A Surprisingly Sane Blog

The anonymity of the internet is an interesting thing.

With the exception of a few long-time followers, very few people know that I used to keep another blog.  It was an anonymous one, and I said whatever the hell I felt like talking about regardless of who it included.

I described in great detail my ongoing issues with my in-laws, spewed a “fuck you” or two (or maybe three…), and talked about problems that certain people would be uncomfortable with knowing I discussed publicly.

But it was difficult to find, and like I said, anonymous.  It’s safe to say whatever you want when you know it’ll most likely never be found by the wrong set of eyes.  Or when you’re writing under a nom de plume.

When my postpartum depression went from pretty bad to holy-shit-hold-the-phone-she’s-losing-it, that blog was no longer a comfort for me.  I stopped writing in it.  Something about it felt artificial.

And that’s when I realized that if I was going to get through all the shit that was happening to me, I had to come clean and face it.  Own it.  Stick my nose in the murky swamp I was struggling to swim through and sniff it like crack… and find a way to accept what was happening to me while I coughed and sputtered under the crap that bubbled up from its dark, mucky waters.

So I did.  I designed this blog and stuck my name right on it.  It’s waving its arms frantically look at me! I’m right here! from my About page.  Type my name into Google, and my site pops up.  I added the link to my signature under forums I frequent, and stuck the url on my myspace and facebook links.  Do a search for strip songs, itchy balls, vagina problems, and my site is one of the top ones that show up- Ta da!  I’m here! Read me!

The more my site has picked up readers, the more I have felt compelled to share.  It’s freeing.  Like finally letting that gut-wrenching fart rip while you drive home from work.  You know, the one you patiently smiled through even though it threatened to leak from your ass and poison your colleagues before you escaped from that meeting room.

Believe it or not, I’ve actually been a fairly closed-off person my entire life.  I had to be.  I learned the hard way that if I told someone close to me that I was having difficulty getting myself to eat that they were going to announce loudly to everyone that I just needed to stick the food in my mouth and swallow it and not starve myself.  Humiliation taught me silence.

My experience with parenthood drove it all out of me, though.  I realized that I could no longer keep it to myself.  All the pain and the frustration and the fear that I really was losing my mind made it necessary for me to learn how to openly admit the truth about myself.  The hard part was who do I tell?

I only have a small handful of people I talk to, and most of them are family.  My family is wonderful, but with the exception of my sister, they’re just not the kind of people with whom I can discuss my problems.  They have all been through their own fair share of horrific, traumatizing events and just can’t handle talking about issues.

So that brought me to the internet, where even wearing my heart on my sleeve with a name tag slapped sloppily on it still leaves me feeling a certain amount of anonymity, even from my readers who actually do know me in real life.  Why that is, I’m not sure.  But hell, I just roll with it.  The charm of my blog (or not) is the fact that I just SAY IT.  Like, holy fucking shit she just used the word fuck like six fucking times while screaming the words “The fruit of my loins!” over and over again! Yes, that’s me.  That’s my blog.  Whoops.  Hide your virgin eyes if your offended.

But now I have to stop my insane rambling and say why I’m struggling with this at the moment:

Here in the world of the endless ocean of internet, I can say pretty much anything, look at it, read it, own it, know that I can’t deny it.  And all the while, I am struggling, agonizing, and losing sleep over the fact that somehow, I have to tell my mom and dad that we are about 95% positive that we’ll be on our way to Washington within the next six weeks for real.  We are going to be moving away from my hometown, from the life that I’ve always known, from the soil that I spent the last half hour watching my daughter dig up around the palm tree in my parents’ back yard.  We are going to be packing up all of our shit and moving (hopefully) to that house that I can’t stop panting over like a dog in heat.  That I’m excited and thrilled and can’t wait to start a life somewhere else.

Stupidly, though, I just can’t seem to find the words to say it out loud.  And it’s tearing me up on the inside.

Now if you’ll excuse me, it’s almost 10:00 pm and a thunderstorm is making its way toward my house.  I’m going to brave the still-100-degree-heat to watch the electricity spark across the sky from my front porch.

And I’m going to remind myself that no matter how much I might be hurting at this very second, it’s just a fairly insignificant detail in the whole scheme of things.

Hell, I might get struck by lightening.  Then none of this would matter at all.

*sigh*

Current Mood: Sad

My birthday isn’t until September, but this is what I want:

That’s the house I’ve been drooling over for the past few days.

It was built in 1900 and has since been updated beautifully throughout.  I have a thing for old houses, if you didn’t know.  I love the character and the charm of the homes from past generations.

That porch?  If we get this house, that will be the very front porch from which I’ll someday be waving my cane at the young whipper-snappers while hollering like a crotchety old fart, “Get off my sidewalk!  That’s mine!”.

Or I hope, at least.

I died and went to heaven when I saw the gorgeous Brazilian cherry wood floors.

Yes, the dining room.  The formal dining room.  We don’t have one of those in our current house, so my jaw hit the floor when I saw it.  Considering there is clearly room for a table in the kitchen area through those French doors (yes, *sniffle*, French doors) and the fact that we don’t even own a formal dining table, the first thought that went through my head was… ohmygawd, it’s a perfect space for teaching dance lessons!

Granite-tile counter tops, and the oven from which I would love to bake my unending multitudes of cookies and fresh bread. The counter space to the right had me jumping up and down so high I almost peed myself.

And that tangerine orange wall color?  I LOVE it.  Hell, I’m digging all the wall colors.  For those of you who have been in my crazy-colored house, you know that’s saying something.  Because I grew up in a house with white walls, I have an unhealthy addiction for brightly-colored ones.

That’s one of the upstairs bedrooms.  One of the four spacious bedrooms in the house.  The other three are every bit as appealing.  Yes, if I like you, you can come visit me if we get this house.  One of them would be dedicated to guests.  Take me up on the offer, okay?  I’ll probably be a bit lonely out there at first.

One of the three bathrooms.  The other full bath?

It has a tub that stands upon claws. And a mosaic tile floor.  I shit myself when I saw that bathtub.  I’ve always wanted one just like that.  *sniffle*

Oh, and the location?  It’s within walking distance from Lake Washington, and there is a park- yes, one with grass and a playground and everything- two houses down.

Keep your fingers crossed that this house stays on the market until next week.  James already has an appointment with our Realtor to check it out, and we are in the process of getting approved for a loan.  If the new company hires him and the house is as beautiful as the pictures promise, James is going to make an offer on it immediately.

It’ll be my birthday present.

Current Mood: Cool