The Pink Suit.

It was a stunning day. The sky was crystal blue, and the air was crisp enough you could tell fall was coming, but still warm enough to wear sandals. I was a senior at the State University, majoring in Political Science and Speech Communications. I had landed a Poli-Sci student’s dream job of working part time for our Senior U.S. Senator. I mostly responded to letters, answered the phone, and forwarded people to more experienced case workers for help. That morning I was getting ready for my first class of the day, an upper level one with the name of National Defense. It was an interesting class with my favorite professor. I was in a good mood though tired, having been up late talking to my new boyfriend. I turned on the Today Show to see what Katie had for me, and remember noting how much I loved her pink suit she had on. It was a perfect color, bright without being Pepto, and a classic cut. She inspired me to wear my own pink suit to work later that day, I laid it out, and put on capris to hike across campus. I sat down on the foot of my bed to fasten my sandals when they broke in on the fluff piece they had been covering.

A plane had hit the World Trade Center moments ago. They started showing live coverage and Katie Couric was talking in the background. I remember being concerned, but my thoughts echoed hers…..what a terrible mistake. Was an overworked air traffic control tower operator to blame? I was sad, but kept getting ready for class.

Then I heard Katie Couric gasp. I glanced up just in time to see…and wish that I had not looked. The second plane. The second tower. I had to leave for class just as I heard them say what I was already thinking. This had to be the work of terrorists. I heard students laughing all over campus–they had not heard yet.

The Political Science department was another story. Ever on top of current events, my peers had seen it all from the ancient tv in the graduate lounge (the PoliTiki Lounge). We all sat silently waiting for class to start, someone’s radio blaring in the background, burning through my ears into my brain. People were jumping to their certain deaths. The tower fell. Rescue workers rushing in. The second tower fell. My professor sent us home and told us today’s assignment was to witness history. I walked back to my apartment thinking how cruel it was for the sky to be so beautiful.

When I got back to my college owned apartment I turned back on Katie Couric just in time to see her interviewing that bald guy from MSNBC, you know– the finance guy. He was covered in ash and soot and you could tell he was shaking. Katie had changed out of her lovely pink suit and was wearing a somber black one.

I hung my pink suit back in the closet and pulled on a navy blue shirt and drab skirt. I then went to work at the Federal Building, where I was searched by the security guards for the first time. All day, all week, all year I answered calls of outraged constituents. “Bomb them!” “Kill them!” “Revenge!” “They must pay!”.

My pink suit stayed in the closet for the rest of the year.

———————————————————————————

I missed getting the below posted on 9/11, and contemplated saving it until next year, however I think it deserves to be shared now. The following is from The Neighbor and below that is a link for us all to watch. Please share your own memories in the comments section. Thanks.

I don’t know if you have a topic already for today, or if you’re interested in one, but I’ve attached some pics I took earlier this year from Ground Zero and the area if they can be of use. It really changes your perspective on the events seeing it in person.

The metal cross in the middle picture is from inside one of the towers and is exactly how it was found, in a cross shape. We were fortunate enough to have one of the foremen of the building site come talk to us and he told us the story. The glass case sitting on the cross contains two baseballs and he said the father of a son who was killed in the towers climbed the cross and put the baseballs on it as a tribute to his son. They are autographed by, I think he said, Mickey Mantle and someone else in that era. Very valuable. I asked how they kept people from stealing them and he said that if anyone ever tried to steal them, the police wouldn’t have to be involved because the city would hunt them down and kill them. Apparently, the WTC site and memorabilia, etc. is respected by everyone, including the thugs. The cross also served as a place of prayer and mass for the recovery workers throughout the months after the attack.

Thanks for sharing The Neighbor. I am not sure how I feel about us always hunting down the thugs. Can we live the rest of our lives shouting “Bomb Them!” “Kill them!” “Revenge!” “They must pay!”? I don’t know, I just know that it is time for us to stop being afraid. click here and turn up the volume

Filed under Soap box, lexapro lexplains it | Comments (4)

Time to start the therapy fund.

