Music... And Some Other Stuff

Warning: I am not about to tell you anything you don't already know. I lead with this so you know that I am fully aware that with this post I am not making any new discoveries because I didn't want you to be like, "Duh, Jen, we already know all of this, why do you think you're telling us something new?" So literally telling you that I am not telling anything new, I'm just sharing my rambling thoughts on this topic.

Last night I felt like singing. It was my Friday night, and I didn't feel like watching TV, the kid was busy doing homework. I had already had some post-work snacks (I'm trying to not do that but that's a whole other blog post entirely) and I rarely like to sing after I've eaten (I'm definitely not a professional, just listen to any of my posts on my YouTube channel and that is clear, but singing on an empty stomach is my favorite), and when I'm at home and I'm going to sing a couple of songs I like to do it with a cocktail or a glass of wine (my home drinking is if I sing or I have people over or I'm on a Zoom with pals), but I never want a cocktail or a glass of wine after I've eaten (because I like that on a relatively empty stomach, too). All of this ridiculous rambling to say, that I wanted to sing was sort of unusual. Maybe it had something to do with a conversation I'd had with a friend earlier in the day about hobbies and expressing ourselves in a creative way and the importance of that. For me, it's always been something I've craved, whether it was sitting on the piano bench next to my dad when I was 6 or 7, my feet dangling as he played a song and I sang along. Or when I would sing along to a favorite on a cassette while my mom, my beloved captive audience, listened and applauded. Maybe it was writing a skit with friends to perform in junior high. Later it was writing screenplays that rarely left my bedroom but it was fun and it was fulfilling. 

And that was a lot of rambling to say that I want to create and I want to perform but that is literally not even the point of this blog but you guys know me and you know that this is the way I talk. What was I saying? Where was I going with this? Because I went off on a tangent and now I need to get on track. It's literally like I'm in the room trying to tell you all of this and if you were just sitting there wishing you could talk to a flibbertigibbet (boy, if ever a word summed me up it's that one) then you're welcome.

Back to the point. Music. The fact that you can hear one song as you are immediately transported to such a specific time and place, to such a warm memory, or maybe to such a sad memory. What else do we have with this much power? Why can't I remember what I had for lunch yesterday, but I can put on a song I haven't heard in maybe fifteen years and remember every word, every change in the melody, all the specific ways the phrasing goes? 

I hear Veronica (from the Spike album) by Elvis Costello or anything from the Bette Midler albums Some People's Lives or the For the Boys Soundtrack and I am in my Nissan Pulsar listening to these cassettes driving home from class at San Francisco State. I mostly hated my experience at the school; it was a ridiculously difficult time in my life (see my social phobia post  for some of that if you're curious) and if you asked me to name any of my teachers I'm not even sure that I could. But I can so easily picture myself on the lower deck of the Bay Bridge letting these albums get me through the drive. Singing along with Bette and feeling joyful at a time that I consistently felt joyless. 

The song I chose to sing last night was You Needed Me by Anne Murray. I don't remember how I was introduced to this song, I don't remember the first time I heard it. I just so clearly singing it at the piano with dad, and I remember buying the 45 on a shopping trip with my mom. I think the inner part of the record was purple. Before last night it had been many months since I'd sang that song, and before many months ago it had been YEARS. Why did it come to me to sing it last night, no idea. But singing it left me feeling like I'd nourished my soul. It also left me a little sad. I miss my dad. How wonderful it would have been to sit by him at the piano at my age. Our relationship wasn't an easy one. He wasn't an "easy" person. In a perfect world our time at the piano would have extended past my very young years, but it didn't because my world and life were (and are) far from perfect. But what a gift he gave me. So much of my love for performance is probably from listening to him play jazz on the piano, sometimes he sang along. From him checking out records at the library and making cassette recordings of them. I used to take his Sarah Vaughan and Carmen McRae cassettes to my room and play them and sing along. (By the way, typing this is bringing the tears and that's okay because sometimes they just need to come out.) I just now put Carmen on Amazon Music (how nice to live in a time where you don't need to go digging through your box of cassettes to hear a voice you miss, you kids just don't know how good you got it). I owe my dad so very much. I have always known this, but right now I am reminded of the truth of this and also to be thankful for what we get from people who are no longer with us, rather than mourn what we did not get. 

I didn't follow any sort of straight line here (shocking), but music is amazing. It means so many different things to so many different people. It takes us so many places. If you feel the need to create or perform, do it. Do it today. Share it with people, if you, like me, need to put it out into the world. Or get your mom to sit on the couch and go sing for her. I know she'll love it. Write that story or that poem. Take those nature pictures. Just take time to feed your soul in whatever way works for you.

P. S. I went to post my video on my Facebook page and was struck by the thought that I could be conflating this song with You Light Up My Life because I definitely sang that with dad (and also Love Will Keep Us Together). Maybe I just sang along with the 45?! If only he were here to fact check me! 

