Free Jamie Snow &/or Our Twisted Judicial System

As a 20-year old Criminal Justice major at Illinois State University I needed a job.

I’d previously been a grocery store check-out clerk, made pizzas at Monical’s, built sandwiches at Subconscious Submarine Shoppe, sorted through filthy return bottles for homeless guys at a 7-11 and volunteered at Skipworth Juvenile Detention Center in Eugene, Oregon, where I got scabies and did strip searches and learned to say, “Bend over.”

This was the sparkling resume’ that scored me a Juvenile Advocate position with the McLean County Probation Department.  It’s like a Big Brother/Big Sister progam but with the oversight of a probation officer and the court.  A judge orders the number of hours spent together per week.  The pay was maybe $10/hour, great for 1980.

It was not the only time a dipsh*t would be placed in a position of authority for which they were completely undeserving.

Jamie Snow was 15.  I was told before hand that he’d already been given two prior advocates, one male and one female.  They’d shown up at his door and he’d convinced them somehow that it wasn’t going to happen.

I appeared at Jamie’s trailer, met his father and off we went.  He tells me now that he opened up to the possibility that maybe this could work when I said, “Look, we’re just supposed to hang out together and I get paid.  I’ll even give you half the money.”  I don’t remember details but it sounds like something I’d have done.

Long story short, Jamie and I spent 15 or more hours per week together for over a year before  I moved to California and lost touch.

But during that year we had some crazy times together, a lot of fun, and he tells me now that I may have been the best friend he ever had.  It’s one of the nicest things anyone has ever said to me.

We went to concerts.  I did his homework occasionally.  He was with me when I opened my car door into traffic and had it ripped off by a passing vehicle.  I let him drive my brand new red car with a clutch after he swore he knew how to drive a stick shift (he did not).  He laughs like mad when he tells me about the look on my face when he began to grind the gears repetitively to excess.

I also worked in a runaway home at that time and Jamie was placed there occasionally due to problems at home.  One night I was working the midnight shift and had fallen asleep watching TV when a man entered the dark room and began attacking me, trying to put his hands inside my clothes while on top of me.  When I began screaming the huge, drunk man ran.  While I was calling 9-1-1, Jamie was the one who caught him trying to sneak back in a bathroom window and chased him away with a baseball bat.

Jamie was not someone who opened up easily or complained about his home life and I still don’t know many details.  Most of what we did together was laugh.  Sometimes you just click with someone and it’s so easy.  I wish now that I’d perhaps taken the job a little more seriously, although Jamie claims it would not have worked that way.

Fast forward 30 years and I looked for Jamie on Facebook but instead found a news article in the Bloomington Pantagraph.  He has been in Stateville Prison in Joliet, Illinois for 15 years on a sentence of life without parole.  He was found guilty of the gas station robbery and murder of an 18-year old named Bill Little for a net profit of $30.

I immediately wrote him a letter.  In the first return correspondence he told me he was innocent.  To be perfectly honest, I didn’t really care one way or the other.

My naivete died a slow death during my time as a counselor in a federal halfway house, during my stint as a probation officer.  My allegiance to dysfunction and excuses had lessened after marrying a Chief of Police and wondering if he’d be shot in the back of the head while eating lunch one day like an officer in a nearby town.

I just wanted Jamie to know I still cared about him.  In our correspondence I became aware that this kid I adored had sometimes gone years without a phone call or a visit.

Ironically, we met in the exact same visiting room he’d gone to see his dad in as a little boy.  Dad did time for burglary, the same thing Jamie was in trouble for as a teenager.

Please note: the personality of a burglar is the opposite of someone who commits an armed robbery and murder during daylight on a major busy roadway.

It took me less than an hour to realize Jamie was telling the truth in his letters.  He was home with his family that Easter during the murder of Billy Little.  Anyone who takes the time to objectively look at the details of the case comes to the same conclusion.

He’d gotten his act together after having five kids and moved to Florida, had his own business as a tree surgeon.  Nearly ten years after the murder from more than a thousand miles away, Jamie was charged with a crime he didn’t commit.  It didn’t matter that he’d passed a polygraph exam.

The awful details can be found at www.FreeJamieSnow.com

It’s a classic nightmare.  Jamie’s record made him an easy target.

He was provided with a public defender who’d just had a stroke.  They then brought in an assistant who has since been disbarred and imprisoned himself.  During that attorney’s trial he admitted to drinking more than 12 hours a day and having a mental illness.

In Jamie’s most recent appeal he was again denied an Evidentiary Hearing even as one of the 3-man panel, Judge Knecht, questioned the prosecutor as to how this could have resulted in a proper defense.

Even the officer at the scene of the original crime, Jeff Pelo, is currently in prison.  More than a dozen witnesses at the original trial, many with criminal convictions of their own, have recanted their original testimony in sworn affidavits.

There is no physical evidence, only eyewitness testimony from a man who chose someone other than Jamie in a physical line-up the week after the crime, even with Jamie standing right there.  He did not name Jamie as the perpetrator until 8 years after the fact, 8 years in which he heard Jamie’s name repeated in the media and by investigators determined to clear this case.  These same investigators gave that witness’s name and number to the victim’s mother.  Even he asked them during an interview, “Why would you do that?”

This witness also did not pick Jamie’s face out of a photo book in the week after the case, but nearly 10 years later testified “I could never forget those eyes.”  This faulty testimony has put Jamie Snow behind bars with a sentence of life without parole.  It is nearly impossible to prove yourself innocent from behind bars.

My friend Jamie is so incredibly smart and funny and loving.  He once wrestled an alligator but he’s never shot anyone.  The funny smartass I knew at 15 has grown into a better man than most I meet on the street and he’s done it all on his own.

Jamie’s case is represented by the University of Chicago’s Exoneration Project.  His attorney says she’s in this until he’s released.

After 15 years hope is difficult to maintain when dealing with a justice system that is so incredibly unjust.

Please Tell Me I’m High On Mushrooms, Not Looking At One Under Your Breast

In December I took a trip to the midwest for over two weeks.

My mother and sister live in Kentucky and were just six hours away, so I went for just a day.  Miraculously, my mother never fails to outdo herself.

After spending time with the children I sat at the dining room table with her.  Her failings aside, there is never a time I don’t feel guilty for being a relatively horrible daughter.

For instance, she filled my trunk up with Christmas gifts.  I did not give her one.  I felt better after opening a few boxes, specifically one with a t-shirt that displayed a very large pink pig and the words “Road Hog.”  You may ask, “WTF?”  And I will tell you I have no idea.

So I asked her on Facebook, “Mom, what’s the deal with the t-shirt?”

Her reply: “Oh, I was going to give that to your nephew, but I thought you’d be the one who’d have the nerve to wear it!”

I did not follow up and ask, “Why would I want to?”

Second box: Gigantic automatic air freshener with 3 refills.

While I was at Mom’s house I observed my sister nearly get shot in the eye with a ridiculously powerful burst of spray from a similar model.  Since my mother has five dogs she has MORE THAN A DOZEN of these things on at all times in her home.  They make me gag in combination with the nasty ass smell she’s attempting to disguise.

Are we sensing a theme here?  (1) Pig shirt, (2) air fresheners.

My daughter got a donut maker and a separate cupcake maker.  My mother, always one to promote obesity and overeating.

Rachel’s comment was, “Wow!  Grandma plays favorites!  I love her!”  She also got a Kindle Fire.

I then proceeded to open two hardcover books I did not care to read, but it was nice of her to send them (?)

My husband got a $100 gift card to Home Depot.  Nice!

I got a Christmas ornament made out of some kind of recycled metal and

a set of sheets intended for people who sweat a lot.

Now that I’ve thought about it I no longer feel guilty whatsoever.

* * * * *

Anyway, back to the subject at hand . . .

We were sitting at the dining room table and I asked my mother if she’d ever had the rather dark mole on her face looked at by a dermatologist.  She said, “I’ve been planning on going because I have this other thing” . . .

As she continues speaking she lifts her shirt and then her bra along with her right breast.

She shows me the skin underneath, not at my request.

I am face to face with something the size of a small pancake, grayish and mottled in color.  It appears to be molding around the edges, cracked and bloody in places.

She continues: “I have this other thing here that needs to be looked at, I’ve been treating it with

WART REMOVER.”

And then she kind of crinkles up her nose and says:

“It smells bad.”

I gag on the words, “Oh my God, Mom!  What is it?”

In a downplayed tone of voice: “Oh, I don’t know.  I had it once before and they cut it off.”

I ask in amazement and disgust, “You didn’t ask what it was?!”

My sister thinks it’s from all that sweating under those large boobs with no air flow.  Moist and murky.

* * * * *

I hate being such a big complaining pussy, but are you fucking kidding me?

Tell me about forgiveness and God and your belief in honoring thy parents when your mother has a mushroom under her right tit.

Parenting Is Not For Pussies

Typically I’m not thinking clearly first thing in the morning, have no routine and am never sure what to do next.

It was f-r-e-e-z-i-n-g.

My daughter has seemed distant lately and perhaps that is why I maniacally ran across the hallway and jumped in bed with her.  She has a perfectly purple room, a fantastically soft mattress, and

had no qualms about sleeping in my bed for something like 9 years.

At various times she peed on me and my brand new pillow-top mattress, barfed all over, and insisted on putting me in the middle with absolutely no concern for my cloying claustrophobia.

But she’s 14 and I now realize it was hallucinatory and irrational to think she’d treat me similarly & be happy to see me.  Instead she began screaming

“GET OUT!  GET OUT!”

