My parents divorced when I was 10.

I hesitated on that first sentence for a few seconds, because I have a difficult time referring to my initial father figure as my “parent.” I’m pretty sure he fed me and clothed me and loved me to the best of his ability, but his best just didn’t hold up. As a matter of fact, he ran dry on parenthood after twelve years or so.

He probably should have just adopted a dog.

My mom and I often discussed her first marriage as I was growing up. She had moved home right after nursing school because she had no money. Without money, she was without a car–and therefore a job. Without a job, she couldn’t afford a down payment for an apartment, so she married her high school sweetheart. She knew he wasn’t the right guy, but she felt like it was her only option.

My mom’s greatest wish for me was to grow up and gain the skills to be independent. She wanted me to fall in love, she wanted me to get married, she wanted me to have children, but not because I had no other choice.

The constant refrain when it came to dating or marriage was: Never commit to someone you want to change, because they never will.

When it comes to your children though things are different. You can’t walk away when your child makes awful decisions. You must try, as you have from the time they were small, to teach them the skills to make good choices.

But what if they never learn?

My sister’s battle with addiction began when she was an early teen. More than twenty years later, it’s still a constant battle. My parents (my whole family) went through all the stages–some taking much longer than others–denial, embarrassment, guilt, enabling, anger, support, grief and begrudgingly after many years and much heartache–acceptance.

There was nothing we could do to change my sister.

We couldn’t “fix” her no matter how badly we wanted to.

The choice to get better or let addiction claim her life was hers to make. All we could do was love her. We didn’t have to like who she was when she was using, all we could do was love the girl behind the addict.

So how do I reconcile these two messages about relationships? Honestly, until I started writing this post, I had never thought about the ways they contradict each other. Don’t love someone you want to change, yet you can still love someone even though you know you have no power to change them.

I guess I’m going to choose to focus on the central theme: love.

It would be tempting to ration the love I’m willing to share knowing how little control I have over the people I choose to give it to, but that’s not me. I just have to remember to give it freely –never with any strings attached–because they may just drag me places I don’t want to go.

This post was inspired by Julie’s Hump Day Hmmm. Check them out.

Who am I to tell him otherwise?

(oh the blackmail opportunities for the teen years!)

The Febreeze was left out after a nap-time accident.

Stupid parents.

Mr. 6 sprays Mr. 4 in the eye with the Febreeze–because what six year-old can resist a spray bottle?

So here’s what I hear first:

Mr. 6: I’m sorry. I’m sorry.

One brother apologizing to the other? The sure sign something is wrong.

Mr. 4: Ow.

Mr. 4: He sprayed me in the eye.

Mr. 6 runs away.

Me: Mr. 4, you okay?

Mr. 4: My eye is wet (I’m guessing that’s better than “it burns like a m-ther f-ckng jalapeno mom.”).

Mr. 6: (from the other room) Well Mr. 4. at least your eye will smell good.

Do you know how hard it is not to laugh while you’re trying to punish your child?

You’re the one “graduating” from sixth grade today, and yet I’m the one who is up early with a touch of the butterflies.

I have been your parent for eight years, but right now–right at this very moment–I know that I am and always will be your mom.

I love you buddy–with or without your curls of fury–and I couldn’t be more proud of you.

Baseball season is upon us once again (does it really ever end?) and as you know there aren’t many options for a girl when nature calls at the field.

I avoid the dreaded Port-o-Potties as much as possible, especially after the incident last year, but sometimes there’s just no choice.

We were down at the fields for a marathon afternoon and all of the sudden my breakfast came back to haunt me.

There wasn’t any time to make it home.

I found a relatively clean cabinet o’ ca-ca and went about my business. So many thoughts ran through my head as I was finding my way to sweet relief.

What if some kid forces the door open and everyone sees me with my pants down?

What if a long line has developed since I stepped in here?

Is the tank full enough that the next person will know I had the sour-apple-quick-steps?

As these totally rational and sane thoughts caused me to sweat a little, my eyes landed on this:

I HAD to know whose job it was to figure THAT out.

As part of my research (see what I do for you??), I made the most fascinating discovery–the PSAI–and boy is their website full of interesting information!

For instance, did you know that there are 1,400,000 portable toilets in use worldwide? That they call waste “effluent” (I’m kinda liking that word)? And that they have developed a Special Events Usage Guide?

I know, me neither.

Those portable sanitation people are some helpful folk.

To top it all off, the nice folks at the PSAI hand out the M.Z. “Andy” Dump–I mean–Gump Award which is a “lifetime achievement award honoring those that have improved the image of the industry and have created innovative approaches for sanitation needs through new and improved products and services.”

I want to party with these guys.

I know new posts have been pretty sparse around here, but springtime here in the wilds of Northern Virginia (and when I say wilds I mean the Target parking lot on Saturday morning) speeds by at breakneck pace (or that might be how I drive to work every morning).

So aside from my regular duties protecting poor little corporate America from mean ole lawmakers and their big bully constituents, I’ve been busy ensuring that America’s youth understands that our national pastime is indeed a sport played outside and does not involve controllers and a big screen.

Of course, I’ve also been spreading beauty far and wide (What? My house is on the corner, I have to plant on two sides).

I’ve been sowing the seeds for a bountiful harvest (if you call a few salads and enough jalapeno peppers to start your own salsa company bountiful).

And well, the kids do need a rinsing off every once in a while.

There are days when your kitchen sink develops a clog and it’s a holiday weekend and 35 people are coming to your house so you run back and forth to use the guest bathroom sink while preparing the food for said guests–ignoring the fact that you will have no way to clean up after them when they leave at 3:00 a.m.