How Groundhog Day (the observance) Is Inspiring Me to Un-Groundhog Day (the movie) My Life (one box at a time)

The most recent episode on the Unspooled podcast had hosts Paul Scheer and film critic Amy Nicholson talking about one of my favorite movies, Groundhog Day. A timely post from six days ago, considering that at the time the actual Groundhog Day (today) was less than a week away (and by the way, apparently Punxsutawney Phil saw his shadow today so bundle up, y'all).

Groundhog Day is one of my favorite movies of all time. Maybe not in my top ten but pretty darn close to it. It's very funny, I love Bill Murray, and I am a sucker for some early '90s Andie MacDowell for sure (Four Weddings and a Funeral and Green Card, and it's really time for a re-watch on both of those). 

If you are unfamiliar with the movie Groundhog Day, Bill plays a weatherman who winds up having to live the same day (which happens to be on Groundhog Day, which he is spending in Punxsutawney, PA) over and over again until he gets it right (and I would tell you what "right" is but I don't want to spoil it for you in case you haven't seen it and if you haven't seen it I would suggest you go watch it right now, if you can find it, and apparently it is streaming on AMC all day today). 

Listening to the pod got me to thinking... I feel like I am living Groundhog Day, so much, right now.

Later that day I was talking to my best friends on our text thread. May I take a moment to say how thankful I am to have my beautiful best friends and our ongoing thread where we talk about whatever it is that is delighting us or taxing us and everything in between? Beyond thankful. Anyway,  it turned out that we were all feeling some kinda way. Like it wasn't that life was beating us up, it was just that life was sort of meh. And I said, girls, I feel like it's Groundhog Day every day for me. Like every day I am doing the same thing. And my friends were like YAAAAAAAASSSSS QUEEN except they didn't say it that way, that's the way I would have said it. And then one of my friends on the socials used Groundhog Day to describe her existence this past year. And I'm like wow, this is a thing. This is an actual real thing.

Don't get me wrong, some of the same things are totally fantastic and wonderful!! I love my job (sometimes I only like it and sometimes I do not like it all but luckily that is pretty rare) so I'm already way ahead of the game in life. On my days off I like to exercise, sometimes TWICE. I like to take a nap (naps are glorious and naps are life). I have a beautiful kid who sometimes comes out of her room to hang out with me. So what's the problem?

Well, obviously, the first problem is that THERE IS A PANDEMIC. There is a heaviness that all of us are carrying; you might not know anyone who has died or been sick (and the longer this goes on that becomes fewer of us), but you know that it is happening all over and that is a lot. That is a lot to have as our baseline, right? Even if we are lucky to have not had it touch us or a family member it is a fucking lot. 

So where do I get off having this malaise? Having this major first-world issue of feeling like I am stuck, that I am just churning, that I am just going through the motions, in a way. In spite of having plenty of laughs and fun and feeling the love from my friends and family, what do I do about this lassitude I find permeating my sense of well-being???

(Did I even use the word lassitude correctly? I can't lie, it popped up when I was looking at synonyms for malaise. I like how it sounds and looks so I guess I'll keep it there.)

But how can I complain? It's because I'm human. I'm so incredibly human, with all of the weaknesses that word can carry with it. Sensitive, emotional, hormonal, just to name a few super human (not to be confused with superhuman) attributes I'd use to describe myself. 

Here's what I have decided to do: Just one thing that is different.

One thing that is different than what I did the week before. Preferably one thing that moves me forward.

This blog post might count as this week's thing. Not sure that it moves me forward so much as it makes me use a different part of my brain, makes me tap into some creativity (pfft, I'm not calling myself creative by throwing all of this stuff out of my brain and onto the Interwebs, but you know what I mean) that I don't use in my every day life.

I have boxes in my garage. I have what I would call a fuckton of boxes. Way too many boxes, considering some of these items in boxes have been in boxes since a 2009 move. There might be school papers from college and grad school that have been in boxes since my 2004 move. This is problematic. This is most definitely a problem. But what if I unpack one box every week? If I keep doing that, I might find things I can give away or toss or bring into my house (WHERE THE HELL WILL I PUT IT THOUGH I ALREADY HAVE TOO MUCH STUFF), oooooooorrrrr I might find it's something that's meant to stay in a box for my kid to deal with when I go to that great box-filled garage in the sky (sorry, kid). 

I might also pick a corner of my house that needs attention and even just give it thirty minutes.

Maybe I'll study up on that Spanish that learned thirty-something years ago in high school. The possibilities are endless.

Just one different thing to make me feel more alive and like I'm headed somewhere even if the somewhere is right here. 

I Hated Myself For a Few Hours and It Really Sucked So Let's See if I Learned Anything and Might Be Able to Help Someone Else

Guys, yesterday, for a few to even several hours, I hated myself.

It fucking sucked.