You’d think that I, a woman who could not bear her own mother even before the onset of puberty, would understand the complexities involved.

But somewhere in my pea brain I thought it would be different if I (1) bent over backwards and stuck my head up my ass and (2) didn’t kill her when she said “Santa might get you great presents too if you were nicer to him like I am” and (3) tried to be the opposite of my own mother whenever humanly possible.

At first I thought she must be joking.  It was asking for trouble when I told her it was perfectly normal for children to sleep with their mothers.

I most assuredly never should have brought up my son and said I was sad he no longer holds my hand when we travel in the car together, never lays his little head on my right thigh as we drive along.

I was laughing but it only gave her more ammunition.

“He’s 26, Mom!  If my boyfriend held his mother’s hand I’d break up with him!” 

As for cuddling, “It’s not normal! 

It’s weird!  Only kids with cancer cuddle with their mothers!”

And this is how she wins every single time, she makes me laugh.  I had to admit she had a point as I imagined my own mother climbing into my bed and immediately wanted to remove the image from my brain with a pitchfork.

Truly, even the word “cuddle” makes me nauseous.

Clearly, I’m conflicted.

* * * * *

The same thing happened with my son at Christmas, individuation slapping me in the face.  I told him I thought we should talk more often since it’s maybe only once a month.

He agreed, but then got confused and said “Well, I don’t think EVERY DAY!  Ha ha ha!!!  None of my friends talk to their parents DAILY.  I think maybe GIRLS do that!” 

We were in the car and his body language told me if we’d been on solid ground he’d probably have started to run in mad man fashion, just to shake off even the idea.

* * * * *

But seriously, this parenting thing is such bullshit!  It’s all about abandonment and desertion, it’s heart crushing nonsense.  Why would anyone choose to do this to themselves, even look forward to it?

I thought I was so superior to the moms who used daycare even on their days off.

It seemed like devoting my life to the little fuckers was so incredibly unselfish and madonna-like.

* * * * *

There is no Dr. Spock of adult parenting.

In reality, my children are relatively lovely people.  I was using them to hide from the world, living through them so I didn’t have to make a life for myself and risk failure.  This is why I’m so discombobulated.

When they behave normally it makes me realize the full extent of my brain damage.

I’m pretty certain this has something to do with the fact that I always thought if I lost my mother in a clothing store she wouldn’t bother to look for me.  I was forced to individuate before I was ready.  So I had this idea that if I just loved them my children would want to be with me always, making monkey bread and hanging out in my kangaroo pouch.

My ideal family, the one I thought I wanted, is really a co-dependent cluster f*ck.

Twisted Dipshit

Either I do nothing or I do everything at once.

Every once in a while I will wake up and schedule myself and/or my daughter for 12 classes and 7 appointments that reach far into the future.  But most days I do nothing.

So last week I purchased 30 days worth of Isagenix to try and get my eating on track.  I had the option of ordering 11 days worth, but went all the way.  What could I have been thinking?

The lovely & extremely thin woman who is my “counselor” has provided me with all kinds of directions.  Oh my do I dislike being directed.  Tell me I have to eat a certain thing and not to eat other certain things and you will find me at 7-11.

Although I’m mostly harming myself this way, I slip into child mode and hide the fact that I’m cheating.  I find great joy in “getting over” on . . . who?  Me, myself and I.

Nothing really brings me more joy than lying to my husband.  He apologized last night for making chicken & mashed potatoes because he assumed I could not eat the meal.

Oh.my.God did that ever tickle me.  I’d just had a Slurpee, an ice cream bar and a package of donuts.  I thanked him for the chicken as I surreptitiously slipped mashed potatoes and gravy into the bowl.

Today I am following the fasting procedures, now that I’ve made it clear I have choices and options and “You’re not my mother!  You can’t tell me what to do!”

I just read a great book entitled: “You are Not so Smart.”

Clearly, this is true.

Twisted Pattycakes &/Or My Barbie Doll BFF

My insane BFF Pattycakes called again today.

Lately I’ve been letting the phone ring without answering.

Her last voicemail: “WHATAYA DOIN?  GIVEN YUR HUZBAN A BLOWJOB?” followed by raucous throaty laughter.

* * * * *

She had a visitor recently and although the woman seemed absolutely lovely there was just . . . something . . . that didn’t sit right.  So Patricia, with her usual down played intelligence and beyond the norm street smartz, tricked the woman into giving her a last name after the chick called a second and third time asking for help finding employment.

It’s not like Patty has a manufacturing business or owns fruit fields.  She’s unemployed herself, after collapsing a lung pushing a garbage cart through a home for the aged.  Yes, this 98-pounder man-handled an enormous plastic bin to the point where she punctured her own right lung.  The girl has a heart the size of the moon.

Anyway, since this unknown prior woman came to visit with her boyfriend’s pal, a dude who’d just recently been released from government custody, Patty searched her on the state website.  Lo and behold, she was in prison for the attempted murder of her husband, an ex-police officer.  How did she do it?  Poison.

She received a miniscule 5 years for putting anti-freeze in his drinks and cyanide in his food “on a number of occasions.”  She supposedly considered suicide but decided punishing her husband was a better idea.  You know someone is pissed when their preferred method of your demise is watching you writhe on the floor for 30 minutes before your eyes go dark.

My favorite part is the neighbor: “She was a little ditsy but didn’t seem like the type . . . always smiling.”

No shit!  The smile should have been the tip off.  I only trust someone who’s exhibiting annoyance with the world.

Patty got the woman back on the phone and said she’d come close to finding her a job when she called the mayor, but the mayor wanted to know “ARE YOU FUCKING NUTS?  SHE JUST GOT OUT OF PRISON FOR ATTEMPTED MANSLAUGHTER.”

I almost forgot the best part, when she told the woman: “Do me a favor, don’t be fixing me any drinks!”

* * * * *

I kept listening.

She mentioned a woman I met once before, Debbie.

‘That bitch is fucking everybody!  She’s almost 50 years old and still posting Facebook self portraits taken in the bathroom.  Jesus Christ, pay attention.

At least keep the toilet out of the shot!” 

“Can you believe it, she went to Atlantic City and picked up some guy down there, slept with him.  The next morning he gives her money for a cab ride home!”

I told her, “You got fucked twice!”

* * * * *

But what’s really got her going is a certified letter that insists she show up in court or a warrant for her arrest will be filed.  Why?  Because she called 9-1-1 five years ago when she heard a commotion across the street behind her house.  Someone was in the process of being robbed and having his throat slit.

She recalls testifying: “You gotta look at the judge when you curse.”

The attorney asked her what she heard: “Gimme your money you fucking spic.”  Uproarious laughter follows.  Testimony lasted two days.  Worst of all, she couldn’t smoke during the breaks.

“They took me in this little room.  The officer said, “You can’t smoke in here.”  I was like WHAT THE FUCK?!”

Now the accused, a scary looking man with an enormous rap sheet, dread locks and a neck tattoo, is asking for a new trial and she has to testify AGAIN.  She says, “No fucking way will I ever call again unless it’s a loved one.  I don’t give a shit what happens!”

Then she ends the call like she always does, ever since she lost her son:

“Call me!  Let’s do lunch.  I love ya!”

* * * * *

There are people in this world you will spend oodles of time with and yet they add nothing to your life.  But there may be one who catches your attention returning to school with kindergarteners from the circus when she says:

“This was a great trip for these lil’ motherfuckers, wasn’t it?”

Do not pass go.  Do not look straight ahead and pretend you didn’t hear her.

Immediately strike up a conversation and say: “Did I really hear you say you have five kids?”

You will never regret it.

Ofukme

Someone told me today he can’t just complain about being fat and skip the gym or that makes him a hypocrite.

Ofukme.

I wish it was just the gym.

I hate the sound of my own thoughts. 

R.E.P.E.T.I.T.I.V.E.

I’m actually shocked that other people can’t read them, that they can misread me.

Especially people who are constantly with me cause it seems like I’m screaming.

It’s so much worse now that my husband is retired.

Now he’s just here, staring off into . . . something.  I’m not sure what.

When we go places he sits in the back of the car like we picked him up at a retirement home and are taking him out for an early bird special.

I don’t know where he carries his disengagable testicles.

I’m a limousine driver with a 14-year old sidekick and her father.

It’s just weird.

What kind of man gives up all control & sits in the back seat by choice?

Worse yet, what kind of woman is married to him?

This was never what I wanted.

My mom married men who were powerless against her anger, who jumped to make her happy.

I swore I would never be with one of their ilk yet here I find myself.

Life is so fucking cyclical.

We’re all stuck on a demonic merry-go-round and I want off.

So what can I change?

1. The lies are killing me.  I need to get real.  No matter what.

2. I need to move physically.  I’m a fucking potato.

3. I need to eat like a non-suicidal person with a functioning brain.

4. I need to make a schedule and follow it and stop being a loser.

5. I need to take responsibility, blame me and only me.

6. I need to stop being 16 and do things that aren’t fun.

7. I need to stop being an asshole.

8. I need to pack my shit up and move.

9. I need money and a job.

I have lots of ideas: memoirs, non-fiction books, internet marketing, websites, e-books.

I look at job sites.

I rotate it all in my head, never getting anywhere.

I get overwhelmed and do nothing.

I bake monkey bread and fall asleep.

Twisted Job Applicant Looking For High Pay & Low Expectations

I keep looking for a job but it occasionally strikes me (after hours of perusing want ads and finding nothing viable) that I am the pickiest (or laziest) applicant ever to put in an application (or not).

