Posts Tagged ‘home’

Photo by Sakeeb via Creative Commons

It’s hot around here. Not only do we have the heat, but also we have the humidity. I hate humidity.

Oh, sure, the curly-haired people love the humidity. It makes their hair all fluffy and fabulous. The baldies bask in it. But me? Not so much. Humidity for me means limp, frizzy hair, excessive sweating, sticky floors, tacky-feeling furniture, damp bedding and moldy bathrooms.
Humidity makes me mean.
As a child I used to fantasize that I could peel off my skin and go dancing in my bones.
While all you winter haters bitch and moan when the arctic winds howl and the mercury dips low in the bulb, I’m dancing the happy dance. You can layer clothing in the cold, people. You can turn up the furnace, build a fire, sip tea or hot cocoa. When it gets this hot, there are only so many layers to peel. Iced drinks last maybe five minutes. Forget ice cream. It’s liquified before you can finish the first scoop.   Degree Clinical Protection Anti-Perspirant and hair clips are my best friends right now.

We do not have central air-conditioning. We have window units. They work really well if you grab them in a love embrace.

Heat and humidity make me lazy. I’ve spent the last week sitting on the couch making out with the air conditioner. When I get up, after the head-rush dissipates, I accomplish maybe 25 percent of any given task before retreating to the couch again to cool off. Don’t even ask about cooking in the kitchen.

My girls do not sleep well in this heat. Both of them awaken cranky and sweaty, complaining that the AC isn’t cold enough, that the ceiling fans are only blowing hot air around.
Today I jumped from the chilled shadows of the coffee shop to the cool canyons of the public library, avoiding my house until the sun began its slide toward the horizon. In between stops, I laid on the AC vents in my car and guzzled bottled water. I’m trying to avoid feeling guilty. So much awaits at home: mildewy laundry, a virtually empty refrigerator, a yard of mulch at the foot of our driveway, a weedy garden, and a pile of paperwork big enough to scare away a tax accountant. It will all have to wait for a cold front to pass through this area.

Meanwhile, I’m still trying to figure out how to bare my bones.

Photo from MZ archives

Yesterday was Father’s Day. It’s an easy day for us as there is only one father on which to heap all the attention. (Father-in-law lives out of town; father is deceased.) My husband is a lucky man, getting yesterday all to himself. Mother’s Day is tougher, what with all those mothers elbowing for the spotlight. I need to claim a super-secret Mother’s Day all to myself.

In honor of my late father, I composed the following list:

Things I learned from my father:

• Know how to read a map.
• Plan your route before you leave.
• Have a back-up plan.
• Deviate from the main road and enjoy.
• Develop an intimate relationship with nature and respect its rules. (Dad regularly took us on vacation to a private cabin in northern Michigan where we lived a week or longer without electricity, running water or heating/cooling.)
• Don’t be over-reliant on technology or modern conveniences. (See above. My father was a major technophobe. I don’t know how he would regard today’s 24/7 connectivity. He didn’t much like it when cordless phones came around.)
• You can’t have too many good books or good records.
• Don’t underestimate the healing power of a Sunday drive to somewhere interesting.
• Fill idle hands with books, brooms, rakes, paint scrapers and brushes. My father had an amazing work ethic. The only time he rested was either to admire his work or to assess the damages. (He was suspicious of idle TV viewing, sunbathing and other mindless pursuits.)

Things I learned indirectly through my father:

• Humor is an essential ingredient in almost every situation, but particularly in those that challenge your patience and sanity.
• Humor has both healing and hurting power. Use with care.
• Never part ways in anger.

Things I wish I’d taken the time to learn from my father:

• Our family history
• How to plant and maintain a perennial garden
• How to grow organic fruits and vegetables
• How to read the stars
• Don’t believe everything your parents tell you.