I give hating oneself zero stars. Would not recommend.

So since I haven't done a blog post since I don't even know when, and since I had the unbelievably good fortune to have a friend offer to work for me today so I could take some comp time and have a much-needed mental health day that I didn't even know I needed (not because of the self loathing thing, because of the working way too many days thing lately, but it's cool that the self loathing coincided with this bonus day off), I figure I'll talk about what went down and encourage others to NOT BE LIKE I WAS YESTERDAY. Because once again, it sucked.

Yesterday's self loathing was sponsored by my weight. I would bet that there are many people who can relate to this. Weight issues have been something with which I've dealt for my entire adult life. And even in my teens. And I'm 50 now so that's a really long time. At various times in my life, being overweight has been a really big deal for me. I've often had my self-esteem connected to those numbers on the scale or how well my clothes fit.

The cool thing about being in my 40's and now being 50 is that what I weigh doesn't usually play into my feelings about myself. Sure, I have plenty of moments where I'm like, "Well, I really wanted to wear these jeans but they are cutting off my circulation, that's a fucking bummer," or, "Maybe more people would want to date me if I wasn't carrying around these extra 100 lbs" (I don't like having that thought but online dating be like that which is one of the reasons I hate it and I'm not currently doing it) or, "My knees wouldn't hurt so much and maybe I'd live longer and be around for my kid if I were at a healthier weight." So carrying extra weight, it is a thing for me, but in spite of that, I choose to think thoughts like, "I'm pretty cute," or, "I don't have that many wrinkles thanks to all this oil in my face," or, "People seem to like being around me and hanging out with me so I must be doing okay," or, "My kid is a teenager and not a total asshole and is in fact pretty wonderful so I must have not done this motherhood thing completely incorrectly." With nearly everything in life, I want the silver linings. I want the glass half-full. I want the bright side. So when it comes to how I feel about myself, while I fully recognize internal and external things that need work, when it comes to the external stuff I don't want that to be my focus. 

A few weeks ago I decided to try a keto diet again. I ate keto for most of 2019 and felt great and lost like 40 lbs. Around October of last year I fell off then there were the holidays and then I never felt like starting back in the beginning of this year and then pandemic and being an emotional eater you can just figure out the rest. It's been tough. So I've been doing a lot of exercising and trying different things on Beachbody On Demand and feeling great and stronger and more flexible and I hadn't even stepped on the scale, which for me, especially if I'm trying to eat differently, is unusual.

Then I got on the scale. And wow. I had no idea that my numbers had gone up as much as they had. It was a shocker. 

And that's when the self loathing kicked in.

How could I let myself go this far? Why have I been lazy with this keto and not logging my calories? Why did I have all those cheat days? Why am I so weak? I'm so ugly. My stomach and hips and thighs are so big. I look terrible. I can't believe I have been walking around feeling good about myself and the fact that for the first time in my life I have been getting up BEFORE work to work out. How can I feel good about myself when I'm doing everything wrong and I look like this?

Yep. That was the tape playing in my head for most of yesterday. Pretty unpleasant, right?

Luckily, I'm a big believer in reset buttons. And sleeping things off. And tomorrow being a new day. Because today, I am happy to report, I don't hate myself.

I decided yesterday I would go take a walk today. I haven't in a while and the air quality is good and the sun is shining and the temperature should be good. And that then I will get in the ab workout that is next up in my lineup. 

I'm choosing to not focus on what my body looks like today. For one thing, we are in a pandemic. If we are healthy and alive, we are lucky. If we can move, we are lucky. If we are able to get up and function, we are awesome. 

Here's some powerful stuff that makes so much sense, from this article about self-loathing from the PsychAlive website (which, by the way, looks like it has some really cool stuff on it): 

How to Overcome Self-Loathing

No matter what circumstances you find yourself in, a nasty point of view toward yourself is never warranted.  It is never in your self-interest.  The proper viewpoint toward yourself should be one of friendship.  Think about yourself and treat yourself as you would a close friend; respectfully and with affection. With understanding and empathy. And maybe most importantly, with a sense of easiness and humor.

 "It is never in your self-interest."

Right??? Right! What did that period of hating myself do for me? It took time away from me enjoying life. That's all that it did.

I can be aware that I have work to do or that I need to modify certain behaviors and not have that awareness turn to hating myself like it did yesterday.

I did get on the scale this morning. I couldn't help myself. I'd had a feeling that the number was going to go down because I had been on a bit of a two-day free-for-all and figured I'd been retaining a shit ton of water. And sure enough, the number was four pounds less than the day before (and yesterday I ate a lot more reasonably than I had been). But I don't plan to get on the scale anytime soon. I got the reality check that I needed, I know where I am, I know what tools I can use to work on that reality. But I'm going to be kind to myself about it. I'm going to treat myself like a friend. I'm going to remember that I'm doing my best on that day considering the circumstances. 

