in their library than Blockbuster does.  So when I mentioned this, the "helpful" Blockbuster hardseller told us that truly the major difference was that NetFlix's library had a lot of pornography and theirs didn't. 

At this point, Hubby turns to me and VERY LOUDLY says, "Jen, do you think you can live without your PORN?!???"  And yes, heads swiveled, people looked (and I'm sure smirked!), and I blushed crimson.  I know he was kidding, and he later did admit that the loopy drugs somehow must have disabled his "appropriate conversation" filter, but it was about the most embarrasing thing he's ever done to me.  Especially since I don't even touch the NetFlix queue because he yelled at me for putting too many children's movies on the queue and keeping the movies too long.  (I wasn't efficient enough with my movie viewing or queue management, apparently!)  So, after the negative feedback about my handling of our NetFlix account, I left it all to him.  Ironic, eh?

And the porn comment was the straw that broke my very patient camel's back.  I got VERY angry and told him I didn't appreciate how he'd been treating me all day and that I was now late and would have to skip some very important things I had wanted to do before the play (like actually take a shower and get ready), all because he was so all-fired excited about the stupid Blockbuster video club that he couldn't wait to do it later even though I didn't even want to deal with that right now, and that he wasn't listening to me or respecting how hard I'd been trying to make him comfortable and keep him company and take care of him and I'd really been trying REALLY HARD to take care of him and give him TLC all day but all he'd done was give me grief and tell me I was a bad wife.  I am sure that the Blockbuster employees (all male, by the way) were thinking I was totally insane at this point!  (Hmm, porn addict, unstable personality, control issues...they probably had a great time psychoanalyzing our conversation, LOL!)

So while I sulked, he finished with the signup, and we left.  Then he pulled the trump card out.  He said, "I didn't realize I was causing you so much trouble and you didn't want to deal with me.  Just take me to my mother's.  SHE'LL TAKE CARE OF ME."

Why is it that men know that they can throw that out and that we'll always, always rise to the bait?

I told him that was ridiculous.  I could very easily take care of him, and he could come to the play no problem--he had a ticket, and we wanted him to be there and it would be better than staying home and watching movies.  He insisted upon going to his mother's, this time not only because he could be taken care of by her, but that way he'd also have someone to watch the movies with him.  (ARGH!)  We fought and fought until we got home, at which point he said, "FORGET IT.  If you won't take me to my mother's, I'll just drive myself!"  I threw up my hands and said in a murderous tone, "FINE.  I WON'T GO TO THE PLAY AND I WILL STAY HOME AND BE A "GOOD WIFE" AND WAIT ON YOU HAND AND FOOT!" 

I think that got through to him a bit because he did calm down, agree not to drive himself to his mother's, and come out to dinner after the play with my friend and me.  I calmed down after I'd bitched to my friend for about 1/2 hour, getting lots of sympathy from her.  Then I realized how ludicrous the whole thing was and realize now that it was really pretty funny and that not only am I a drama queen, but my husband is too! 

And the moral of the story is: next time my husband has loopy drugs, I'm dropping him off at his mother's right after the procedure and going to the spa.  *GRIN*

Saturday night I went to the theater to see The Heidi Chronicles.  I thoroughly enjoyed it, but have been having a "theater hangover" ever since.  My imagination is very active and I tend to get easily drawn in to the world of books, movies, or plays.  When I do, I feel as if my "real" life is only a dream and the world of the play or movie or book is more real.  It is very easy for me to inhabit these other realities.  [In fact, after seeing the movie Jurassic Park for the first time, I was so drawn in to that world that I was CONVINCED that there were raptors following me or waiting behind closed doors--for three weeks.  Even though I knew it was not humanly or physically possible for there to be raptors waiting inside my car or in the garage or behind my bedroom door, I kept expecting to be jumped by one at any moment!]  So suffice it to say that I can't watch horror movies, and I usually feel like I've woken up from a very real dream when I finish a book or movie or play.  The stories and characters stay with me for a while and I even miss spending time with them, especially if it's a story I've really enjoyed.  That's how it was for me during The Heidi Chronicles.  I'd heard a great deal about this play for years, and have always wanted to see it.  I think it must be one of my most favorite theater experiences ever--the play was THAT good.  And it was one of those experiences where I did get completely drawn into the world and the emotions of the characters.  Part of that was good acting, but the majority of it was how wonderfully written the play was, and how fully realized the characters were.