Photo by Fran Ulloa via Creative Commons

After her dramatic entry into this world, I held my firstborn in my arms and felt her weight free of my body for the first time. This separation was the first step in a long walk toward total independence. As I inhaled her scent, ran my fingers across her velvet skin, and gazed at her scrunched-up little face, I asked: Who are you?  Who will you be some day? I sensed her individuality emerging even in those tender moments. She was her own person. Who she’d be someday was already determined by genetics. I was only there to provide food, clothing and shelter and to discourage her from choosing serial killer as a career.

While it took a number of years for her self to be fully realized, back then it was a far-off concept. Back then, she was pink and chubby. She cooed and gurgled and curled into me when I held her. Back then I thought we had an unbreakable bond. As I reveled in the reflexive squeeze of her tiny fist around my finger, I fantasized about a future with us lunching together, dancing barefoot in the rain and sharing secrets.

Never in those baby-powder scented days could I have imagined a person who’d recoil from my touch, who’d stuff ear buds in her ears to drown out my conversational chatter, who’d slam a door in my face before I could finish a sentence or who’d pull the plug so swiftly and surely on all lines of communication to render me unworthy.

I thought it would be different between us. I was going to be a different mother. She was going to be a different daughter.

I thought if I did exactly the opposite of what my mother did, those things that ripped a hole in our compatibility, that the opposite would result.

I thought wrong.

Maybe there is nothing anyone can do to prevent this inevitable phase. I have no idea how to parent my teenaged daughter. No clue. It’s gotten to the point where I dread the days she is at my house. Not because I don’t love her. I do with a fierce passion. I dread those days because they result in a tsunami of emotions that overwhelm the entire household. No matter how Zen I try to be with her, to just experience the frustration and ride with it, to avoid throwing fuel on the fire, to be the adult, the bigger person, it always ends up the same: one or both of us shouting or in tears. It always ends with me venting to my husband or one of my friends or the Internet.

Further complicating matters, she lives with me four days out of the week. So, the remaining days, she’s getting an entirely different message, living within an entirely different dynamic. It’s like a looping weather pattern, as our family travels in and out of the eye of the hurricane. Calm for a few days, and then an emotional onslaught so debilitating at times I question my strength to get through the day. And she’s a good kid, really. She’s not into drugs or drinking. She’s a solid student. I cannot fathom what I’d do if I had a juvenile delinquent on my hands.

I’ve been at the gym a lot lately. Sweating away my frustrations on the cardio equipment and weight machines. I’ve been meditating like a maniac, hoping the calm achieved might give me some added mileage.

I’ve been searching online for tickets to South America.

No. Not really.

Some of it is normal teen angst, I’m sure.

Some of it is the particular suckiness that is parenting through joint custody.

Some of it is a middle-aged mother who realizes her oldest child is a mental gymnast. She is very much her father’s daughter: He is the master of debate, the fan of forensics, worshipper at the altar of logic. I hate conflict and endless debate. They live and breathe it. This personality clash led to the dissolution of my first marriage. What, then, do I do about a mother-daughter relationship built on the same shaky foundation?

I’m waving the white flag of resignation: I don’t know how to do this.

I don’t have answers. I welcome heartfelt suggestions.

I leave you with this link to a smart piece I heard on PRI’s “This American Life.” Listen to Act III: family dysfunction has a long and colorful history.

Thank you, Collette.

Home is on my mind.

This week marks 10 years of living in our house, which has become over time, experience, buckets of sweat equity if not actual financial equity (thank you, recession) a home. When we took possession of the property in April 2000, we were giddy soon-to-be-married lovers. Everything we did was a romantic moment. Our first meal in this house was Middle Eastern takeout.  We sat cross-legged on the scuffed hardwoods, scooping tabbouleh and hummus onto our plates. Between bites of stuffed grape leaves, we chatted and laughed and listened to our voices bounce around the bare walls.  We discussed changing the paint color, improvement projects, where my then 6-year-old daughter would sleep, where our *gasp* future children would have their bedrooms. This modest brick bungalow was the blank slate of our future.