Maybe I'll do some meditating, too. I always say I'm going to regularly practice meditation and then I don't. But maybe just typing this will at least get me to do it today. Fingers crossed.

I'll look for little things to do around the house that make me feel less chaotic. I bought an organizer for the lids of plastic containers. Just putting the lids in this thing and organizing that one shelf took me about 10 minutes and it made me feel so much better. Calmer. Because I judge myself on my inability to stay as organized and as tidy as I would like at my house. So now there's one less thing about which to judge myself. One little thing that was taking care of myself because it made me feel good and it wasn't expensive or time-consuming.

So if you have spent any time recently hating yourself or being unkind to yourself I hope you will take my advice: Love yourself. Be kind to yourself. You ARE lovable. You are worthy. You are not deserving of hate from anyone, especially yourself. Talk about it. Write about it. Get it out of your head and into a phone call with a friend or a diary entry for yourself. Don't let it swirl around in there and make you think it's true. I'm not a doctor nor do I play one on TV but I do know that RuPaul says at the end of every episode of Drag Race that if you can't love yourself how the hell you gonna love somebody else, can I get an Amen? And you know what I say to that? AMEN!

Stillness

Being in South Lake Tahoe, sipping my coffee while sitting on a picnic bench near my room, with the sun beating down on my exposed right shoulder

(remind me to tell you about the eavesdropping and being closer to the sun), staring at the barely moving lake, surrounded by mountains, some of which are still snow-capped in mid-June, the only noises being twitters from birds, honks from geese, and the motor of an occasional small plane overhead, peppered by human sounds here and there, one family member calling to another, all of this, this scene I am so fortunate enough to be able to work overtime and/or increase my credit card debt to afford, it reminds me of the importance and the beauty of being still.

My morning coffee view that inspired this post,

South Lake Tahoe 

Longest sentence ever shall be left as such, grammatical errors and all, because I feel like it makes sense in the context of this current moment in my life.

I think I go around not realizing how I need moments like this. At home I have the benefit of having zero trouble being totally lazy. People will be like, I just need to slow down and take a moment for me and I'm like follow me, I'll show you the way. Granted, my house is always going to be less tidy than the go-getters who don't slow down. And I only have one kid and she's thirteen-and-a-half and frankly, doesn't need me as much nor does she care to hang out with me as much as she did in the olden days. So it's actually too easy for me to get alone time.

I also am lucky enough to be surrounded by beautiful nature at home and nearby. But usually I'm walking or hiking through it, sometimes taking in the sounds but sometimes listening to a podcast. I like the podcast because I like my mind distracted. Because I don't want to think about work or how much replacing my window will cost or about how seventh grade has been so rough for my kid or about how I'll never find someone to date or even love if I don't look but looking for it is always such a reminder that no one (in whom I'm interested) seems to be  looking for this particular version of me or about how much I miss and need my mommy. Like obviously I think about all of these things but I also do a lot to distract myself from these thoughts so that I can be functional.

I'm hoping this trip and these words will make go to one of my favorite spots for nature and take a moment to just sit. To be still. Sure, to meditate. What did one group therapist once say to describe the process... to not stop thinking but to let the thoughts come and go without judgment. Maybe I'll do that more.

Maybe within the still moments I'll take time to nurture neglected parts of myself. Like this part right here who needs to express itself by writing but only ever writes Facebook statuses and really long text messages. We'll see.

Oh, yes, the eavesdropping. This guy was sitting on the shore with his ridiculously adorable baby, taking in the sunset and sharing it with someone via Facetime or similar. And best I could tell he said:

Dude: It's because of the elevation, bruh, we're like closer to space, and space is...

That's what I swear I heard. Does it make sense? No, not at all, it doesn't even go with me trying to tell you how intense the sun felt on my shoulder. But it's amazing. Just like a Tahoe sunset.

A Week in the World of Online Dating Made Me Listen to Myself from May (So I'm Glad I Blog About Some of This S$%t)

I don't even know how to start this hot mess. Just know you're in for some oversharing. But I hope it's going to make you feel better about what you thought was a hot mess in YOUR  love life. Or that you can relate and be like oh man. Jen is RIGHT THERE WITH ME. Or basically you're just watching me have therapy, right in front of you guys. Because this is how I do it at the moment even though we all know I could really benefit from some couch time.


Men. I like them. I sometimes want to associate with them. But I haven't in quite a while (which is, I know, a relative thing to say, because at one point in my life "quite a while" was four years and now it might be more like four months and everyone else has numbers somewhere in there or more or less or whatever because that's how we wacky humans are), and part of the reason for that is the multitude of reasons for that include: I'm lazy; I don't want to clean my house and womanscape myself; I don't want to get a babysitter; it's summer and it's all about me and the kid and vacations; my hormones are all over the place and it's next to impossible to plan ANYTHING; I don't want to not be at home with my kid; I don't want to not be at home on my couch with my DVR; I don't want to take time away from time I hang out with my friends who are AWESOME; I don't want complications in my life.