Now that The Son is two, he gets to watch one video a day. This morning it was Happy Feet. Singing, dancing, adorable penguins, and a conservation message without being preachy. Awesome. Plus? It does not make Mama want to stab a pencil in her ears. I am looking at you Elmo!

Everything was going along swimmingly. We were dancing along with Mumble, singing along with Memphis and Norma Jean, and occasionally coloring. All of a sudden….SPLASH! SPLASH! SPLASHEDYSPLASHSPLASH! All of the penguins jump in the ocean for the first time to find dinner on their own. The Son starts to SCREAM. He cries huge crocodile tears. He hides his face in my shoulder. I ask what is wrong? Does something hurt? What happened? He keeps pointing at the swimming penguins and screaming. I see an animated penguin with a freshly caught fish in his mouth….and figured out the problem.

Yesterday’s movie was Finding Nemo.

Filed under The Son, lexapro lexplains it | Comments (5)

What a day, What a day.

I awoke to my phone singing “When I’m 64“. The Son was still asleep on his Daddy’s pillow next to me. We ignored it. Then the home phone started to sing at me, “Let me call you sweetheart“. It was obvious that he was not going to let us sleep in. I answered and feigned alertness. “Sure! I have been up for hours! Hang on.” I spit out my mouth guard I clench at night.  The Son woke up, “Hi! Mama!” The Husband was not in the mood for adorable toddler chatter. “My car is dead.” Insert your four letter word of choice here.

It has been a good little car. One of the two of us has used it to commute 45 minutes each way for the past six years. Since February The Husband has nearly 20,000 miles on it with his new job. Our plan has been to drive it into the ground from which it came. Hopefully that is not today.  We are kinda broke. The Husband’s tuition is due this month and we were having issues getting it together already. It turns out that last year (When I worked full time!) we made too much money to qualify for financial aid, and they do not care that The Husband is now the sole monetary provider for our household. You may again insert your four letter word of choice.

The Son and I skipped our usual Monday morning routine of the library and play group to wait around on The Husband to let us know how we should transport the poor, dead car home. So we waited…and waited….And waited. Finally just at the time The Son goes down for a nap, The Husband pulled up in my mom’s borrowed car announcing…let’s go! We drove to the busiest highway in the busiest part of our bustling capital city, parked on the shoulder while praying we would not be hit. The Husband could not figure out how get the little dead car onto the trailer. So we draped a quilt over the front end of TheHuckablazer and I gently drove directly into the rear of the little dead car. It worked! I was able to push little dead car up onto the trailer and then watched The Husband strap it to the trailer with gum and hair ties. Still no nap. Maybe you should choose a new four lettered word this time.

We were supposed be at a photographers at five to have The Son’s two year old pictures taken, since my photographer moved to Las Vegas. So to clarify, we were covered in car ick, The Son was extremely tired and cranky, and we were two and a half hours away from the photographers at 3:30. Anybody see where this is going? Crap is just not strong enough.

We came home and The Son was bathed, in PJs and asleep by 7:04. The Husband shoveled some food in his mouth and turned right around and went back to capital city for class. I am watching yet another SATC and catching up on my favorite blogs.

Filed under lexapro lexplains it | Comments (3)

Hupdates

I am down to the teeniest tinest dosage of Lexapro possible and the ughs are back.  Dizzy? Check.  Nauseous? Check.  Tired? Check.   The computer screen is whirling around, so I went to post a really cute post I wrote ages ago about my bridesmaids….and it is gone.  Poof, the computer gnomes ate it. So I was going to post pictures of our trip to the zoo….and I could not look at the screen long enough to re-size them for the blog.