After a wedding ceremony, a pregnancy and miscarriage, an adoption process that resulted in another girl child in our home, endless home projects, parties, illnesses, spilled paint and shattered dreams, a parade of Christmas trees, birthday party sleepovers,  financial heights and economic lows, power outages, infestations, and the first green sprouts of renewed hope, we are still here. Our marks add to the collective history of this little house built in 1941. While I may resent the moldy basement, the dingy siding, the windows that don’t open, I also have a deep gratitude for these sturdy walls, floors and the roof. The bones of this place have held up. They’ve  given us shelter from the heat, the cold, and the economic storms. During the darkest hours of our despair, I’ve  felt comfort in this house as it held me in its quiet embrace.

I’ve been thinking about  my hometown.

No, Detroit is not a travel destination. No one drools with envy when I announce I am from Detroit. However, I have the pleasure of knowing as friends and as acquaintances a number of people from all over the world who are happy to make Detroit their home.  These people  left behind their cosmopolitan cities, their colorful cultures, their mountain views and beachfront vistas to come here to this (insert latest media catch phrase). They like the cultural diversity, the music scene, the abundance of water, hunting for and discovering the hidden gems amid the ruins, and the niceness of the people. Despite our crime statistics and widely reported corruption, people here are nice. Really.

Do not believe everything you read and hear about Detroit. Read this transplant’s blog post to gain a fresh perspective on national and international reporting on Detroit.

I’ve been thinking about  local bloggers.

I was thrilled to open The Detroit Free Press today to find two of my favorite Detroit-area bloggers featured in a larger story about, well, blogging. I’ve met Melissa of Rock and Drool. She is a beautiful and dynamic woman who doesn’t hide behind a persona or false words. She dishes it out straight. I love that about her. I’ve not met the other Melissa who writes Suburban Bliss, but I’ve been reading her blog for years.  I found her by accident when I Googled “MOMS Clubs in my neighborhood.” It appears she saved me from the special hell of organized play groups.  At the time, I was a former career woman sitting alone in my house wondering how I was going to get through another day. How was I going to find other stay-at-home mothers who were like me? Suburban Bliss helped me realize I was not alone. Not only did I start blogging shortly after that, but I also formed my own play group.

I’ve been thinking about my home on the Web.

I have neither the numbers nor the controversy surrounding my site to gain any attention, so the media will not be knocking on my door anytime soon. Whew! Whatever it is I do, another fellow Detroit blogger, Collette of My Babcia’s Babushka, gave me a pat on the back and declared my blog all home-like, or homely, or home-ish or something like that. Thank you, Collette, for the props.

Home is on my mind.

… always a workaholic?

Is this true?

Until a little more than three years ago, I worked full-time outside the home. When I wasn’t working full-time, my schedule was a combination of full-time school and part-time work.

To those who work full-time it may seem like a dream to be home for three years. At first, I thought so, too. I allowed myself big blocks of time to get caught up on TV shows and movies, to nap when my baby napped, to go on long walks. We went away on long weekends and enjoyed life to the fullest.

Then, the guilt began creeping in. Most of it self-induced. I realized I didn’t exactly feel comfortable with an unstructured life. I needed deadlines and commitments to get things done. Somehow having every day of the week to go to the zoo or the park made it less special.

Now, I have filled almost every block of time in my week with something, whether it’s time for work (when it comes my way), volunteer commitments, working toward personal goals, and the ever-present house and yard work and child care. It’s like I dread an unplanned expanse of time.

When I worked full-time, I was famous for bringing my work home, taking on projects, staying late, and coming in on weekends. I suppose in the beginning it was designed to get ahead. In the end, it was a curse. It did not lead to promotions. It led to more work because I was known as the go-to person for this stuff.

It’s easy to  blame all this on my upbringing. My mother and father always kept busy. They didn’t allow their children to wile away an afternoon. If you were home, you were upright and holding something with a handle: a broom, a rake or a paintbrush.  If you were caught empty-handed, you were given a broom or a rake or a paintbrush.