Because no matter how you slice it, at some point, men=complications. At least in my life.


There was the one guy I met in a "normal" way who on the outside was all that and then I was sort of interested then not then I was then they really were and then I was NOT. And there's the guy who seemed interested one minute and then not the next and then again and then not and then DISAPPEARED. And then there is the completely emotionally and logistically unavailable guy who wants to do x, y, and z, but not a, b, and c, and I'm like yeah... I was looking for the whole alphabet, actually, but thanks for the offer of those three letters. And then there's the young guy... why am I not interested in the young guy? Let me get back to you on that because I'm actually forgetting why it is I'm not calling him...


So with that hot mess of a paragraph OF COURSE I decided I should put myself on an online dating site or two. So that I could feel annoyed and rejected by more than just my limited pool of men. Well, that's my take a week later. Initially I was like, oh my gosh, these men in my circle, there are more men in the world, I need to widen my scope and see if I feel like dating at ALL because I'm feeling like I don't AT ALL, but maybe it's just this pool of folks, right?


Didn't that totally make sense? It made sense to me at the time.


Well, what has transpired is that nothing has transpired. I think I found four people interesting enough to send them a message. So then it's like I'm getting rejected on three fronts. If no one picks you up at a bar it's because you don't look like their type. If someone doesn't replay to your message you don't look like their type, your profile blurb is not interesting, and the message you thought was so witty that there was no way they wouldn't reply, also did absolutely nothing for them. So it's like boom. Boom. Boom. And then of the gents who messaged me, I was not interested in any of them. One of them LOOKED like my cup of tea but seemed like an arrogant ass. And then on both of these "free" sites you can't see a bunch of stuff if you don't pay. Apparently there are like forty-seven men who like me on one of them but I have no idea who they are because I refuse to pay for this shit when I don't even know if I want to leave my couch. If they can't be bothered to send a message their "like" for me can go fuck itself.


So add my ever steady stream of flowing hormones and there have been a couple of times where I'm just like man, I'm going to go ahead and cry right now. I didn't, but I kind of wanted to. And this morning I was saw this post on Facebook and the headline was, "109-Year-Old Woman Said Secret to Long Life is Avoiding Men." And I was just like THIS IS A SIGN. And I should write about how I've come to the conclusion that men are not for me. I've loved a couple of them and those experiences turned out to be disasters. EXCEPT that with the first guy I wound up with the greatest thing in my life, my kid. So I feel like I just need to shut up about this. Because I. Have. An. Amazing. Kid. Do you know how many people would love to be where I am? I have a job, I like my job. I have great friends, I love them, and I love my family so much. And then on top of it, I have this beautiful daughter who keeps me entertained and amused and I love her with all my heart and then some. And I co-parent peacefully with her dad. So why should I care if I'm at the high school dance all over again and no one wants to dance with me? It DOESN'T MATTER. At the end of the day, I will sometimes feel like this really matters. But it DOESN'T MATTER. It just doesn't matter at all. If my lot in life is that boys don't know I'm alive, but my life is all wonderful and great and filled with love, then that thing about boys DOESN'T MATTER. Would I rather a full dance card and not the other stuff? Of course not.


Maybe one day it will fall into my lap. Out of the sky. Basically someone from another planet because I'm the right "type" for an alien. Maybe that will happen and until then I'm going to remember that I already covered this back in May. And I read the post below (I'll italicize the whole thing so you know that this is me talking all the way back five months ago) and was like, "I already know this. I've known this. I know it down in my soul." And I instantly felt okay-er about everything.


So at the end of the day this is not about how I lose at love and sex. It's about how I win at the rest of it. Because I have won and I do win, daily. And my glass is half full about this and my heart is all the way full.


Friday, May 22, 2015

Acceptance Might Look Like Pessimism But At Least I'm Very Okay

I'm trying to think how I can do this post and not sound totally pessimistic. Truth be told, with regard to this subject matter, I have been made amazingly pessimistic. I started out like anyone else, full of hope and dreams and ideas of how perfect things would be, eyes filled with stars and rainbows and unicorns and heart emoticons.

And then I had life happen to me. And life says, in general, mine is better without a man in it.

Should I be doing this post when I'm hormonal? Better question is, since I will be forty-five years old in two weeks and one day and heavily rely on my Maximum Strength Estroven, how much time do I get to spend these days not being hormonal? So I might as well get this out, even if there's a chance I start crying and I did a bunch of crying yesterday so I really really really don't want to cry today because frankly, that shit is super tiring. Downright exhausting.

But the tears, while partly due to being a little sad, are also part of the cleansing. Part of the accepting. I'm accepting how my life should be, on what I should concentrate, to what I should pay attention, that which I need to make a priority, the things about which I need to care the most.