For example, one of the very few things I love to do is care for babies before they can walk, talk or think for themselves.  I have this skewed image of myself as Aunt Jemima, a loving, caring baby mama.  Reality: I am happy to hold the baby, caress it, love it, speak sweetly to it, as long as it gazes into my eyes like a retarded deer.

The moment said infant does not appear to like me I go on the defensive.  I begin to notice negative qualities previously ignored, cradle cap and ear wax.  If the child continues to reject my love & affection I eventually forget I ever had a positive thought about that unappreciative, ugly baby.

When looking for positions caring for infants there are usually other complications, like older children.  Can I care for older children?  Yes.  But quite often parents who pay upwards of $15/hour for childcare want things like “occasional preparation of meals, bathing and help with homework.”  Those words freak me out as if I was being asked to install power in a nuclear plant.

Feeding people makes my head spin like a barn in a twister.  ”Good” parents think their children should be fed well, like on plates, at a table with healthy food.  I can’t even come close to pulling that off all at once.  No doubt one of the little tykes would dislike cheese or tomato sauce or meat.  I would be expected to express love and understanding and I can’t do that.  I have friends with picky kids and I’m tempted to throw them in my dryer and see if a few spins would teach them the beauty of sandwich crust.

Yes, I could make microwaveable macaroni & cheese, although sometimes measuring the water and perfecting the time is a problem.  Real meals stress me out.  And 3 times a day?!  I just don’t want to do it.  The expectations are too high.  The mess is too big.  The children are too needy.

Baths are like dusting, they’re only going to be dirty again tomorrow.  The kids cry when you poke them in the eye with the shampoo bottle or empty it over their heads while they’re screaming.  I get anxious and tired and want to drown myself in the sink.

The last time I gave my great nieces and nephews a bath they acted as if I was putting them in a pot to boil.  They kept crying “Waa, waa, waa.”  Self fulfilling prophecy. I used a wash cloth a little too roughly and before you knew it one of them was bleeding.  Seriously, are you fucking kidding me, kids are not supposed to bleed that easily.  Mine never did and that’s no doubt a good thing.

Cleaning someone else’s house while watching their children?  Oh my, I never did that in my own home.  You need to take a breather while they’re napping, even if it’s for five hours.  They might not sleep again for ages.  Also, I saw a story once about a kid drowning in a mop bucket and have PTSD.

I become completely depressed visualizing the drama of a child with reflux and what would no doubt happen when I forgot the rule about never laying the child flat on his or her back.  Calling for an ambulance, doing CPR, those are the kinds of things that call for an emergency trip to Dairy Queen on the way to the hospital.

* * * * *

Eventually I’m forced to say “fuck it” and move on to the legal area. I’ve been a secretary and word processor for attorneys in the past.  Except I always found placement in places where expectations were relatively low, which made me look unrealistically good.  Those kinds of positions don’t just come your way out of the blue.  You need either a spectacularly lazy lawyer who doesn’t really care what’s going on in the office or one with low self-esteem who takes on the boring tasks himself.

I imagine my employers asking me questions like, “Seriously, you were a legal secretary for how many years?  In what country?”  I imagine people pointing and laughing at my inability to make charts.  It’s not that I couldn’t eventually learn how, I just don’t want to make charts.  A little bitch inside my head thinks charts are for serfs.

If anything mentioned in the advertisement leads me to believe I’ll have to do menial labor, like make copies, that’s kind of a deal breaker.  I had one job where I had to make thousands of copies and got horrible paper cuts.  So now I go to the extreme and imagine that all jobs involving a copy maching will leave me standing in front of it for hours per day.

It’s just another ridiculous reason to skip to the next ad.

* * * * *

Sometimes I peruse the counselor listings.  I have no training as a counselor but I’ve always thought I would make a good one.  Except for the fact that I hate it when people complain repetitively and to a great extent crying freaks me out.

After an hour or so I’m down to dribs and drabs.

I begin looking at driver positions and things in the human services field.

But taxi drivers deal with vomit and in my OCD brain all strangers have bedbugs.

I would sell my plasma but am diabetic.

Employment is complicated.

Twisted Shit (In My Shoe)

WARNING: If you have a weak stomach avoid this entry . . .

There are embarrassing things and then there are tragedies.  I don’t even know what to call the incident that happened yesterday, but I can’t let it go by without telling you about it, although you may never read me again afterwards.  But that’s okay.

Only once in my life have I had a similar experience, and that was during childbirth.  I don’t think you can compare the two, really.  I mean, if you bear down and push hard enough while having a baby, lots of women poop on the table.  It just happens.  No one talks about it much.  Needless to say, if you’ve never gone through the experience, do not eat huge meals before labor.  Your medical staff will be so incredibly appreciative.

* * * * *

After gaining about 20 pounds I stopped insulin shots and began attempting to control my food intake.  But it’s kind of messed with my gastrointestinal system because I’m all over the place.  Sometimes I eat a salad for the day, other times I just eat.  All day.

Three days ago I had a can of pork and beans at around 9 pm.  Two days ago I had a salad around midnight, nothing else.

Yesterday I’d been out all day and had coffee left in a cup from the morning, I drank some of it while driving down the Garden State Parkway.  And suddenly I felt a rumbling in my stomach.  Ugh.  But I knew there was a rest stop ahead so I hit the gas.

Driving 80 mph I see the sign “5 miles ahead” and panic is setting in.  I’m starting to talk to myself.

It has never taken longer to go 5 miles.

Mind you, I’m dressed in camo pants and a black sweatshirt, because this 51-year old woman thinks she’s a fucking ninja.  I don’t know what in the hell is wrong with me, but I can’t act normal.  Between the outfit and the fact that I was talking to myself it would have appeared I was (a) part of a SWAT team or (b) schizophrenic.

In fact, my mind was beginning to shatter.

Four miles, three, two, one, and I’m entering the parking lot but just can’t imagine how I’ll make it into the building.  Of course there are no parking spots available up close.

As it turned out, that was a good thing.

I stand up and immediately began to shit myself.  It’s one of those things where you just can’t believe it’s happening.  You’ve worried about it, considered the possibility in the past.  Maybe even come close, thrown away a pair of underwear once or twice.

But completely evacuated your ass as if you just drank Drano, while standing in a parking lot at Exit 98 in Wall, NJ?  Nope, I didn’t see this in my future.

More shit ended up in the inside of my camo pants, my shoes, and the parking lot than did before my fucking colonoscopy.

It gets better.

I headed for my trunk to get paper towels, thinking I could stem the tide, so to speak.  There was no longer any possibility of entering the rest stop unless I wanted people to point and scream.

But my body had just gotten started with its’ complete and total betrayal of me, the inner me, the part that kept thinking “This can’t be happening.”

Then I looked down and behind.  It appeared a mounted policeman had let his horse shit in this particular parking lot.

The consistency of human shit appears different when it’s not properly contained.

And at the most humiliating moment of my entire life . . .

I looked directly into the eyes of a black man dressed in a maintenance uniform, about 8 cars away.

He had a broom and a big ass dustpan and a bemused, entertained, knowing expression which told me he’d seen the whole show.

I backed out of the parking lot like a blind woman in a Batmobile.  If that man had looked into my dirty sullied soul for another single moment I’d surely have died.

And then I had to drive all the way home with shit in my shoe.

* * * * *

The smell blew my mind, the part that hadn’t already shattered.  It seemed so much worse than usual.  Or maybe we never usually get that close to it?  And baby I was in it, fucking smothered in it.

I pulled into my driveway, lifted my leg, and shit fell onto my floor mat.  It was like a fucking Stephen King novel.

Naked below the waist, I stood in the driveway and hosed myself down.  It snowed here last week and the water was a little icy but maybe shock had already set in.

It was at that point the phone rang and I tried to explain why I couldn’t talk, something about spilling a cup of coffee all over the car.

Yes, I lied.  Cause, you know, people tend to think bad thoughts about you when you shit yourself.

H-IV Negative &/or Still Twisted After All These Years

It came up again today, which doesn’t happen very often.  Someone asked me how I could possibly be H-IV negative when I’d had a baby with a man who was H-IV positive.

I began to stutter.  The fear is never completely gone, it’s always there, at least the memory of it.

Such a crazy time it was, pregnant at 25 by a guy with this new disease I’d barely heard of but knew could kill me.  A disease I couldn’t talk about because people would run, shun, shy away, freak out, even those in the medical profession.  I had to keep it to myself and make life and death decisions and still go to work every day even though it felt like my world was ending.

I chose to keep the baby.  I chose to stay with the man.  I wasn’t brave, more like fearless.  I didn’t know enough to make informed decisions.

I was tested once, twice, three times, four, sure my luck was eventually going to run out.  But it didn’t happen that way.

* * * * *

Now I know the chance of transferring the H-IV infection through a single episode of heterosexual unprotected sex is 1 to 2 women in 1,000.  I know that I probably saved my own life by saying no the one and only time it really counted, when I refused to have anal sex, bluntly, loudly, definitively.

Say it loud, say it proud, don’t touch my ass.

I saved my kid’s life, too.

When I think of what other women went through, those who found themselves positive, discovered their children were positive, I could dry heave with sorrow and terror.

* * * * *

I kept this secret for so many years.  It didn’t even seem like a choice.

I’ve had some difficult things to get through, like every human being on the planet, but man have I been blessed.  I won the lottery of life.  The good by far outweighs the bad.

I would lose 1,000 parents rather than a child.  I would take a million fucked up mothers over finding out my baby was going to die from AIDS.  There is no comparison.