In an effort to get some fresh air and try to clear out the cobwebs in my brain, I suggested we give the  Olympics (The Son call them the Dum Dum Dums because of the music) a break and head outside.  I know, a family project!  How about we clear out the weeds over in our side yard.  The Husband will chop ‘em down, and The Son and I will tote them to the curb.  I knew it was bad when I heard him curse.  My husband NEVER curses.  Not even Damn.  Or Hell.  Or Bitch.  (Obviously I have no problem with the aforementioned vernacular).  As The Husband was cutting bushes around our air conditioner, he accidentally cut a wire instead of a branch.  Damn! Hell! Bitch!  We may be having a cool summer, but it is so not noneedforAC cool.  He has been scurrying like a little mouse (a sweaty, pissed off mouse) from the attic to the garage to the yard to Lowes and back again.  And….I just heard the AC kick back on.   YAY!  My Husband rocks!

So, that is why you are getting a cobbled together, barely coherent post today.  Now, I am off to bed to seethe about the silver on the uneven bars. SO.FREAKING.UNFAIR.  I need sleep, tomorrow The Son and I have to get up early to drive Grandpa to Capital City to get the bandages off from his corneal transplant he got today.  Your prayers are most welcome.

Filed under Family-blame the DNA, The Husband, lexapro lexplains it | Comment (1)

Our Brothers’ Keepers

My brother is exactly three years and one month younger than me. If I squeeze my eyes tight and try to remember my very earliest memory, it is of my dad holding me up to peer through a cloudy pane of Plexiglas at a smiling nurse holding my downy-headed brother. My second memory?  Waking up from an afternoon nap in tears because I had a dream (napmare?) about my little brother being “really sick”; of my mom holding my hand as we tiptoed through the blue and red nursery to peek at him peacefully dozing in his crib.

My entire cognizant life I have been an older sister. I would be lying to say that we never fought, that I never did anything cruel, that I never wished I was an only child. However, every single happy memory I have of my perfectly nuclear family of origin includes him. I suppose I thought he would be present for all of my happy adult memories too, but that is naive. He is an adult. He has his own life, a life of which we are just a teeny part, a life I cannot force him to share. The big sister in me wants to tell him what to do, to tell him to get his brilliant, snarky ass back in college, to not partake in nicotine, to call his mother. Do I want to be my brother’s keeper? It would appear so.

I met my brother-in-law almost seven years ago, of course he was not my BIL then, he was just J.

He was just emerging from a dark time in his adolescent years, and had come to live with his four year older brother, my adorable new boyfriend, to “get his life together”. The first night I was introduced to J the three of us talked for hours in their tiny, oh so gross, apartment. My big sister gene immediately kicked in. As The Husband and I got married and settled into our new matrimonial bliss, J would come over almost every day and camp out on our couch. By this time he was every bit as much my brother as JHJ. We moved towns; so did he. We still saw him several times a week while he was in school, he would be there anytime his brother wanted to have “guy” time, anytime he was sick of dorm food, anytime he missed us. I slowly, but surely, started to spend more time with my BIL than I did my brother…and I noticed. Did my brother? Is that when I stopped being a confidant?

Now that BIL and JHJ are both bona fide adults, they do not seem to need us as much. Or, they do not let us help as much; no more subsidizing emotionally, physically, financially as we once did. The Husband feels this loss as keenly as I do, he has the same “keeper” urges as I do, he loves them both every bit as much as I do. The worst part is that one of our brothers lives less than a mile away, but the span is the same. Miles or despondency, the results are equal. Both of these grown men do things that make The Husband and I want to bang our heads against the wall with irritation and consternation, do they feel that way about us? Is it a singularly elder sibling affliction?

When do you let them go? Have we waited too long? Do we wash our hands and act as though we are merely acquaintances with a shared past history? Do we spend Thanksgiving reminiscing and cordially asking to pass the potatoes? Is it too much to yearn for the relationships we once had, that of dare I say, friend? Is this part of those growing pains that should have happened to us in our teens? Did we both come from such close families that it makes the gulf smart all that much more? Is this an argument for a sibling for The Son, or against?

Filed under Family-blame the DNA, lexapro lexplains it | Comments (3)

A matter of faith.