And finding a relationship or finding some nookie are two things about which I do not wish to care. As they say nowadays, when it comes to these things, I can't even. I just. Can't. Even.

I feel like since I first noticed that boys were cute (and this is going back to about 1975), it's been a struggle. It's been a round peg trying to fit into a square hole, it's been a girl who is too shy to make herself noticed or who has terrible hair and pitiful eyebrows and later, let's throw on a full-blown social phobia that would last more than 10 years. And then there's the fact that at nearly six feet tall, the world of men is smaller than the world of men for my counterpart who is an adorable five-five. Yes, I love you, all my five-five lovelies, and I'm so envious that there are a bunch more short apples you can pick off the dating tree. I mean, we know, my first boyfriend was just over five feet and I made a baby with a guy who didn't reach five-six. But when it comes to dating, it's kind of hard to find guys who are okay with or don't feel weird about their woman being taller, and frankly, as tall as I am, I still have this silly girly want of being able to look a guy in the eye and his eyes are not pointing at my boobs. And finally, let's add to this mix of Mission Impossible: The Dating Version that my "type" when I was twelve was Burt Reynolds and Tom Selleck. These were the guys I thought were hunks. And that has persisted, and changed to something softer and nerdier and maybe not as hairy (though give me a hairy chest and I'll even deal with the back hair over someone who looks ready for an Olympic swim team), and those guys are not looking at me... they might be look at thinner and lighter and blonder, frankly. Which is okay, we all have preferences (see Tom and Burt above and please, let's not get confused and think I want Burt today because, come on, I'm talking Smokey and the Bandit/Paternity/Cannonball Run Burt), I'm just saying obviously, when it comes to the stars aligning and I think some guy is cute and he thinks I'm cute and he makes me laugh and he thinks I'm hilarious, you can see, it's challenging.

Don't get me wrong, it's challenging for everyone. I live on this planet, I know you can have the most perfect body and perfect hair and be just the right height and say all the right things and still have a hell of a time finding a guy. Or finding one who is decent. Or one who doesn't drive you nuts. I'm not saying otherwise but I'm just talking about my experience right now.

After my last experience on a dating site, on which I talked to a few nice guys and a few very dull guys and put myself out there and got no responses to some messages and met a sort of confusing guy with whom I had a lovely time but I probably won't see again (long story), I'm fucking exhausted. I'm tired. I am over checking my email to see if anyone "liked" me or messaged me. I'm over getting the email from them showing me my "matches," I'm over looking at the same group of matches over and over again because even when you say oh man, I'm so not interested (that guy looks like a goth Abe Lincoln, top hat and all) and hide their profile, five minutes later it's right there in the group of the same faces you cannot possibly look at one more time.

I'm tired of feeling rejected by someone I don't even know. I'm tired of fishing when I don't even know what I'd do with these fish when I get them. I work at least forty hours each week. I want to spend my down time with my kid, and I'm so selfish of that time but there's so little left for anything else. So why I am getting angst when that guy who was kind of cute and said some kind of funny things in his profile is not messaging me? WHY DO I GIVE A SHIT?

I'm not good at this stuff. I'm just not. I accept that the universe has been trying to tell me for over thirty years that Jen, you are totally good at some stuff. When your head is not up your ass you're a good friend. Your kid thinks you're a good mom. I was a good daughter. I like to think I'm a good sister. Many times I feel like I'm good at my job. People look forward to seeing me and spending time with me. These are the people by whom I should judge my likability. NOT some random guy who thinks he is cool because he likes all these fucking bands I've never heard of. I don't give a shit that you saw X Factor 12 in concert and have all their songs on vinyl. I just don't care. At all.

I was lucky enough to find someone to whom I was able to cohabitate for many years and we managed to create this kid who is AMAZING. The light of my life and a continual source of joy and you already know all this if you've ever talked to me for like five minutes.

And so for now, I'm done. When it comes to looking or hoping or wondering, I am done.

I want to concentrate on being a good mom. A better mom (my kid ate vegetables TWICE yesterday!). I want to concentrate on being healthier. I want to clean my fucking house. Dusting and all. And I don't want to keep being sad because I feel like nobody likes me everybody hates me guess I'll go eat worms. Because I know I shouldn't internalize that shit and yet I do. And then I eat some comfort food and cry and and that is not energizing, it's the opposite of that. So I'm over it and I'm done and I can't even.

But I'm optimistic about letting go. Writing this down has made me feel lighter already. And I don't know that this will help anyone else but if anyone has been where I have been, I really hope it will.

I've always felt I can be happy all by myself. But it's not even that I'm by myself. I'm surrounded by love. If that does not currently include the love of a tall hairy chested guy, I'm so very okay with that. So very okay.

A Quick One About How Grief Works and How It's So F*%ked Up

Five minutes ago I'm cleaning the bathroom counter, just minding my fucking business. And now I'm sobbing. Not crying, not all teary, I'm sobbing.