Some of the things that happened were scary and humiliating and sad.  But in the end I walked away with the most wonderful bouncing baby boy, who never gave me a moment of trouble, who has lived a charmed life as if protected by angels.

I have no doubt they are his father and his uncle, funny, bright, charismatic, beautiful men who made the simple mistake of putting needles in their arms to dull life’s pain, to catch what was once a random irresponsible high and became a life sentence.

They were behind me during his graduation from graduate school.  I swear I heard them laughing like excited boys, saying “Look at him!  You did good, Bub.”

It was all so worth it.  I need to remember all the ways in which I have been the luckiest bitch on the planet and forget the rest.

In Reply To Peter Parkour &/or My Twisted Mommie Dearest

Today’s blog entry shall entail my response to the beloved Peter Parkour, who continues to read my rantings and comment upon them, which means more than he knows.  This man is a philosopher, a deep thinker, a profound dude.  Check out his blog at www.hateandanger.wordpress.com

Peter’s comment on yesterday’s blog entry follows:

I read this last night and I’ve been contemplating how to comment ever since.  I keep coming back to the same answer each time.  I hope what I have to say doesn’t come across too abrasive, because it comes from the heart and I want nothing but the best for you.

I had a revelation not too long ago.  Monsters aren’t born; they’re created.  They didn’t want to be monsters.  Life led them down a path to monster-hood.  That doesn’t make it ok for them to be monsters, but it does help me to understand how they got to where they are.

If I can’t forgive a monster, at least I have somewhat of an understand of the monster.  Instead of hating the monsters I can pity them.  This in no way makes the actions of a monster ok.  No one deserves to suffer at the hands of a monster.

All monsters need help. Some need to be detained from society, but we need to learn from all of them. Instead of punishing monsters we need to treat them and work toward preventing others from being created in the first place. This is coming from a recovering monster.

Comedy, humor and satire are still great outlets for the performer and the audience, but hate only hurts the hater.  I ran into a quote recently that would work well here: “Bitterness and Resentment are like taking poison then waiting for the OTHER person to die”.

I love you Pam.  Take care.  (((((HUGS)))))

* * * * *

Peter, you are THE BEST for continuing to read my drivel and leave comments, this one in particular.  I especially love your line about monsters, although I can’t imagine you as one.

How interesting that we had a family drama today that resulted in my speaking with my mother for about an hour just within the last few minutes, before I knew your comment was here.  As I spoke with her I found myself thinking about how civil our conversations usually are, which is not how I ever sound when I write about her.

Although I’m angry and vent it here, there has rarely been a time when I didn’t at least give my mother basic respect, probably even deference.  I do feel sorry for her and that kicks my ass most of all.  First I had to have this woman as my mother and then suffer the mixed emotions of pity and guilt and disgust.

I agree with everything you said 1,000% and I use this philosophy in my daily life with everyone I know.  I make all kinds of what others call “excuses” for people, and I think of it as my way of understanding why people do what they do and act the way they do.

My niece, for instance . . . I will never blame her more than 50% for what has happened with her children because I believe she was not given what she needed as a chld and the opportunity to bond with her children was stolen from her when she went to prison.  Yes, she chose to take drugs, but it was as a result of pain that she didn’t choose. She became her nuclear family’s scapegoat.

My sister, I do the same for.  She was never given the love and attention from others that I received and it didn’t allow her to give my niece what she needed because she never got it herself.

I psychoanalyze myself, my children, my friends, my loved ones and always have a reason why we do what we do.  For at least half my life ”To know all is to forgive all” has been my motto. I did it with people I had on my probation caseload.  I am TOO MUCH this way quite often.  I can be ridiculously co-dependent.  Except when it comes to my mother.

I can remember a time when I loved her.  I remember crying when I would go to my father’s for the weekend and had to leave her.  I remember watching her put on makeup and admiring her in the mirror as she told me if she ever died I’d have to put it on for her so she’d look good in the casket (what the fuck?).  I was about 7 then.

I remember a car accident and a bicycle accident where she was the person who took charge once she got there.  I remember thinking I was glad she was so forceful and that she wasn’t crazy when bad things happened.  Suddenly she would morph into a person who handled emergencies so well.

In a lot of ways I was a favored child in our household, probably just a step down from my brother.  Because I was the oldest, or maybe because I was a girl and no dummy, she knew I was judging her and not finding her satisfactory.  She wanted to be seen as superior.  She has never had female friends and didn’t know how to handle having a daughter.  I think the majority of her life she could only find intimacy through sex.  She passed that on to me but I was able to mature and grow past it for the most part.

My mother graduated 8th grade weighing 180 and she was extremely jealous of me when I developed into a teenager.  It has always been an issue.  But then my mother is jealous of everyone.

I think she was probably molested by my grandfather.  I found out this summer that he offered $1,000 cash to my step sister if she would spend the night with him.  She was a very young teenager when he did this.  He was an alcoholic during my childhood, sobering up after having bladder cancer in his 60′s.

I think he went off the rails when my uncle, my mother’s baby brother, died at age 3.  I think Mom was 5.

Grandpa made sexual references quite regularly, so much so that I bought him a subscription to Playboy when he turned 80.  Mom was his favorite.  My grandmother was practically disabled by the death of her baby on his 3rd birthday and had a stroke.  She became pregnant almost immediately with my aunt.  I’m sure Grandma was neurotic as hell with my mother, even though she was a wonderful grandmother.

So, as you can see, I do think about these things and try to understand.

But she let me down so big, Peter.  She’s not a stupid woman by any means, she is far smarter than I am and yet during my childhood her basest instincts were all that mattered.  Her new husband, her pornos, her dildos, her booze and pills.

I tried to explain to my daughter today what it was like to be a young girl living with a maniac, holding the phone, looking at the phone book, thinking there must be some unknown number inside it that I could call to reach someone who would come and take me away, protect me from her.  My childhood felt like it lasted 50 years.  As a pre-teen I wouldn’t ride my bike to any spot where I couldn’t see my house.  I thought if I got lost she woudn’t care enough to come and look for me.

In some ways, as an adult, she got worse.  She stopped bathing, she stopped taking care of herself, she stopped doing all the things she taught us were imperative.  As the daughter of a woman who does not take care of themelves cosmetically, who admits to having genital warts and allows herself to be in a position where men shave her vagina at a party, there is a piece of me as a female who is so mortified, so disgusted that this is what I come from that I can barely breathe when I think about it.  This from the woman who left my father to let him die alone, without his wife and children, so she could get some strange dick.

I guess I might be able to forgive that if she at least washed her hair (lol, sorry).  For God’s sake, she wore a swimsuit top to my niece’s 8th grade graduation.  This is an unforgivable fashion faux pas.

When my father died and she was all I had left she barely spoke of him, it was like he just disappeared.  There was no love in our house, only hatred.  She never told me she loved me throughout my childhood.  Never.  All throughout I watched other girls who had mothers that loved them, that cherished them.  Still do.  I’ve never been good with things that seem unfair.  A lot of those girls had fathers.

Yet I know people who had it so much worse and they are so much more forgiving.  She’s never apologized, she doesn’t think she did anything wrong.  Yet my daughter gagged when we entered her home due to the fact that she does not clean up after her dogs.  We had to step over dog turds and around piles of pee.

Long story short, I don’t know how to forgive her.  She is so crude and mean sometimes.  I bought my great nephew a pair of pink sandles when I visited last year cause that’s what he wanted.  He was 3 and has 2 sisters and liked pink.  She told me, “The only thing worse than a fag is a Mexican fag.”  She was saying this about her own great-grandson.

I found out this summer that she used to take my 3-year old step-sister in a corner and tell her how ugly she was.  My step-sister is a beautiful grown woman and still can’t imagine people think she’s attractive because my mother’s words ring in her ears.  It breaks my heart.

It’s more like a shatter, really.  She was able to alter the course of my life, to misshape my brain.  I can make adjustments but she caused permanent damage, invisible damage, that has left me feeling like an outsider, damaged goods, not good enough, my whole life.  It has hurt my children, my relationships, my siblings & other people I love in a multitude of ways.

* * * * *

Yet I had a lovely conversation on the phone with her tonight and didn’t call her a cunt even once.  I did not, however, say “I love you” and I’m pretty sure I never will.  I feel nauseated by the idea, like it would be the ultimate betrayal to my little girl self.  I need to be true to myself and if that means never letting go of the anger then so be it.  I deserved so much better.

Love,

Pamajama

L to R: Grandma, Penny, Dad, Me & Mom

Twisted Stalking Bitch

Tonight I realized, again, that my mother is stalking me on Facebook.  It is completely disgusting and creeps me out to know she’s following me around, reading the comments I write even to people she doesn’t know.  How did I find out?  She followed up my comment with one of her own.

On top of everything else her spelling and grammar are heinous.

I’ve blocked her completely in the past, but I’d rather she’s unaware I even care.  So now I’m going to have to play games.

Perhaps I will come out as a lesbian on Facebook, but only make it so my mom can read it.  Is that even possible?  I’m not sure.  I think maybe if she can read it then her friends can read it and that’s not what I want.  I want her to be the only one reading it while thinking it’s public to the world.

Or perhaps I should develop a disease or win the lottery.  I’m not sure which would bother her more, but I’m pretty sure it’s the lottery.

* * * * *

She began contacting peope when I went to Illinois via Minnesota in September, merely a flight layover.  I mentioned Minneapolis on-line, never realizing it would flush out her snooping.  Well, it did.