In some regards, I’m glad they passed on to me this work ethic. (I wish I could pay it forward to my children. Direct requests are always a battle. teaching by example only seems to work with my preschooler.)

Yet, I wonder sometimes why I deny myself basic pampering and selfish “me” time. I’ve literally been at the salon or in a bookstore and felt the weight of guilt bear down on me so heavily I have the urge to flee.

Is there hope for me?

This post brought to you by the lovely Brenda and Flog YoBLogFriday. Click on over and enjoy:

By quinn anya via Creative Commons

I base many of my parenting decisions today on things I did as a teenager.

That is why my almost-16-year-old lives in a box in the basement.

Well, not yet. Soon. She’s going on her first big night out with another teenager in a car. Alone.

I’m worried. I sound like my mother did in 1980 when a cute guy with his own car asked me out and she said “NO!” just as she did on every previous occasion when a member of the opposite sex expressed interest in me.

Yes, you read that correctly. My mother would not let me date. I don’t think my father was against the idea. But due to the economy at the time he was working nights or out-of-town or something that made him unavailable for day-to-day parenting decisions. So, I developed dating loopholes: I spent a lot of time at “the library” and “the movie theater” and at “Dora’s house” (not her real name). Dora and I had a deal: Our whole friendship was based on lying for each other so we could go out with our boyfriends. Every few months we’d actually have to make an appearance at one another’s house just to keep things legit.

I’d say I was going to see “Alien” or  ”The Blues Brothers.” Except, not really. I’d read the synopsis in the newspaper, memorize it, then head to a dive bar  in Detroit that let in underage suburbanite kids with small brains and fat wallets to hear eardrum- shredding bands. I hated that I wasn’t allowed to officially date. I hated the sticky web of lies I’d spun. It was hard to keep all the stories straight.

Eventually I decided to take a stand and declare that I had a boyfriend. Mom was not happy. Still, I kept up the relationship and eventually she acquiesced. She had loopholes of her own. She eavesdropped on phone calls. (There were no cell phones back then.) She took the phone off the hook so I couldn’t make late-night calls. (There was no Facebook, IM, MySpace or e-mail back then.) She intercepted letters and searched my room while I was at school.

I do not want to be that kind of mother to my Girl from the West. I know my mother did it all out of worry and fear of the unknown. (We had teen pregnancy back then and something called V.D.)

That kind of parenting creates liars and sneaks. So far, I feel my Girl has been as honest with me as is possible for a teenager. I know she’s not telling me everything but I feel I have some kind of handle on her comings and goings. Mostly, it’s because I am directly connected to those comings and goings.

But, with the impending arrival of  driver’s licenses as she and her friends each reach their 16th birthdays,  a world of worry opens up.

What about the other teenagers out there? How honest are they? How mature? Are they practiced liars who fool their unwitting parents?  Are they on drugs? Will they drink and drive? There is so much to consider, to worry about with a child who is almost an adult. Cars carry with them a multitude of dangers, some involving a vehicle in motion; some pertain to cars at rest.

It doesn’t take much to think back to the irresponsible, recklessness of most of my peers when they had that piece of plastic in their wallets and what new levels of stupidity it propelled us into. I think of the dead man’s curve that claimed the life of a 17-year-old classmate on July Fourth, when he took his eyes off the road to toss a firecracker out the car window and ended up hugging an oak with his engine block. I think of the guy I was scheduled to go on a date with had he not been broadsided and killed on his way home from a Detroit Tiger’s game. Dead at 20. All this occurred in our sleepy suburb along the lake, where a traffic jam might be six Cadillacs lined up by the valet parking shed at the country club. My girl will be traversing some of the busiest stretches of road in our area.

So I worry. It does no good. I cannot control all the forces the universe, even with my super-deluxe magic wand. I can’t really lock her away in the basement. (Damned social welfare agency and their rules.)