Because grief is just fucked up, my friends. I'm can't sugarcoat this for you. It's the truth, and if you've grieved some major people, you will get this.

It's a chain reaction for me today. I smell the antibacterial cleaner, I've used it many times before, and something about the smell today makes me think man, this smells like hospital. Like a clean yet unpleasant sort of smell. 

So like boom boom boom, the associations pummel me. Mom in the hospital in January of 2014,  knowing she was not going to live, not wanting to leave the hospital because she knew she was going home to die and that my brother and I would be the ones caring for her, maybe thinking the longer she stayed in the hospital might give her one more day with us, or just one more day that we weren't changing IV fluid bags or giving her blood thinner injections.

And I'm just flattened. Not only because she's gone and I can't even explain how much I miss her and how much I need her and how much I want to pick up the phone and talk to her like we did several times a day. I can tell you, I miss my mommy, but you can't get it, unless, unfortunately, you've been there, lost that. But my heart also breaks because I hate that she felt that. That she knew she would have to leave us and her granddaughters. I hate it, so much, more than I have ever hated anything. And today, smelling that fucking stupid antibacterial cleaner brings it all back and I'm crying more than I've cried in months.

This after having a pretty good productive morning, one of those when I felt so unproductive that my productivity was making me feel all proud and stuff. And then I had to go and clean the counter and use that stuff and not the lavender cleaner that wouldn't have me here, typing all of this and blowing my nose.

So it's fucked up. And a friend who is grieving recently posted something on Facebook about how it comes in waves and that on that day she was drowning. And some days you are doing that. Just drowning. So right now, in this moment, my head is under water.

And I'm not writing for sympathy, I'm writing because  I needed to write it down. Because you people are part of how I deal with this bullshit. I write it down and I post it because I like to create and I like to perform and I like to connect with people. Especially people who get it and they go oh fuck, that happened to me just last week. I'm not alone because Jen cleaned her stupid fucking sink and then missed her mom so badly that she felt like a broken mess. I'm not alone.

Now I've done this, I'm going to share it, I'm going to blow my nose and put on some makeup and go to lunch because I have lunch plans, and while I'm there I'm going to laugh and eat and have a good time, and then I'm going to pick up the kid and hug her about eight billion times. And I'll be smiling because I've already cried and I got this out and as I always say, if I spent the entire day crying Mom would be so pissed. Like, what the fuck are you doing? I get it, I was awesome, you miss me, but you're alive, live some life.

So I'll do that

Stop Yelling. Start Listening. Try Understanding.

I am this close to getting off of Facebook. Because it only mostly seems to amplify a huge problem we are having right now and it makes me sad and depressed and feel a little bit hopeless about the world and I hate feeling that way.


Some people in our country are arguing the way people do in bad relationships. It's all hurt and defensiveness but no one is LISTENING.


I don't have the right words to say about this, but I have to say something anyway.


We have to talk. We have to listen to each other. We have to try to see the reasons behind people saying BLACK lives matter and why saying ALL lives matter is not listening to the folks who are saying black lives matter, and to that end, go look at this piece that a friend posted from Fusion that is short and to the point regarding that and...


... I'm not a sociologist or a historian but I wish I played on one TV and could give you a crash course on race relations. On the history of black folks in America, on oppression, on the sociological ramifications generations later on a group of people descended from slaves. I can't educate you on that, and you can read about it and you can try to remember what you learned in school, but there are some things, that when it comes to these issues, you will NEVER get. You might say, but I'm not a racist and I don't see racism so... and I would say, you don't get it, and I'm not trying to be offensive but there are some things that can't be fully "got" but some people. And if that offends you, maybe you'll stop reading or maybe you'll read on for a second to see that I'm trying to help all of us, which feels like a tiny mouse trying to push a giant wheel of cheese entirely uphill in order to feed an entire country. I'm the mouse and this isn't even as big as a giant wheel of cheese but I'm still trying to get uphill in hopes that I say something that makes even just one person LISTEN more.


I'm in a position of being a black liberal person with law enforcement ties (and I won't say more than that because I like to have a certain amount of anonymity with this blog because who knows, one day people beyond my 4 Facebook friends who read this might see this stuff). So I feel like I have a perspective that many do, but obviously, many do NOT.


So have there been people killed in custody or while being taken into custody who should NOT have been killed? Yes. Have there been people killed while being taken into custody and it was completely justified, that their actions and the situation led to an officer having to use lethal force? Yes, absolutely.


Here's what it also means: Officers do NOT WANT TO USE LETHAL FORCE. EVER. There is no cop, unless he is a total psycho (and every occupation employs people who should not have that job), who wants to kill ANYONE.