She’s not even slick about it.  She asked a former high school classmate of mine: “Do you know why Pam is going to Minneapolis?”  She also asked my aunt, including the statement: “Do you know why Pam is going to Minnesota?  She doesn’t talk to her sister and I much,  we don’t know why.”

Oh, you don’t know why?

Her best friend saw me this summer and said,

“Oh, I’m always happy to see you, Pam, no matter what your mother says about you.”

In person Mom couldn’t care less what I have to say.  It’s happened many times, I relax enough to tell her a story, look at her face and realize she’s not listening.  She’s not even looking at me.  And I feel like an idiot once again.

In July at my high school reunion she told me “What goes around comes around” in relation to my son.  She believes her parenting of me is relatively identical to my parenting of him.  I moved away, he moved away, and she wants me to know I’m to blame.  I’m sure if truth were told she would imagine herself the better mother.  At which point I would be forced to set her on fire.

She’s the mother who came home for my brother’s wedding, told him she had no cash money, so was bringing tuna salad and a sneer as her offering.  The same woman who brought home a couple of guys and fucked one while the other robbed my brother’s coin collection when he was a teenager.

I’m not even joking when I say men have died to get away from her and her venomous mouth and evil countenance.

This is a woman who sold my sister a car she knew was a lemon, even though she didn’t pay anything for it.  She was running a car lot and this car came in as part of a deal.  It was actually dangerous.  When my sister began driving a truck (Mom was the dispatcher and company owner) she sent her to dangerous places men wouldn’t go.

She’s the same woman who begged me to come home for Christmas, purchased the ticket, then talked about the expense the entire time I was home, beginning minutes after my arrival.

I think that was the same trip I was picked up at O’Hare Airport with her husband at the wheel, a cooler of beer between the front bucket seats, in a snowstorm.  And dropped off in Indianapolis after riding 2.5 hours with 3 dogs, one who had 3 legs and just one eye.  I’m allergic to dogs.

The trailer behind the vehicle carried an enormous satellite dish, the kind that sits in your yard, as we pulled into “Arrivals and Departures.”  It was broken by the time they made it to Kentucky cause that guy is no genius.

Mom divorced him (#3) about 10 years ago and he just finally left last month after robbing her blind.  Before he left she chased him around the parking lot attempting to assault him but couldn’t catch him.  Now I’m not saying he didn’t deserve an ass kicking but these people are 70 and 74 or something like that.

He told her he was coming back to shoot her.  She went home, got her gun, sat in a chair and waited.  She no doubt paid for both guns at some point.  Dumbass.

I had a dream about him recently and I’m sure it’s because of all the awful stories I’ve heard from my sister and niece about inappropriate things he’s said to them.  They just take it.  He told my sister he couldn’t train her as a truck driver cause it would be too difficult to travel with her, he’s just too attracted to her.  Gag.  Puke.  Kill.

In my dream I took a friend home with me and woke up with him putting his hands inside her underwear.  I was watching her face and she was begging me to help but I couldn’t reach her in time.

Now that is some fucked up shit to dream about your mother’s husband.  Needless to say, I will not be introducing anyone ever again to these idiots.  I don’t know what I’d do if, instead of hearsay, I was there in person for the daily perversions they consider typical.  And I don’t know how I’d live with myself if I just accepted it the way other females in the family do.

So, yeah, Mom wonders why I’m not in close contact.

Go fuck yourself, Mom.

Twisted Pieces of My Heart

I’ve been the kind of mother who is a pain in the ass to all authority.  I once wrote 2 pages of instructions regarding my daughter’s potential haircut.  After handing them over to the salon owner I proceeded to burst into tears.  She did not get her hair cut that day.

Oh, yes, I am a fucking freak. 

In my defense, I have had fine, straight, brown hair my entire life.  My daughter has magnificent blonde curls.  How can she possibly be mine?!  If you fuck with her curls, if you even tell her she should straighten her hair, you awaken a wildebeast that slumbers inside me.

There are other issues at play.  My sister-in-law gave my son his first haircut without my permission.  I came home from work and his hair was trimmed.  If I’d thought the police would take me seriously I probably would have filed assault charges.

I was forced to wear a short pixie cut with bangs my entire childhood.  My reactionary response was my daughter’s hair grew to her ass.  When she was little it sometimes took us as much as an hour to get the tangles out.  I will skip the details about getting lice twice.  Let’s just say, I am an honorary monkey.

But as much as I adore and love my daughter, my son is my moon and stars.  His father died when he was a year and two days old.  My father died when I was ten.  It made me doubly psychotic with regard to protecting him.  My focus was nuclear and that is probably part of why he now lives in California.  He was cognizant of the fact that I was living through him even before I was aware of it.

For over three years now I’ve been blaming a majority of my wack-a-doodle brain frack on my brother Jim’s death.  This morning I realized OOPS!

Yes, I’m sad about my brother but he lived across the country all my adult life.

Yes, I loved him like mad before I ever knew my kids would even exist, he was the one thing in my family I felt good about, that I was proud to be associated with.

I will love and adore that little boy forever, the one who drove my mother insane with his antics, breaking her prized possessions and gleefully telling her to go fuck herself.

But I realized this morning that the real earthquake in my life occurred when my son grew up.  There is no preparation for losing the love of your life.  And say what you will about him still being there, my little boy is gone.

I judge my self-analysis on one thing only, whether the thought that pops into my head makes me cry like a fool.  Well, I can think about my brother and laugh, remembering all the good things.  When I think about the fact that for all intents and purposes my son is gone I lose my shit.

I compare myself to friends whose sons are dead and I think I’m a dipshit for feeling this way.  But I can’t dispute the fact that the hole in me, the one that grew into an abyss in childhood, was filled by my son.  Suddenly I had a family, I had someone to take care of, someone to play mother bear to.  And I did.  I had a purpose for the first time in my life.  I hung onto that purpose like a lifesaver from the Titanic.

Then he left.  It would appear I should have transferred all my attention onto my daughter.  Instead, the old shit came back.

After my father died, then my grandmother, the two people who loved me most in the world, I was a mess.  I moved to California, I got pregnant, and then that fucking guy died.

It didn’t even make any sense for me to give my heart away again, but I did.  I gave it to my son.  And then I gave it to my daughter.

Although I’ve given the girl more love & adoration than many people get in a lifetime, sometimes I wonder if I’m slacking off because she has a father.

Today I began to wonder if it’s because I want to leave before she leaves me.

The complete & total devotion I’ve felt toward my childen was the one thing that made me proud of myself.  But recently I’ve been focused on me and surprised by my selfishness, ashamed of it.

Now I think it may just be survival instinct.  My chidren will always be my heart.  But I need to make room for myself in there.

Ode to Meat Loaf

Today my blood sugar is

288

or some similarly ridiculous number.  I stopped taking insulin, it made me gain weight.

This probaby isn’t a good thing.  My brother dropped dead when he stopped taking his blood pressure medication regularly.  I don’t think it’s quite as serious though.  But maybe.

If I don’t eat at all, then I don’t need insulin.  If I exercise and only eat salads and protein, I don’t need insulin.

If I feel sorry for myself and eat an entire pumpkin pie, I need insulin.

* * * * *

I am home alone with my husband and would like to tell him that living here is killing me. However, I don’t like making him unhappy.  He gets this sullen look on his face like his life is over.  So instead of making him unhappy I just continue, every single day, to say “Fuck it.”  I stay here and eat pumpkin pie.

It’s obviously not working all that well.

He says he loves me, but if he loved me would he want me to be miserable & potentially dead?  It’s a conundrum I can’t comprehend.

When speaking of marriage people repeat over and over, “Til death do we part.”  Or something like that.

I watch Jerry Springer and Maury Povich regularly.  People take this one single sentence seriously.

People also make promises every single day that they don’t follow through on.   How can this one statement, not even an original thought, be considered so completely different?

Yes, you hope it’s only going to happen once.  But nothing in life is a sure thing.  It’s just not.  It’s the difference between fairy tales and reality.  When we accommodate little girls in having weddings that cost thousands of dollars we continue to push the fairy tale.   Marriage starts with an entirely false premise.

Years go by, children grow up, people change.  Yet it’s not supposed to matter cause you made a promise on one single day of your life.  It doesn’t matter that it’s

YOUR WHOLE FUCKING LIFE and YOU ONLY GET ONE. 

Jealousy issues and crazy beliefs about loving the same person forever and ever, excluding all others, give people the idea they have the right to own one another.  This is ridiculous.

It is not a failure to move on.

It is not a failure to realize you’re with the wrong person.

It is not a failure to realize you’re a mercurial dipshit who changes her mind.

It is not a failure when things happen in life that lead you to believe you’re supposed to be somewhere else.

It is not a failure to have married that mercurial dipshit, spent 20 years with her, and had a lovely child together.

* * * * *

I do not entertain inaction or passivity or patience well.  My style is to throw shit in the back of the car, probably in garbage bags, scream “Hasta La Vista” and hit the road.

Why am I so completely done with something that once seemed perfectly lovely?  I don’t have a definitive answer.  But I do know that staying too long has made it so much worse.

You know how people brag about being married 50 years?  Yeah, fuck that.  I mean, it’s a nice idea and all but sometimes it just doesn’t work out that way.  Most of the people I’ve known who lived together more than 40 years actually hated each other a lot of the time.

Yes, they hung in there but it wasn’t because it was such a wonderful experience, it was because they coudn’t figure out how to get  away.