For those of you not familiar with the play, it's by Wendy Wasserstein and was first performed in 1988.  It was considered a feminist play at the time; it generated a lot of controversy, even within the feminist movement.  The main character, Heidi Holland, grows up in the '60s and the play follows her from the early '60s through until the '80s.  It shows how her relationships grow and change, and very realistically shows her interactions with her female friends and two male friends, one a gay pediatrician who is her best friend, and the second a journalist with whom she has an on-again, off-again affair.  Throughout the play, Heidi is more often observing the events around her and commenting on them, instead of participating.  Only at the end of the play does she actually begin participating in the events of her life.  There is a very obvious dichotomy between Heidi and the rest of the characters, who go through their "lives" doing much more acting than thinking.  Heidi always seems somehow separate from the action, as if she doesn't really know where she belongs.  It is for this reason that so many women identify with her character, I think.

I certainly identified with the character of Heidi.  For years I've felt like it was much easier to just go where the path led me, rather than try to figure out how to get what I really wanted.  Watching Heidi clumsily navigate career, friends, relationships, and the attendant complications, I realized I was really watching my own life up there on the stage.  I felt as attached to and responsible for Heidi's decisions as I do my own.  In other words, I had the realization that, just like Heidi, I've been an observer in my own life for a large part of it, rather than actively participating and directing my choices and my direction.

The irony is that I am more aware of this fact now than I ever have been.  Since my miscarriage in October, I've felt like something huge wasn't right in my life and I couldn't go back to life the way it was before the miscarriage.  It has slowly dawned on me that I've given away the responsibility for my decisions for a long, long time; as a result I don't know where I am in relation to where I want to be.  In fact, I don't even know where I want to be or who I want to be.  For sure, I have some wonderful things in my life that I don't want to lose, like my family and friends.  But I feel aimless and unfulfilled professionally and personally.  My friends and family are absolutely wonderful and I cherish them, but I can't let them define me.  I have to define myself and I've lost the vocabulary to do so.  Part of the reason the miscarriage was so hard for me (and that I think it has led to this reevaluation of my life) is because for so long I've wanted to define myself as a mother.  Only as a mother.  When I lost the baby, I lost the chance to define myself in the way I'd been planning to.  Now I have to figure out who I am outside of that role of mother.  Am I a business analyst like I was at my last job?  Am I a social worker, like I wanted to be when I started grad school?  Am I a writer or a poet, since that is one of my true passions?  Am I an artist, since that's a passion too?  Do I follow my passions, or follow the money trail back into the business world?  Do I go back to school or not?  How do I reconcile the need (and it IS an imperative need) to figure out how to feel like I have a meaningful and satisfying life with the other imperative needs of housing, food, clothing, transportation, etc.?  (And how is this NOT a midlife crisis???)

I realized something else the other night after the play.  I've been having crazy, vivid, intense dreams since the miscarriage and have been paying attention to them because I know I'm working through a lot of stuff on many levels.  For the last two to three weeks I've been having dream after dream after dream about remodeling houses.  Most of the dreams involved major structural renovation of houses, including moving walls and stairwells--we're talking major construction.  I know the dreams are not about any literal projects since we're not planning to do any major remodeling in our home (although I'd like to finally get my dining room painted!).  I finally realized that these dreams are trying to tell me to start that personal remodeling project I've been putting off.  Like Heidi, I need to be a participant in my life rather than just an observer.  I need to remodel my life to make full use of all those closed-off spaces and dusty corners, rather than condemning myself to live in a ramshackle life built by other people.  And it will be most definitely be a major construction project full of relocating staircases and tearing down walls.  (I think the dreams were a pretty brilliant subconscious metaphor, actually!)

So I guess I need to start drawing up some blueprints and gathering some paint chips.  It's time to finally start building that dream life.

 

At dinner tonight my husband informed me that I had to sew a tennis ball into his shirt tomorrow.  Just like that, with no explanation.  I looked at him like he'd gone bonkers and waited for more info.  It turns out that his physical therapist believes he has something called thoracic outlet syndrome, which causes my husband's arms to fall asleep in the middle of the night, which then usually wakes him up and has been making him very tired and grumpy.  This happens because some muscles or something in the area of his thoracic spine are compressing the blood vessels and nerves that go to his hands.  He learned in PT tonight that he can replicate this by pushing his chest forward and lifting his shoulders back, as if he were squeezing them towards his spine.  This causes him to have absolutely no pulse in his wrists at all.  Not good!