My guide is this: If she’s not doing any of the stuff I was doing, or only one-tenth of it, we’re good.

By evelynishere via creative commons

This week I had a revelatory moment. It struck me as I was walking into a building and caught a glimpse of my reflection in the plate glass. I saw a smartly dressed woman with a laptop bag slung over her shoulder.

“Where have you been the last three years?” I asked the mirror image as I pushed the intercom button to announce my arrival.

As the door buzzes open, I consider how it feels to wear a black dress with flowing red scarf tied loosely around my neck, stockings, heels and all-business glasses. Even if I feel a little shaky on the inside, I have all the right props. No one here will have any idea that I haven’t done this full-time in three years.

I was glad to leave my current persona at home for a while. I liked wearing my old self even if just for a day.

I love my children. I love my husband. But they cannot define me and be enough for me. I need a little more. It feels good to be working again.

Several weeks ago I accompanied my husband on a business trip to Chicago. Mostly I did it to get away. Partly I did it to witness the presentation I’ve been hearing about, and helping him with in small ways, for more than a year. Afterward the organizers invited us to dinner at a popular restaurant in the downtown business loop.

While I’d secretly hoped for a quiet dinner for two, so I didn’t have to worry about how many glasses of wine I’d ordered, and I could kick off my uncomfortable shoes under the table, it wasn’t to be. Instead I felt “on” since it was more of a business dinner. I had to watch my words and not get all, well, the way I can get sometimes.

After a few exchanges of pleasantries I was asked: “So, what do you do?”

I mentioned my  part-time freelance business that is temporarily full-time.

“Oh, so mostly you are just a mommy then.”

Why the instant leap? Why the dead-end of conversation once the leap is made? I felt crushed.

Mommy — not even mom or mother — mommy! was said the way someone might spit out the word pedophile.

And I had thought the guy was pretty nice at first.

Just this week I logged on to Facebook to find a so-called friend had sent me some application quiz that determined my dream job was to be a wife and mother. Huh? First of all, this person knows I’m trying to return to the workplace. Where  this whole you-are-better-off-at-home sublimation comes from I’ll never know. Rather than fire back some snarky remark, I just deleted the whole post.

But back to this week: I check in at the front desk, hand over my business card and announce who I am. Then, I’m led down a long, polished corridor that winds its way to the CEO’s office to conduct a joint interview with two high-ranking members of this organization.

I was taken seriously. I engaged in adult conversation, discussed plans, strategies and  deadlines. I had a schedule to juggle, appointments to confirm and my planner was bleeding ink to the margins. It all felt so natural. People were paying attention to me. I wasn’t so-and-so’s mother or somebody’s wife. Not that those things are bad but I do have a name and my own identity. Motherhood and marriage can shove those things to the back of the closet.

That’s the upside.

The downside: My poor, poor house is a wreck. Tasks both inside and outside sit uncompleted. There are three family birthdays fast approaching, not to mention the whole holiday stress-fest.  I have a mother who feels ignored, a visiting brother who feels slighted and probably a husband and two daughters who feel they’re not getting the service they’ve grown to enjoy.

Sorry, folks.

This is my first big paid gig and I feel the need to do a good job, to be viewed as dependable, reliable and able to deliver on time, as promised when we set our terms in September.

It feels good to have a task, a deadline, responsiblity. I’m hoping these seeds planted will nurture a larger garden of opportunity down the road. If nothing else, I learned what I needed to do to be successful working from a home office.

I’m on the other side  – even though it’s a short visit.

And I like it.

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• Man Made Mad Men (yesbutnobutyes.com)

It doesn’t happen often.

But, it happens.

It’s not going to stop.

Ever.

“Excuse me,” is how it begins. When I have a loaf of bread in hand, examining ingredients and calorie counts. When I’m loading my car in a windswept parking lot. When I’m at the community center watching my girl leap and jump and twirl.

“Would you mind telling me,” they ask:

a.) Is that little girl yours?

b.) Where did you get her?

c.) How long did it take? How much did it cost?”