*****

“Stop right there!  I gotta know right now.  Before we go any further, do you love me?  Will you love me forever, will you need me, will you never leave me?  Will you make me so happy for the rest of my life, will you take me away and will you make me your wife?

And when the feeling came upon me like a tidal wave, I started swearing to my god and on my mother’s grave that I would love you till the end of time!  I swore I would love you till the end of time.

So now I’m praying for the end of time, to hurry up and arrive, cause if I gotta spend another minute with you I don’t think that I can really survive.  I’ll never break my promise or forget my vows, but God only knows that I could do it right now. 

I’m praying for the end of time, it’s all that I can do.  Praying for the end of time, so I can end my time with you.

Meat Loaf ~ Paradise by the Dashboard Light

******

Is that really how it’s supposed to be?

Blog Fright

On Facebook it seems I cannot shut up.  I have so much to say and it never fits in that little box.

Then I come to WordPress and develop brain freeze.

It’s not like I get great replies or tremendous positive feedback for keeping the site going with my blathering attempts to make people laugh.  I post things that I think are way more entertaining than

“I found a great new brand of cheesy bacon popcorn.  Love it!” 

That fucking sentence got 8 replies.  I threw an absolute tantrum over it.  By God, I was going to quit posting.

Of course, I had just received an e-mail rejection from Wegman’s Grocery, a store I really do enjoy.  I’d applied a second time through their website (due to an advertisement) and this time was not even worthy of an interview.

Those bastards interviewed me previously on September 3, 2010, the day of my daughter’s 13th birthday party, and I was not hired.  Kind of thought it was because I was so completely scattered, what with 50 people coming to my house that afternoon.

What could that HR bitch have written about me on her tiny form?  I mean, granted, she’s such an important person. Maybe I just don’t get what it takes to throw some shit into a bag, give proper change and say, “Thanks!  Come again.”

It would probably be much better if I wasn’t a college graduate.  I wouldn’t have that cocky attitude that says, “This is so fucking beneath me.”  I can’t even say, though, that I really feel that way.  I’m from the freaking midwest.  I love to help people find things.  I kiss ass like a dipshit.  People run into me and I say “Excuse me.”

Believe me, I know my faults.  The ones that weren’t ingrained in my head as a child ( (1) you stink, (2) you have bad breath, (3) you’re a whore, (4) you’re the most indecisive person on the planet and (5) there is no bigger slob in history) I’ve discovered all on my own.

Perhaps HR chick wrote something about my outfit because I know it was atrocious.  However, that seems to be the way most of the employees there are dressed.  They’re wrapping meat for God’s sake.

Does that sound bitchy?  I think it might sound bitchy.  That’s when I come back full circle and think, “See Pam, there’s the reason you weren’t hired.”  Even if I don’t outwardly express my sarcastic egotistical mind-set some people can smell it on me.

*****

So back to the original subject, why do I continue writing on Facebook but not WordPress?

1. I always take the easy way out.  Writing a status message is so much easier than completing a blog entry.

2. Immediate satisfaction.  I’m much more likely to get a response on FB quickly.

3. I have always been afraid to shine.  In a screaming tyrannical voice I was told over and over again by (who else) my mother, “You think you’re so much better than everyone else,” specifically meaning herself.  I think I’ve spent my whole life proving her wrong.

4. I tend to be quite OCD about blog entries.  I hate just slapping shit up on the screen.  I can spend 4 hours on 700 words, writing and re-writing.

5. Blogging made me happy.  So I stopped.

*****

Here’s to doing all the things that make me happy again.

Twisted Fears

Lately when I write it sounds like I’m taking myself way too seriously, sort of like a 51-year old hormonal tight ass.  Nothing could be more completely unacceptable.

But even as I write those words I hear a voice in my head say,

“Well, it IS your only life.  It would be nice if you didn’t fuck it up.  You might want to take it a LITTLE seriously.”

Some people stop eating (not me), some people get ulcers (not me).  Fear simply paralyzes me.

I just had the most evil thought . . . I’m starting to sound like Oprah.

* * *

As Anni said in a recent comment, “So change your life!“  Oh, Anni, I would if I only knew how.  But I’ve become such a pussy.

MEOW!

Although being someone’s princess looks like a lottery windfall, if you listened closely enough you’d hear the “drip, drip, drip” of eroding self-confidence.  One day you realize your balls have withered and resemble an airless old leather football.

At 19 I stood on the wing of a plane and stepped off into nothing but air. I’ve always thought it was one of the dumbest things I ever did but maybe that’s not true.  Maybe the epitome of stupid is really the hesitation to act on your own behalf, fear of success and failure in equal parts.

“There are no mistakes” according to “Zen and the Art of Happiness” by Chris Prentiss.

Intellectually I believe it.  Acting on it is an entirely different story.

* * *

So for today I’m going to make a list of my most ridiculous fears, hoping it will explain why I’m so stuck.  Here goes:

1.) If ever given the chance to escape my eagle eye, I fear my 14 year old daughter will gain 100 pounds and stop brushing her teeth.  Her deodorant will sit unused.  She will begin dating on the sly (since all men love enormous girls with atrocious breath).  Her boyfriend will be a big nasty bruiser, his hobby will be pimping.  I will be entirely to blame.  My selfishness will have caused her downfall.

2.) When I move I will lose my hairdresser. (I know, can you believe this ranks right below my daughter’s life?  This is how completely shallow and vapid I am.) Although I rarely am happy with my hair today, it will be so much worse.  I will have to go to SuperCuts and they will scalp me and my big fat face will shine like the moon.  I will never have enough money for a decent dye job, so I will purchase boxes of dye in a discount food store like Aldi’s.  I will dye my own hair and whenever I sweat the color will drip down my neck.

3.) I will end up homeless and I do not like the out of doors.  Bugs and bright sunshine are my kryptonite.  Sleep and/or the cold will no longer be my friends.  When it rains I will get wet and my hair will smell like a fat man’s feet.

4.) Pharmaceutically speaking I’ll be screwed if ever I can’t purchase the ridiculous amount of drugs I take daily.  However, if I have no money for food I can stop taking insulin, which really could be a plus.  If I don’t overeat then I don’t need to take insulin.  And I’ll lose weight.  Things are already looking up.

As you can see, my mind works like a see-saw.  I argue with myself, just like schizophrenics in the street.  On the other hand, I already have a pack of homeless compadres waiting for me to join them under a bridge somewhere.

5.) My teeth will all fall out.  I will not be able to afford dentures, my face will cave in and I will look like I give BJ’s at a truck stop for a living.

* * *

“Take me for what I am, who I was meant to be. 

And if you give a damn, take me baby, or leave me.” 

From the Broadway musical

RENT

Twisted ~ All On My Own

It all began to fall apart when my brother Jim died in August of 2008.  Nothing since has ever felt the same.  Until it happened I couldn’t have known my little brother was a weight-bearing cornerstone of my planet.  It’s small solace to know how much I’m sure this pleases him.

It happened the same week my one and only son moved to NYC (soon to be San Diego, and then West Hollywood).  The same week one of my closest friend’s sons stepped in front of a train.

Every single belief I held as a sure thing came into question.  I now know there are no sure things.  I knew it all along, I just didn’t want to believe it.

My daughter became a teenager the following summer.  To see her face it was suddenly necessary I look up instead of down, more discombobulating than you might think.  Sometimes she now buckles her knees just to make me happy.

Once everything started to settle, the hole I found in the center of my heart was enormous, much bigger than my twisted family could fill with its’ entertaining stupidity.  It was so much more fun to focus on my psychotic fucking mother, to direct my anger at my bully of a sister.  They have not changed, just the insanity of the moment. 

It was so much safer to be in the eye of the storm, pretending to be above it all.

For the last three years (is it really?) I’ve been spackling and gluing, dumping a panoply of addictive possibilities into my own personal toxic landfill:  tequila & gay bars,  ice cream treats & insulin shots. 

I decided my therapist was less than helpful when she claimed I spent too much time fantasizing, supposedly a by-product of childhood.  Seriously?  Life has always been way too real.

Meanwhile, the husband whose calm demeanor once seemed like a saving grace became an emotionless choking anchor around my throat.  The promise to love, honor and cherish is one he wants me to fulfill, even if it leaves me bound and gagged on the bottom of the ocean floor. 

Forgive me for being s(h)el(l)fish.

I’m no longer happy being a twisted observer even if it means I’m safe.  The passive role leaves me gasping for the person I was meant to be: pro-active, impatient, brash and assertive.  I’d rather make an atomic mistake and go out with a spectacular bang being true to myself.

Hiding behind others is so unnecessary when I’m twisted all on my own.

Sometimes You’re Depressed & Then Sometimes You’re In Deep Shit

This past week has been less than stellar.

1.) Started on insulin and not impressed with its’ lack of effect regarding my BS numbers.

2.) Gained 10 pounds and feel absolutely disgusting, every time I feel stressed I reach for sugar like a hard-core junkie.

3.) Feeling stuck and unhappy, bursting into tears re: inability to change my life (see #2).

3.) Regular thoughts that my life is over and not worth a pig’s ass anyway, so big fucking deal.

But today I woke up and went on-line and someone had laughed at a sentence I wrote last night.  Sometimes that’s all it takes.  I started thinking about how I’ve been through such crazy shit, how can I let the fact that I’m currently unhappy be my ending?

Stagnancy is the death of me.  I’m not good at being patient, I suck at doing the same thing over and over.  I have to make a change or it’s going to literally kill me.  I wish that was an exaggeration, but I don’t think so.  I’ve never been this stuck before.