Last night at VBS, the lesson was about Peter and Jesus walking on water, and the bible point was “Jesus gives us the power to be brave.” Do you know how hard it is to tell an eight-year old to just trust and have no fear? On Sunday the sermon was about the lilies of the field. God is clearly trying to tell me something.

I have written a little bit about depression and the reason I am on Lexapro. After seeing several different doctors and therapists, the crippling anxiety and hypochondria I was suffering was diagnosed as depression. I did not feel depressed. In fact, I never have. I did not cry for no reason, or not want to get out of bed. There were, however, days when I would spend hours upon hours googling symptom after symptom. There were nights, when I would clench my teeth so hard in my sleep , when I woke my face would be swollen. I would ask The Husband to take me to the E.R., ask my friends if I looked like I was having a stroke.

Before The Son was born, and when I had my last serious bout with what we now know was depression, I was CONVINCED I had a brain tumor. People may laugh, in fact I had a very dear friend make fun of me for some of the things I came up with. You just cannot understand what that kind of anxiety feels like until you have had it. To me it was real and serious and I was going to die before I got a chance to do anything with my life. It was my worst fear. Why was it my worst fear? I have grown up a Christian. I believe in eternal life, I know I am going to heaven. Yet the idea of dying young scared me so bad I would have panic attacks and think I was having a heart attack. I slowly worked through it, dealt with all of the grief and major changes which happened to me in such a short amount of time, and had several years where I never once thought I belonged on an episode of Medical Mysteries.

After The Son arrived in all of his blobby wonderfulness, I did go through a period of slight baby blues, but it was really not that serious. Then one day I was reading an article about Andrea Yates, the woman who killed five of her children. Bam! I was petrified of snapping. Snapping and hurting my baby. This is confusing, even for me, but I never wanted to hurt The Son. I never felt like I was going to hurt him, but I was afraid something would go haywire in my brain and cause me to harm my son. It was my new worst fear. It would cause me to not only lose him, my sweet darling baby who I loved beyond comprehension, but all of the other people whom I love at the same time (I cannot tell you how much our families love The Son, there is not a doubt in my mind he is the single most precious thing in about a dozen people’s life.) There would be no forgiveness or support for me if my nightmare came to fruition. There was something scarier than death now.

Instead of googling symptoms, I was reading in depth psychiatric papers on women who kill their children, trying to figure out what was different between them and me. I would try to keep myself out of situations these women were in (mostly lonely, isolated, over worked, poor). At the height of this fear, I was scared to be alone with my own baby. What if? What if I somehow went crazy too? For those of you wondering, women who are AFRAID of hurting babies NEVER actually harm their kids because they understand it is horrific. That is a BIG difference. Women like Andrea Yates do not understand they are doing something wrong. It may sound sick to you….and it may be what keeps me from hitting publish on this post, but I feel a lot of compassion for those women. They needed help and did not have the support system I have.

I was able to put words behind my fears and get help, both psychiatric and medical. I was suffering from a pretty common (COMMON! Why do we not know about this! Why is it not in What to Expect When You are Expecting? On the cover of Parents magazine? ((this is why I probably will hit publish))) form of PostPartum Depression. I took meds. I talked it out. I stopped trying to be a square peg in a round hole career wise. I got better. Now I am down to a microscopic dose of the drugs, and damn it all to hell, the anxiety is creeping back up on me. This time I am worried about being a good enough parent, or what would happen to The Son if something happened to me. I am handling it much better, it helps to know what your real problem is and makes it easier (but not easy) to rationalize your anxiety.