Most of the time, the questions spill out of the mouths of well-meaning folks. Maybe they are considering adoption but haven’t done the research. Maybe they are in the process and want to compare notes or seek reassurance that their dreams soon will be realized. Maybe they never learned about boundaries.

Once upon a time I lived on the other side of the fence.

I remember when:

a.) The concept of adoption first slipped through a small opening in my wounded heart. Suddenly I saw adoptive families everywhere. I desperately wanted to know how that child became a part of that family.

b.) We were in the process and we would see a newly formed family so absorbed in their attachment process, that I couldn’t bear to pierce the bubble they’d built around themselves. Besides, at that point I knew where to go to ask questions and find families more than happy to share their journey.

c.) We were waiting for what felt like a century for our referral to come in. The longer the days and weeks stretched out, the more painful it became to see a happy adoptive family having dinner at a restaurant or shopping for school supplies at Target. I had an almost uncontrollable urge to approach these families and just be with them, hoping their good fortune would rub off on me. I wanted their assurances, support, and blessings. I never gave in to those urges.

Now, when I’m approached, I feel two things at once. I am both flattered and annoyed.

I’m flattered that our family story is of interest to others.

I’m annoyed that someone couldn’t find a more discreet way to satisfy his or her curiosity. (To be fair, many truly interested people have pulled me aside out of my daughter’s earshot or used less confrontational methods to convey their interest. In those cases I am more than happy to be accommodating.)

I understand what it means to be inquisitive for personal research, to have heartache for what I have, to have sincere curiosity. I try to answer questions quickly and refer people to the Internet or a local adoption agency. I remind myself that when we signed up for this, we knew we were stepping into a spotlight of sorts, that we would be perceived as spokespeople for this journey. I try to remember that my daughter is watching and listening to how I respond.

But sometimes people are just plain rude and cross the line of decency. It is no more acceptable to approach someone in a wheelchair and blurt, “Where’s your other leg?” then it is to act as if my child is invisible and ask, “How much did she cost?” as if she were sold in the bulk food aisle.

Please don’t reduce my child to a commodity.

Once, I asked a woman how much her biological children cost her, because after all, no child arrives without a price tag.

I wish it would stop. But it won’t.

We are conspicuous only to you. What we see is our beautiful child. What she sees is her loving family.

The world, however, has its eyes wide open. The world, without meaning to, will burst our bubble.

Last week my Girl from the East started her first year of preschool. No longer is she safely cocooned in our fuzzy, pink bubble of attachment, with her mother and father to deflect the world’s arrows and daggers. No longer is she sequestered in her Mandarin school with look-a-like families and abundant tolerance.

Now my girl will begin to tell her own story and see how the world receives it. Now we must build her strength and pride and keep it strong. Now we must fortify our own resolve for the eventual hard knocks that all children face.

World, please be kind to my girl.

Give me the strength and wisdom to do the right thing when the world doesn’t honor my wishes.

image by runningkate

I’ve lost things lately:

• my favorite plastic sports bottle, a souvenir of my snow camping experience
• my sterling silver hoop earrings
• my mind

Also, I’ve lacked focus:

• Literally. I need bifocals. I’m pretending I don’t. The faking it isn’t working anymore and it’s making me look feeble. I hope that explains all the typos in my comments around the blogosphere. I hope that explains all the pasta on the tablecloth at lunch the other day.
• I’m job hunting outside my field of work. Where to direct the confused self when the forest trails are marked either Overqualified or Underqualified? Some days I’m resigned to signing on with Merry Maids or dressing in red and khaki and enlisting in the Target army. Other days I feel a strong desire to go to grad school and follow dreams. Some days I just shop for a roomy refrigerator box to call home.

Job hunting sucks. I’ve had it too easy all my life. I’ve almost always slipped seamlessly from one position to the next. Even during the rare times when I had a gap in my work history, I filled it with temp work.