There are days when you read her and you almost wet your pants because holy crap is she funny, but then you secretly plot to steal her brain because you know you’ll never be that funny, but then you secretly thank the goddess of discount designer shoes that she walks this planet at the same time you do.

There are days when your six year-old mumbles the word “evaporate” as he’s drifting off to sleep so he can commit the new word to memory and your heart just explodes with pride, but then you remember five minutes earlier he was telling you about the “masagna” he had for dinner and you decide that he might not get that Nobel after all.

There are days when you don’t think your blogging is ever going to amount to much and then you get invited to this super-swanky, invite-only reception for the premiere of a new movie and you decide that you might not abandon your blog after all, until you get to the super-swanky, invite-only party and they play Kung Fu Fighting over and over and over again for two hours straight and there is no alcohol, so you decide that the party was secretly a punishment and you were invited because your blog sucks big black licorice-flavored turds.

There are days when your friend complains over email about all the traveling they must do over the summer and your inner bitch can be silenced no more so she sends a snide reply suggesting that the person have a terrific summer and contact her when they actually want to talk, but then your bitch rethinks her rudeness and cancels the reply before it’s sent. Still feeling pissy after the original reply is discarded, the bitch decides to send one anyway–just a bit snarkier this time–only to realize once that one is gone that they were both sent and now you just look like an idiot.

There are days when you can feel the scream begin deep in your stomach and as it rises you know that if you don’t figure out soon what your purpose in life is there is no way you’re going to prevent that scream from deafening those around you so you decide to tell your husband about it and he suggests you quash it by getting up earlier in the morning to make your children pancakes.

There are days you don’t kill your husband.

There are days when you are little and you think it would be cool to have a retainer or a cast or something neato like that and then you grow up and you trip on the sidewalk because apparently a single step down can be dicey terrain to negotiate and you break your ankle and you get a cast and then the cast comes off and your ankle still doesn’t heal and then you want to remove your leg at the knee and use the separated appendage to knock your orthopedist silly until he fixes you enough so that you can wear flip flops again, because damn it’s finally flip flop weather.

Yep. There are days.

If I avoid walking through my kitchen today, does the mess cease to exist?

Welcome to my Sunday experiment more easily accomplished because of the two baseball games and the meetings both the hubs and I need to attend today. Add to it the fact that I’m supposed to be using crutches again and I think I feel perfectly justified in closing my eyes as I walk through that room just one more time as I head out the door.

Hope you’re enjoying your Sunday and ignoring the ugly in your life–even if it’s just for one day.

Check it out.

The mommies are on the loose and they’re talking about sex.

You know you wanna know what we have to say.

It’s okay. Go ahead. Click.

It started out as the most innocent conversation, but I was left with many questions.

A wad of rain-soaked clothes were left in my co-worker’s car resulting in a musty smell. He was telling me about the vast amounts of Febreeze he had sprayed in his car and was complaining that he could still smell the odor.

When I was younger we had dogs. We always used Lysol to clean up after the puppies while they were being housebroken. The puppies in my life pre-dated my children, and therefore my tolerance of poop, so I would often gag when I was forced to pick up the poop. The smell, the consistency, the little remnants left on the floor; I still associate the smell of Lysol with it all.

It was this I was telling my co-worker–that if I smell Lysol now I would swear to you that it smells like puppy poop–when he made an unexpected connection to my story.

Him: “Oh yeah. That’s just like when I smell someone who has on my jerk-off lotion.”

Me: *blink. blink*

It takes a lot to leave me speechless, but I definitely didn’t see that coming.*

*Heh, I said “coming”.*

So I let this information sink in–about five seconds goes by–and then it begins to happen.

I have questions!

Me: “You have jerk-off lotion? Is this special lotion? Do you only use it for that purpose or do you just use whatever you happen to have around? Can’t you just do it with a dry hand?”

And he actually began to answer them.

We work in a very small consulting firm, so this conversation is not as inappropriate or uncomfortable as it sounds. He’s in his late-twenties. It’s the 20-something boys I know who keep me hip to the whole single scene. Not that I don’t respect them, but I do sort of look at them like animals in the zoo–observing their behavior and being grateful that I live on the other side of the bars.

It was a bunch of young, male, former co-workers who taught me years ago about the prevalence of manscaping and the expectation of Brazillians for the women they dated when I still thought all that grooming was reserved for the porn set. Seriously, you ever think you want to be single again? Just talk to a bunch of late-twenties males. You’ll run home to your spouse at lightening speed.

Anyway, so he starts answering me.

Him: “Yeah. I haven’t gone without it for like 10 years. It’s nothing special, but I usually have two bottles, one in the bathroom for regular use and one in the bedroom.”

Me: “What if your girlfriend develops a sudden case of dry skin and sees the bottle of lotion by the bed and just starts slathering it on? Do you run to stop her?”

Can you just see that all in slow motion? “Nooooo. Not THAT lotion.”

Him: “Not at all.”

Me: “But then she’ll remind you of…um…jerking off?”

Him.: “Yeah! I know. That’d be awesome.”

Um. I don’t think she’d think so.

So now I have a challenge.

I have between now and our next holiday party in December to figure out a way to delicately suggest that she might want to bring her own lotion with her to her boyfriend’s house.

And I swear the next poor guy I see in the lotion aisle at CVS is going to be so sad he met me.

“So how do you decide which brand?”

“Are you brand loyal?”

“What if there’s something different on sale?”

“What features are you looking for?”

“Wouldn’t lube work better?”

“Do you prefer scented or unscented?”

I just have so many questions…

*For the record, I’m not a prude. It wasn’t that I was unfamilar with the concept, I just never thought that’s where the conversation was going to take us.