And of late, have their been a disproportionate amount of young black men killed by police officers? I don't have that numbers on that or on anything else because I'm seriously just usually a frilly little blogger trying to entertain you people. I don't know how many white folks were killed by police officers and we haven't heard about it, but it would look like this is the case, and even if it IS the case, it STILL doesn't mean that police want to shoot people or that police want to shoot black people, it just does NOT mean this, at all.


What many people are not understanding, and I'm talking to you, my law enforcement friends, is THERE IS A REASON THAT A BUNCH OF PEOPLE ARE ANGRY. You have to understand, this is not coming out of nowhere. It is coming out of recent events and it is coming out of a history of oppression and a time when black people were undoubtedly targeted. Do I think cops target black people today? No. Do I think that SOME cops do? I'm sure there are those that do. Because cops are humans, there are still racists walking the earth, and some of them are cops. I also think there are some who target other races. I know it's not what is supposed to happen and I'm not trying to be inflammatory but I'm also saying, don't insult the intelligence of people and say that race is never a factor because it's simply not true. By and large, I don't feel this is what happens, and here is one of the things that sucks.


You take a teeny, tiny, minute percentage of what is happening in the world, and see it get conflated to: POLICE OFFICERS SHOOT BLACK PEOPLE.


So now I'm talking to my people who are not in law enforcement, no, not all cops are racists, not all cops racially profile, and most definitely, not all cops are looking to shoot black people.


People become cops for a variety of reasons. Frankly, for as many years as I have known cops and worked with them I have no idea why anyone would want that job. My joke is always this: If danger is over THIS WAY I'm going to run THAT WAY. Cops don't do that. They run TO IT. To protect YOU from it. They don't know you, they never met you, they don't care what race you are. When they go to a call and a life is in danger they are going to do everything in their power to keep YOU out of danger. That is their job. Yes, they give you tickets, and they arrest people, but if someone is breaking into your house in the middle of the night, you're not going to call your best friend, or your mom, or your cousin. You are going to call the police because these are people who are trained to try to protect you and your stuff. This is their JOB. And every single day they go to this job they don't know what will happen to them. I kiss my kid goodbye in the morning and have very little doubt I'll be back that night to see her again. Cops know that most of the time, they will, too. But they also know that it can all change in an instant for them. They know this and their families know this, and they live with it and on their days off they play with their kids and take care of their parents and all the same stuff that we do.


The people who have ASSASINATED cops these past couple of weeks, these are NOT the people who are saying Black Lives Matter. These are horrible fucking people who are trying to make a statement in a terrible, horrible, backwards way but are nothing but cowardly murderers. If you are a police officer who, with all sorts of things going on around you, having to make split second life or death decisions to protect you and your fellow officers and other people, if in that second you take the life of someone you are trying to apprehend, and there MAY have been another way to make that happened, that is NOT the same as walking up to police officer and unloading a gun into them. These are not commensurate situations. AT ALL.


Also, that cop who ran after the guy and shot him in the back while in pursuit? Like with anything else that has happened in the news, I have no details. Because I can't handle the news. At all, ever, for years I have been that way. But I cannot imagine the situation that would have you run after someone and shoot them in the back unless they were running with a gun into a crowd of people. But THAT horrible situation is the EXCEPTION.


Think of ALL the thousands of cops who go to work every day, who have been going to work for years, who rarely even have to DRAW their weapons let alone use them. These are the people who need support right now.


So in summary, cops, you need to get why people are upset. You need to understand some terrible stuff has happened and that some people feel scared and victimized and rightly so. You need to listen to what they are saying, and you need to respond with the fact that you understand where they are coming from, and assure them that you're their to protect them. They don't need to fear you. They do not need to think you're out to get them. I ALREADY KNOW THIS IS TRUE, YOU ALREADY KNOW THIS IS TRUE. But you need to show them and tell them, the people who don't get that it's true. And you are suffering, you are hurting, YOU are feeling targeted, but do not think the people who are trying to tell you that Black Lives Matter are hunting you down. Don't say to THEM All Lives Matter or Cop Lives Matter. We all know that all of these things are true. See again the part I posted about Black Lives Matter. LISTEN. And then make them understand WHO YOU REALLY ARE. Don't yell at them about who you are, don't be angry at them because they don't understand who you are, listen to why they think you're one way, and show them you're not.


People, know what I said about cops to be true. They are here to help. They are human beings. Like with any profession, amongst them you'll find jerks and racists and completely awful people and people who make bad decisions. DON'T SEE AN ENTIRE PROFESSION AS THIS. THEY ARE NOT THIS. Listen to them, see what they do, ask them what they do, don't yell at them about what you feel a small percentage of them to be doing WRONG.


Listen to each other. Don't yell at each other. Try to understand. We're ALL HURTING RIGHT NOW. I joked to a group of friends, I don't know what to do, I'd like to buy the world a Coke and teach them all to sing. That's what I fucking want to do and I don't know how to do that.


So this is the closest I can come to that. Here is your Coke, people. Drink it and let's all fucking sing together and not tear each other apart.