Now I’m a woman who is halfway to 90 (as one of my drama queen contemporaries likes to say) and almost three years gone from the workplace. My line of work is no longer an option. I have a young child and outside help one day a week. This job search is like riding a bike up a mountain with one leg.

As Dr. Phil would ask: How’s that working for you?

Not so well, Phil. It’s hard to keep the momentum when you have six days between efforts.Until I find work, I can only use FREE babysitters. So far, I’ve found one who’s willing to give one day a week. I’m grateful for the day but one day does not a job search make.

I live in the state with the highest unemployment in the nation. I’m trying not to let that get me discouraged. Much.

I remain hopeful. I joined a babysitting co-op. My little one starts part-time preschool next week. Something has to give.

Job hunting in 2009 is not the same as it was in the late ’80s and early 1990s. Then, it involved typewriters and telephones. It involved pieces of paper, bulletin boards, classified advertising sections of the newspaper and talking to friends and family.

No one I know seems to have any clear answer for today’s big hunt. Get a Web site, they say. So I did. Create your own personal brand, carve out your niche, they recommend.  Still working on that one. Get on social media and work that bitch daily. I do. Although sometimes it feels as empty, cold and meaningless as, well, working some bitch. Networking? I’ve got a steep learning curve on that one. Remember, I worked as a copy editor for the last decade.

Don’t even get me started on the frustration of online application processes. Do you know what happens when you spend 45 minutes completing an online application for a specific position and then the free Wi-Fi zone drops your Internet connection?

For the first time in my adult life, I’m not sure what my role is in the world. It isn’t enough for our bottom line for me to be a mother and caretaker of the family and home. It won’t be enough for my children if I’m gone all day and tired and stressed when I get home. I’m not sure I can return to the workaholic career treadmill I ran on for almost two decades.

Does society smile upon the mother who cares for her children at home? What about the mother who decided to put her family first for a while and now seeks work? Is she given the same chance as the mother who put her career first but lost her job for economic reasons?  The workplace seems to frown upon the mother who chooses her family over her career. Society also frowns upon the mother who does not take care of her children.

There are no easy answers to any of this. One day a week I try to figure it out.

This I call frustration.

“It’s not your fault.”

This is what friends and family reassure me when I start to think that resigning my job almost three years ago put us in the black hole we are in today.

Who knew everything would fall apart in two years? They ask.

You would have been out of a job anyway, they assert.

Your children needed you, they remind.

True on all three counts.

The plan was to take one year off work. One year to help my newly adopted daughter bond and attach and adjust and feel that she had loving caregivers in her life who were there for her 24/7 if needed.

Turns out, it was needed. It took two years of dedicated attention.

Unfortunately, after the two-year mark, when my husband and I both knew it was time for me to go back to work, our world fell apart. The automotive industry tanked. It is the lifeblood of this region.

The newspaper industry crumbled. It is the lifeblood of this family and most of our friends.

So, there you have it: two major industries that had everything to do with our bottom line in ruins.

Our little world we worked so hard to create, a secure world of steady pay and healthy savings and home equity,  a few nice vacations a year, didn’t include worrying about unpaid bills or clients who are slow to pay or who do not pay at all. Worries were for things like would we get good seats for the concert? How much would braces cost? Will the scratch on the lease car be counted against us when we trade it in?

I’m seeking a status change: from stay-at-home mother who tried to work from home but found that what she does isn’t worth more than a bag of pennies to full time working mother who’ll do what it takes to save her home and family.

I’m  seeking status change from someone who labors over every dime of the weekly grocery budget, who is sick of the college diet at mid-life to someone who can actually eat at a restaurant once in a while, or order a fancy coffee drink without thinking that someone else in the family will do without something because of this one selfish act.

I’m seeking a status change from someone who hovers over a gaping pit of bitterness and despair about things for which she has no control to someone who openly accepts change and pain because she knows it will make her a stronger person.

That’s what’s on my mind today.

Back to the funny business tomorrow.