He has tried any number of remedies to help this problem, having suffered from this now for over a year.  We've spent a small fortune on orthopedic pillows, three different orthopedic arm/elbow braces, wrist braces by the dozen (or so it seems), wedge pillows, etc.  His closet is a veritable Frankenstein's laboratory of discarded devices that seem to hold the shape of the arm or hand they cradled.  (It's creepy.)  But of course, none of them have worked because they are treating the result of the problem, not the cause of the problem.  The physical therapy is hopefully going to help the cause, if my husband can keep up with the home exercise regimen.  (He did PT once before and it did help, but once he slacked on the home exercises, we ended up back at square one.  I hope he gets more serious about the exercises this time...)

So the tennis ball sewn into his shirt is supposed to make it uncomfortable for him to turn onto his stomach, which is his usual sleeping position and causes his shoulders to flex the wrong way, which in turn causes his blood flow to be cut off to his hands. 

As I am usually up for interesting challenges, I of course said I'd sew the tennis ball into the shirt.  We then discussed whether tennis balls were the best deterrent, as they have a distinct, rather unpleasant smell.  He suggested a styrofoam ball, but due to our recent purchase of a Tempur-Pedic bed, I think the styrofoam would be too squishy by itself, and in combination with the bed would not be a deterrent at all because he bed would probably just accomodate the styrofoam ball and he'd roll over and sleep as if nothing were there.  We decided raquetballs were probably the best since they have no "tennis ball" smell, yet have more give then a tennis ball but are firmer than a styrofoam ball.  Of course, the problem of the bed is still there, but hopefully the raquetballs will still provide enough discomfort despite the cushy bed absorbing most of it.

I asked him if he wanted two or four balls sewn in.  I was thinking that one on each side, or possibly two on each side, would make it much less comfortable to roll over.  He looked at me as if I'd sprouted horns or something, and told me he didn't need to have boobs, he just wanted "ONE BALL.  SEWN IN THE MIDDLE.  THANK YOU VERY MUCH."  I snorted and almost fell off my chair laughing--the image of him with a t-shirt on with a uni-boob was just too much.  Then I imagined how it would actually look to have him with two, or even four and laughed harder!  He was laughing with me and threw out the next great suggestion--I could just loan him a bra, and he'd stick a ball in each side and sleep like that.  (Funny image and therapy issues aside, it's a pretty genius solution!)  He says he's telling his physical therapist about the "manssiere with balls" idea at his appointment tomorrow. :D

This "uni-boob" discussion made me think of a discussion we had at Thanksgiving, in the same similarly surreal and ludicrous vein.  The Turkey Day conversation was about a recipe for some wonderful meatloaf muffins, and included more family members so it was even more entertaining.  It all started when I got the recipe for the meatloaf muffins from a bulletin board friend.  I made them for my husband one night and we both loved them.  Since I needed to feed more houseguests at Thanksgiving, I thought I'd make them again.  So I told my husband I was going to make them again, and we started to talk about how good they were.

All of the sudden, he says, "I don't think we should call them meatloaf muffins, though. I mean, when you make a banana nut loaf and use the same recipe to make muffins, you don't call them banana nut LOAF muffins, you just call them banana nut muffins. We should call them MEAT muffins, not MEATLOAF muffins."

This started a serious discussion amongst our whole family over the Thanksgiving weekend about what to call this recipe. The discussion went on all weekend and totally cracked me up. In fact, it quickly degenerated into a total giggle fest for everyone.

Official recipe name: Rachel Ray's Meatloaf Muffins with Barbecue Sauce

My husband's original name change suggestion: meat muffins. (My objection: I do NOT think about meatloaf shaped and baked in a muffin pan when I hear the words "meat muffins".)

Next iteration: beef muffins. (Again, I am really, really, really not thinking dinner when I hear this.)

Next suggestion: beef cupcakes. (I couldn't even respond, I was laughing so hard.)

Next suggestion: cow cupcakes. (Now we're going in a totally different, still unappetizing direction!)

Next suggestion (for hamburgers, which got into the conversation because they are related): cow patties.

I will never look at meatloaf muffins or hamburgers again the same way!

Interestingly, the name suggestions all came from the guys. The women in the group (even my then 9 year-old daughter) were all united in thinking that "meatLOAF muffins" was still the best name for the recipe. I think the men in our group didn't see why we might have other associations with some of the names they proposed...  ha ha ha!