Clearly, I have to stay away from sugar and junk food as if it were really heroin because I am a junkie and it’s kicking my ass.  So for today I’m going to take that very seriously instead of sneaking around like I’m hurting anyone other than myself.

All the lies I’m living have to end.  I really am tougher than I like to think.  I can do this. 

Most importantly, my #1 relationship, the one that really matters most, has to be the one I have with myself.

Fuck this shit.

Holy Sh*t &/or Twisted Me

So I’ve been thinking I should be a nicer person for a few reasons, namely the fact that my insensitivity and flippant comments can hurt people’s feelings when I don’t even know I’m doing it. 

Especially sensitive peeps I love tremendously.  There are only a few of those in the world and I need to make more of an effort to protect them from the fact that I open my mouth and let words spill out without considering their potential effects.

This is nothing new.  I made my best friend mad as far back as grade school because I wasn’t good at keeping her secrets.

Now that I think about it, perhaps it’s not that other people are particularly sensitive.  Maybe it’s that I’m a complete and total bitch.  Fuck me.  I am like my mother in so many freaking ways.

* * * * *

There was also a woman on this show “Heavy” who impressed me tremendously.  She had the sweetest voice and demeanor I may have ever heard.  She’d lost her mother and gained 100 pounds.  Then she lost her son to suicide and gained 60 more.  But if you saw her on the street all you would notice was that she could barely move from the weight collected in her butt and thighs.

She reminded me of the people I admire most, my grandmother and my mother-in-law, women who give nothing but love to the world around them even when they’re not getting it in return.  Both of them just have/had the kindest souls you could ask for in a person.  This woman was like them. 

But how often do I blow off someone who isn’t perfect looking in favor of some jackass who impresses me for completely ridiculous reasons?  Actually, due to my anti-social weirdness that can border on something needing diagnosis, I tend to blow off everybody.  But you know what I mean.

I can also be cruel.  My jokes are usually at someone else’s expense.  But if it gets a laugh I keep going.

* * * * *

A friend of mine placed a poll on Facebook, just a silly thing, asking people to vote as to whether I should write a book.  She was being sweet and complimentary and overblown in her kindness toward me.  It was lovely.

It became a big deal in my head when another ”friend” of mine, an extended relative on my husband’s side of the family (who I barely know), a man in his late 70′s, replied: “You might as well write the book, you don’t seem to have anything else to do !!!!!!!!!!”

Now, mind you, the statement is completely true.  But it still bugged the shit out of me.  Clearly the fellow does not find me entertaining  and thinks I’m an asshole.  At least, that’s how I read that sentence.

Reality is I do spend a lot more time on Facebook than I should, I write more than some, a lot more than some.  I actually feel like I’m being a drag if I don’t think of something entertaining to post. 

Like I’ve told my husband, “You have a social obligation to speak to people.”  This conflicts with the fact that I don’t answer my phone, but fuck it.

My initial instinct was to block the old bastard.  But I didn’t.  He is a fascinating conversationalist and has entertained me twice.  If you’ve got good stories I’m pretty much yours for life.  He’s also old and has health problems.

Plus, I knew what he said was the truth.

Wow!  It’s not as funny when you’re the butt of the joke.  You’d think I’d have learned that before fucking 50.

* * * * *

Later this evening I was yammering on about someone else and not being kind, not even a little.  Complete truth be told, I’m jealous of the woman I was making catty comments about..

That’s when God spoke to me with a freaking bitch slap.

At the same exact time I was saying shitty things . . .  she was writing on my Facebook wall that I should write a book because “you’re so funny, I would definitely buy it.”

Oh my God. 

I began screaming about what a whore I am.  Really, more of a slore, I have never been paid, a slutty whore. 

I cannot even express the shame I felt over my nasty ass.  This was no accident.  It had such a direct connection to everything I’ve been thinking in the last couple of days about trying to be sweet  instead of caustic.

It’s not even that I need to create a new persona, I need to tear down walls I’ve built for protection.  If I’d grown up to be who I was meant to be, if I’d been true to myself, the sweet chick is me.  She’s far more like my grandmother than my mother.  I am far more like my grandmother than my mother.

Sometimes being called on your shit is a good thing.

The Twisted Nature of Life &/or A Conversation With Mom

Spring has sprung and in all the excitement I picked up the phone and called my mother.  I know!  What a bizarre way to celebrate.  We’d had no communication since Christmas.  I’d essentially cut all ties with her and my sister due to the most recent stupidity.  When I say “cut all ties” I did it the virtual way, by blocking them from my Facebook page like a passive-aggressive dork.

I’d made a snarky comment about Mom on my page & she’d replied with something like “You must be talking about some other mother I’m unaware of, I don’t give a shit what you do.”  Rest assured, her stories of my childhood would read oh so differently.  Our communication patterns are clearly warped & then fried like a Twinkie at the county fair.

As for my sister, she let her boyfriend (we’ll call him “Sick Fuck”) back into the house after throwing him out due to the altercation relating to his comments about my niece’s breasts.  Somehow I’ve gotten pulled into everything by virtue of the fact that I’m my niece’s #1 supporter.  It’s not that I believe she makes no mistakes, it’s just that I’ve never understood this idea of kicking the underdog.  Especially if she happens to be your daughter or my niece.

Anyway, my sister is incredibly pissed off that I am close with Samantha.  She hurls curses at her and screams things like, “Go ahead, call Pammy!  I know you tell her EVERYTHING!”  She has some how turned everything around, when Sam is her daughter, not mine.  I have become the moral arbiter in my sister’s eyes, not a position I applied for or qualified to fill.

So fuck it, I felt like neither Mom or Penny were happy to hear anything other than perhaps I’d (1) been run over by a car or (2) was working in the power plant demolished by the recent tsunami or (3) my husband had finally acknowledged my worthlessness and set me out on the road in ratty underwear to be hit by the aforementioned (1). 

We’re not the kind of family that applauds one another’s successes.  More often it’s the family tradition to jump for joy over a blatant mess.  That’s the only way to get bumped up the ladder of success, climbing over each other’s backs, preferably in work boots or high heels.

* * * * *

By having no contact with the two of them, though, it put my niece in an awkward position.  She found my mother reading my Facebook page on her own computer.  I had skipped contacting Mom on her 70th birthday because of something she said to Sam.  This weird silent split was only making it more difficult for my niece, the last thing I wanted.

So I called mom and she was of course surprised to hear from me.  If my own daughter blew me off the way I do her, I’m not sure I’d be willing to just pick up where we left off.  So although she never admits to any wrong doing whatsoever there must be some vein of guilt or conscience deep within that acknowledges she owns a part in our epic butt fuck of a mother/daughter saga.

We were on the phone for 90 minutes.  It’s not how you would imagine it, as I am one of those nervous laughter types and after I call Mom on anything I cackle in the hope that she will do the same instead of call me names like when I was 10.  It’s a laugh riot. 

I can only hope that some of what I said will ring in her ears during the weeks and months ahead.  It only matters because I need someone to realize Samantha is not the only bad guy, as she’s trying so hard and yet being treated as the devil’s spawn.

This is a girl who was addicted to crack and hasn’t returned to it since being released from prison even though she is consistently told (1) she doesn’t care at all about her kids and (2) she’s a worthless piece of shit.  My mother stated several times, “Oh, she’ll never do that again.” 

Duh, you freaking dumbass.

 This led to a discussion about addiction and the fact that neither she or I can get off sugar or get our food in order, my brother is dead from the same shit, and my sister’s addicted to alcohol, cigarettes & gambling.  Since we can’t rid ourselves of these substances, how is it possible not to deem Sam a huge success?  Instead of being the black sheep she should be the shining star. 

Although I repeated it several times, I’m not sure she could ever take it in.  She’s too selfish to be able to give credit to anyone other than herself.  She is so incredibly egomaniacal, egocentric, childish and warped.

Eventually I told her there was a reason I didn’t call on her birthday and asked if she wanted to know why.  Did she remember saying something to Sam about how many cocks had been in her during a fight over a $300 electric bill? 

“Well, I don’t know, I might have.”

REALLY, Mom?  This is something you could FORGET saying to your beautiful beloved granddaughter?

I replied, “Mom, you’re 70!  At what point do you realize you’re the grown up and these kind of hurtful words are inappropriate when screamed at your granddaughter?  When do we learn a better way?  You know this isn’t something you should be saying to her.”  Mind you, I continue to laugh inappropriately because it is so ABSURD to need to say these words.

Her reply? 

“Well, Pam!  She fucked a black man for crack!” 

She stated this as if she couldn’t imagine anything worse in the world, with such indignation you’d think she’d led her life by Dear Abby’s advice. 

So I said, “Well, Mom, when I was about 11 you brought a black man into our van at the Indy Time Trials, got under a blanket with him and unzipped his pants then proceeded to jerk him off with me right there.  How is that different?”

“Well, I was probably drunk.”  And that part she said as if she were telling me she’d made me an omelet for breakfast and left it on the counter.  Perfectly reasonable, oh well, not a big deal really.

I said, “Are you going to tell me that a lot of women in America don’t fuck a man they don’t particularly want to on any given night?  At least Samantha got something out of it.  We’ve all done our fair share of whoring around.”

Her reply: “Oh God, not like that!”

How the fuck do you argue against such ignorance?

So I asked: “Do you remember taking me with you to put notes in your boyfriend’s cars?”

“Well, yes, but at least I kept you with me!  At least I didn’t leave you with a babysitter!” 

At this point I just snort.