Why do I feel afraid at all? I am living the American Dream people! I am madly in love with my husband, and he is madly in love with me. We have a healthy, darling, happy child. We have a nice roof over our heads, plenty to eat, two cars that run (and one that doesn’t), and we get to spend time with each other, our family, and friends. We not only have a wonderful biological family, but a church family just as special. I know God has blessed my family and I with all of this, so why can’t I just trust He will continue to bless us, and stop the fear already? Am I such an immature Christian? Am I going to be forced to live my life on drugs because I cannot just let go? Will I pass this horrible gene/habit on to my fearless, faithful little boy? I am praying this is just a side effect of withdrawal, and once it all leaves my system, I will be brave. I understand Jesus gives us the power to be brave, I am just not sure I know it yet.

Filed under faith, lexapro lexplains it | Comments (7)

Hupdates: the excuses post.

Thanks for hanging with me through my light posting this past week, ready for a secret? I am slowly weaning myself off of Lexapro. I have been on it for 15 months now, and most of the things that were causing my anxiety have passed. I hate taking drugs, and they do have some side effects that I could live without, so I am going to come of off Lexapro over a two month period. I hope to be fully drug free by The Son’s 2nd birthday.

Since I have now had two separate episodes of serious depression/anxiety ( the other was when I was in Grad school when we lost three relatives in a four month period), according to my doctors I will probably have another one at some point. If I do, then they will recommend that I am on some kind of SSRI for the rest of my life. I will just cross that bridge when I come to it. If I come to it.

You want to know what some of the super cool side effects of coming off of this drug is? Sure you do. No? Well I am telling you anyway.

• General malaise
• Chronic lethargy
• Crying spells
• Dizziness accompanied with “electric brain zaps”. (By far, the most persistent symptom for me)
• Irritability and unreasonable aggression
• stomach upset

It is pretty hard to look at the computer when the room is spinning. I hope that my body will adjust quickly, but it may be a rough couple of months. If you are a praying kind of person, then feel free to add me somewhere towards…oh, let’s say the middle of your list.

Also, The Son and I have crammed in as many hours with my Ma (maternal Grandma) and cousin Gabby as possible while they were visiting this week from KY (the state, not the jelly). Gabs, The Husband and I took The Son to a water park on Wednesday, and had so much fun. I brought my camera and never even took it out of my bag. I tried my hardest not to think about all of the germs running around rampant, or that we were walking barefoot in a puddle of candida infested sludge in the locker area. In the land of a thousand tears (aka the Toddler Zone) I turned a blind eye to the sagging swim diapers of thirty rude children. The Son loved it, and was having a grand ole time til his daddy scooped him up and stomped off after having watched our baby get shoved for about the twelfth time. He cried, but a float in the Lazy Cesspool cured him. Half way around he decided he needed to Nur-Nur. I tried to assuage him, but he would not be pacified. So I popped out a breast and nursed floating by dozens of teenagers. The Husband was mortified. I was….kinda proud of myself, and kinda wishing he was weaned. I do not think any one noticed, but they could have.

On the fourth we went to my parents house (all the way down the street) and were joined by my grandparents, Ma and Gabs, and MMiL and FFiL! We feasted on baby back ribs, fresh corn, baked beans, seven layer salad, fresh bread, home-made ice cream, blackberry cobbler, fresh peach shortcake and gallons of sweet tea. We then all rolled ourselves up the hill to the country club to watch fireworks, and see the people behind us sit in a sprinkler zone! All in all, a lovely day. All that was missing were our baby brothers. The Husband and I agree that sometimes it sucks to be the oldest.

I have switched the ads so that they have to be approved by me before they are published on the site, hopefully that will get rid of the mail order wife ads.  I am sorry if you were hoping to find an Asian subservient bride here, you will just have to try somewhere else.

One last update. It is in regards to my son’s toilet habits, so if that kind of thing does not interest you, then move along. He has used the potty 100 times! He received a special truck (instead of a car) sticker, and then got a Hot Wheels truck thingy (the name painted on the side of the truck? Big Dump. Make your own joke). The three of us shouted and clapped and danced around the five square foot bathroom. Being a parent rocks. Who needs Lexapro.

Filed under Boy is my face red, Breastfeeding, Family-blame the DNA, lexapro lexplains it | Comments (3)