So I can just see what is in store for me in the near future: a dinner of cow cupcakes followed by a night with a man with a uni-boob...

Some random thoughts this morning:

1.  I survived the sleep-over party!  The girls were actually pretty darn good, pretty darn cute, and not even terribly loud.  They played games, made a giant fort in the living room, ate dinner and cake, watched movies, played dress up, and went to sleep at the early hour of 1 a.m.  Not bad, not bad.  One of the girls even found a dress she loved in our dress up box, and told me she wanted to borrow it to use as her wedding dress!  It's a mauve bridesmaids dress from about 1972 with matching dyed shoes.  The whole outfit (shoes too) is made out of viscose or some pseudo-satin polyester fabric.  Too funny!  And my husband survived the estrogen-fest of six human females and two canine females in the house.  He was seriously outnumbered for a while!

2.  I also survived the family birthday dinner the night after the sleepover!  When you add together my family and my husband's family, you get at least 15 people, so family dinners are something you have to plan for.  I am not used to successfully pulling off dinners for that many people, but I did it.  And I made quite the yummy feast.  I was proud of myself.  :)  I had a revelation during the dinner, too.  I was looking around at my family and his, hanging out together talking pleasantly, and I realized--I have the family I always wanted.  To explain: I have issues with my own parents (who doesn't?) but have been working hard to accept them as the imperfect people they are.  It's hard, and I don't frequently feel thankful for them, as awful as that sounds.  But in looking around, I saw my mom in the context of the larger family, and was very happy at that moment to have her there amongst all those other wonderful people there celebrating my daughter's existence.  We also have such a diverse family.  We have it all--religious diversity, age/generational diversity, people with disabilities, sexual orientation diversity, etc.--even racial diversity, since I count my friends as part of my family, and I have a diverse set of friends, too.  As I have always wanted my daughter to grow up in a diverse environment so she could learn to look past the stereotypes to the individual and enjoy people from a variety of backgrounds and experiences, I was thrilled to realize that without even consciously trying, I had achieved the diverse environment I'd always wanted.  Not only that, but I really love these people.

3.  Happy Valentine's Day.  Why is is that even the most happily, most comfortably married among us feel the need to trot out the romance and flowers and champagne, and feel somehow invalidated if we don't make a big deal out of this day?  I value the comfort and intimacy of my marriage far more than the butterflies in the stomach, risks, and possibilities of new romance, but Valentine's Day makes me feel inadequate!  LIke I'm not romantic enough, not sexy enough, not "in love" enough.  I don't usually worry that I settled, that my husband is not my soul mate, that I made a mistake, but for some reason today I feel really insecure.  

We're way past that hot-passion-fireworks-and-longing-glances phase and into the comfy jammies and socks with holes phase.  We've gotten past that crazy-in-love phase and are now comfortable with each other outside of the bounds of conventional romance.  We have a shorthand language that includes the fireworks and heat of our early relationship, but includes also the many other experiences we've had that have deepened our connection.  We have real intimacy and real acceptance of each other.  (I think this is what a real relationship is all about--and I love it.  But I still miss the romance occasionally!) 

I looked at my husband the other night as we snuggled into our new king-sized Tempur-pedic bed bought because we both have back problems, and noticed that he had on his wrist guards for his carpal tunnel syndrome, his Breathe-Right strip for his snoring, was lying on his orthopedically correct memory foam pillow reading a book about the Iraq war, and wearing his comfy sweats with his t-shirt tucked into them.  I laughed (but only to myself, as I didn't want to hurt his feelings) at the image of stodgy middle age that I thought he (we!) rather portrayed  and thought that I probably didn't look much better in my baggy, comfy, worn-out sweatshirt with holes in it, and my sweatpants, with my own orthopedically correct memory foam pillow and non-fiction book.  I thought, "So this is it, this is where romance has gone--it's turned into wrist splits, snoring remedies, and comfortable clothes!"  But I now realize that when I looked at my husband the other night and laughed to myself, it wasn't because I saw a middle-aged, slightly overweight, kinda nerdy guy with health issues (although he is those things too)--I laughed because despite those things, I saw the man who made my stomach lurch and my face flush so many years ago.  I guess I need to remind myself of that more frequently--that the man who swept me off my feet before I started wearing orthopedically correct, comfortable shoes still exists.  And I still have a closet full of bad-for-my-feet-but-way-sexy shoes.  Maybe I'll pull some out tonight...