We talked about Sam’s current boyfriend, who is back in jail, probably getting more facial tattoos as I write this.  Mom went on and on about how Sam had the opportunity to date “a nice guy” who wanted to take care of her and the kids but Sam wanted nothing to do with him.

My reply: “Mom, you married a man who has never, ever treated you properly or respected what you’ve done for him or even thanked you.  And you left everything to be with him, gave up everything.”

She said, “Well, you’re probably right about that.”

I said, “Mom, you left my father and immediately married a man who had a drawer full of bills you paid off.  You have never, ever been with a man who took care of you.  It’s always been the other way around.  And my sister, Sam’s mom, your daughter, left her second husband because he “was too nice.”  So how can you expect more of your granddaughter, or for her to behave any differently than every woman in this family?”

“Well . . . “

Then I add, “And what about the babies, Mom?  She had 3 beautiful children and our family tradition has always been to scream and cry and wring hands at the idea of a baby being born, as far back as my grandmother when she found out you were pregnant with me!  Yet you wanted Sam to have an abortion and that baby is the most beloved of all of them since she reminds us of Jim (my deceased brother).”

Her reply: “Oh, I don’t know what I’d do without those kids!”

I tried to throw in some positives, mentioning that she at least never allowed a man to live in our home who would say negative things about us or cut us down at every turn, the way my sister’s boyfriend treats Samantha.  It’s impossible to describe what a huge ordeal it is for me to see a way in which MY MOTHER is superior in any way to MY SISTER.  But my sister has really lost her way.

Still, I felt I had to make the first move to patch that relationship up too because, once again, this situation is not helpful to Sam.  So I sent my sister a Friend Request with a paragraph about knowing she is frustrated and stressed out.  I mentioned that I don’t handle being screamed at very well and I apologize for that because I know she is in need of help.  I told her I loved her and am sorry.  She accepted the following day with a comparable paragraph.

Not that things have changed.  Sam’s youngest one had a seizure day before yesterday and the idiotic boyfriend wanted to go with her in the ambulance.  What the fuck?!  This is a guy who’s still married to his fourth wife and has never taken care of his own children, on federal probation for having back-due child support in so many states.

My sister got pissed at her daughter for looking askance at this jerk-off and telling him she’d go with her own daughter, thank you very much.  This was somehow considered “selfish.”

I have no doubt that this piece of shit is trying to do his best.  His best is just really fucking similar to worthless.

One minute my niece is selfish, the next she doesn’t give a shit about her kids.  The girl can’t win.  I have no idea how she’s lasted this long.

 * * * * *

Clearly what I need to focus on throughout all of this is my own part in it, my own foibles, mistakes and improper behavior.  As angry as I am at my sister when it appears she is putting her boyfriend first, the reality is I have made and continue to make so many mistakes with my own children.  More often than not, I am incredibly selfish and put my own needs in front of theirs . . . just like Mom. 

It’s a balancing act and I will never be a 1950′s housewife type. 

As this crazy aging process continues I’m not even sure if any particular balance is the correct one.  We all have a limited amount of days on the planet and who is to say having children precludes our ability to ever again live life however we want, even if it displeases our kids (or anyone else)?  I don’t know the answer to this.

Certainly in the past five years, since my son became an adult & my brother died, my perspective has changed 180 degrees.  I don’t enjoy seeing the ways in which I am like my mother but I have to acknowledge I’ve done no better when it comes to some of her most outrageous behaviors.  

I just thank God I have the ability to analyze and apologize. 

Tell Me Your Secrets

I have finally signed off of Facebook and am once again sputtering in disgust at the lack of original thought which exists in the place I spend so much time.  (It’s very much like real life, when I find myself taking over the conversation with my in-laws because no one speaks about anything other than recipes or weather.)

Now there are polls.  People don’t even have to write a single line of content, they can just vote yes or no, Coke or Pepsi.  Egads!  I’m not asking for every single fucking detail about the overwhelming love you feel for [insert name] (blech!) or (God forbid) another song lyric. 

Just give me a single original word.  Please.

Yet, as always, whenever I complain about someone else it comes around to bite me in the ass.  There are certain things even I cannot tell the internet and that saddens me incredibly.  Really, it’s amazing how much I enjoy spilling it all.  It’s just a thing, I like complete openness and honesty (except when I don’t).  Yet I know there are good reasons for keeping some things to yourself.

Like the time I told a tableful of co-workers at lunch in a Chinese restaurant about my mother shooting the dog.  I immediately realized, “Oh shit wrong audience.”  Boundaries, Pam, boundaries!  The looks on their faces clearly told me none of their mothers had ever discussed anything even close to their third husband’s crooked penis with these chicks.

Nothing makes me happier than when someone tells me their deepest, darkest secrets and allows me to love & accept them in return, as I almost always do (to anyone other than my mother).  Really, seriously, I love people so much when they openly admit to mistakes and flaws and weakness  (yet it’s so difficult to expect acceptance for myself). 

Shame is such a heavy freaking load and usually so unnecessary if only we knew everyone else’s stories. 

Oops, just remembered one that would have been better kept silent, as evidently I’m not 100% accepting (so typical of me, bitching about everyone else and then remembering my own foible to torment myself).  Yes, the 3-week husband, the one who hit me in the head so hard I actually shut the fuck up.  He wrapped his weiner in bologna and coquettishly flirted with his dog. 

I’m just not an animal lover.

I’m currently reading “Feel the Fear and Do It Anyway,” and the author, Susan Jeffers, talks about hearing the same fears expressed over and over again in the classes she teaches.  Total strangers walk in, the room is ominously silent, and slowly people open up.  Suddenly students can identify with one another and everyone begins talking at once.

No one likes a cocky bastard who appears to have no flaws.  There are no flawless people, so clearly he’s lying.

Reconnecting with people from high school has kicked my ass with utter sadness, knowing there were so many other students as miserable as I, who thought they were just as weird and believed they came from the only dysfunctional family in town.  It’s devastating and such a waste.  We should have all been sitting around talking about our fucked up parents instead of some bullshit geometry or marching band formation. 

JESUS CHRISTOS, who created the curriculum anyway?

* * * * * *

Also reading “Roseannearchy” by Roseanne Barr.  Just a synopsis: She is Jewish, talked to God and he talked back throughout her entire life, she is honest to a fault, probably a genius, and

believes men don’t want women to get fat because their penises can’t.

Although I love the line because it made me laugh, I don’t think this is an argument she could win.

Roseanne is nearly 10 years older than I and has gone through full-blown menopause.  She no longer is interested in sex whatsoever, actually states that she hates it.  She refuses to take any kind of hormones and is pretty happy about her status as a sexless person, even though she has a boyfriend she lives with on her Hawaiian macadamia nut farm.  She didn’t mention what he does to take care of business.

How come we have sex ed classes in junior high, when we’re not supposed to be having sex, and we don’t know shit about what it’s going to be like as we grow older?  Of course, it’s different for everyone, but it certainly wasn’t what I expected.  Most of the women I know are closer to the disinterested side of things, I don’t currently speak regularly with any who actually enjoy it.  It’s a pretty sad state of affairs down yonder in a lot more relationships than not. 

The one chick I know who’s a fan is unwilling to do it when her children are home.  This is the most idiotic thing I’ve ever heard, yet completely true.  She sends them once a week to a damaging evangelical church activity just for time alone as a couple.  I love her dearly but she’s a moron.  Surprising that her husband has a massive internet p*rn collection and constantly plays on-line poker in the basement?  I think not.

If I’ve learned anything it’s that my mother-in-law was right when she told me it’s the only thing men care about and without it relationships fall apart.  Big time.

For me sex was always  just part of what I needed to do to make the other person love me.  I was in favor of the control it gave me and I liked that it made me feel attractive.  But a couple of years ago everything changed.  I wish I knew why, because it’s a fucking pain in my ass.  There is no clear explanation as to whether it’s about weight loss or hormones or just being a backwards dipshit.

I now have so much empathy for teen-aged boys because if this is what men go through their entire lives then I’m glad I was easy.  Of course I had O’s, but it always seemed like everyone made such a big deal out of a rather minimal outcome.  I mean, books can last for days, movies at least 2.5 hours.

Of course I know women who are the opposite, including my own mother (God, how I wish I didn’t know those details).  Friends who have regaled me in the past with their stories of multiple O’s left me with my head tilted to the side and my mouth hanging open.  Huh?!  Even worse, though, are the instances where these women somehow ended up with men who could not care less.  I laugh as I write that because it’s so sexist.  Clearly it’s not a happy place for a man to find himself, either.  Really, it’s misery both physically and mentally.

I’d say I was just with the wrong person, but I’ve seen some of the men these other excitable chicks do the deed with and I’m telling you there’s no way they’re that completely different naked.  We’re talking face transplant and complete body transformation before I’d consider them viable for any female.  Blech!  But it’s true, I am a picky bitch.  You will never, ever, ever find me with some stranger, any stranger.  My choice has been made, there will be no internet dating or random pounding.

This is an area where I’m uncomfortable being even as open as I’ve been in this entry and that’s not very. 

I never wanted to be like my mother (the nympho whore), my grandmother (anal retentive clean freak) was my ideal.  When Mom was on vacation Grandma stayed with us.  She was the one standing outside at the garbage can, burning my mother’s negligees.  In other words, my sexual identity is a fucked up mess and God is laughing at me.

So I’m wondering about you, dear reader, will even one of you share your sordid hormonal secrets?  Oh, how I would love to know there is just one other woman out there like me.