Velveteen Mind

I'm No Heroine

I'm no heroine
at least, not last time I checked
I'm too easy to roll over
I'm too easy to wreck
I just write about
what I should have done
I just sing
what I wish I could say
and hope somewhere
some woman hears my music
and it helps her through her day

The words above are not my own.  They are Ani Difranco's lyrics to I'm No Heroine (click to listen to a live version of the song for yourself).  I've been listening to her for over a decade now and I'm still not tired of her, which is a feat for me, let me tell you.  I don't listen to a lot of music, but I'll listen to Ani Difranco any day of the week, in any mood, in any place, at any time.

She says what I don't think to, which again, is saying something, given my long-winded self.

It has come to my attention that somewhere along the unusually winding road of the last few years, I started waiting around for a hero.  Someone to swoop in and rescue me.  Someone to see me and recognize that I needed some help.  I needed some rescuing.

It has come to my attention that that hero is not coming.  Which is a potential problem, because I'm no heroine.  Yet it looks like I'm going to have to save myself.

After I wrote Victor Vito, a lot of people sent me messages commenting on how "strong a woman" I must be.  It was sweet, but not necessarily true.  It is so much easier to talk the talk of the strong woman, hell, sometimes I strut the strut, but the reality is that sometimes I felt like that strength existed only on the surface, for the good of those around me. 

My outward strength, in response to the hurricane and the consequent and subsequent misfortunes, had trapped my pain further down.  Any time it tried to show itself, that strong woman that was flaunting her fierce smile on the outside would bitch-slap the hidden vulnerable woman in need of help any time she would even clear her throat.  I had trapped myself into the role of heroine.

And I'm no heroine.  At least not last time I checked.  I'm too easy to roll over.  I'm too easy to wreck.

So at some point, I started silently praying for a hero.  I began hoping that someone would notice that I needed help but probably wasn't going to ask for it.  That I needed to talk.  That I needed to be weak for a while.  That I was a damsel in distress, lashed to the railroad ties in my frilly white dress.  That I needed an escape.  That I needed an excuse.  That I needed a diversion while I snuck out from the shadow of strength I had created so I could take a deep breath and bellow, "What the f*ck just happened?  What the hell am I supposed to do now?  Why?!  Why?!  Why?!  Damn it to hell!  I need some f*cking help here!"

But we are mothers, grown daughters, wives.  We do the helping.  We are the rocks.

when you look at me
you see my purpose,
see my pride
you think I just saddle up my anger
and ride and ride and ride
you think I stand so firm
you think I sit so high on my trusty steed
let me tell you
I'm usually face down on the ground
when there's a stampede

It took two years of my head being bashed against those rocks for me to decide to stop waiting for that trusty white steed to show up and start wrangling one for myself.

So it began with me.  As is the only way.

The last few weeks, I've been focusing on me.  I've been taking time for myself and generally not doing any work that I didn't feel like doing.  Instead of blogging, for instance, I've been sleeping.  Not in a depressed "all I want to do is sleep" sort of way, but rather I would use the time I used to use for blogging (when my boys were down for naps or in bed at night) to actually get some regular good old-fashioned, keep-you-sane 8-hours-a-night kind of sleep. 

Because I'll be damned if I let this blog turn into a chore.  I love it, and I love the community of blogs I have become a part of, am looking forward to catching up on reading what you have all been writing about, but there is a time and place, and recently the time has been for me to step back.  I still have loads of fun stuff to share with you about the birthday party, Pants's first days of preschool, etc., but I wanted to share this first.

Most importantly, I've been honestly facing what I want out of my life.  No, this is not the life I signed up for, but it's the life I'm meant to live.  No one is going to save me from it and deliver me back to my old one.  There is a reason for everything and it's high time I started embracing this reality.  It's time I started proving that I'm up for the challenge.

It was time for me to step out of my head and step into living a more tangible life.

And you know what?  It's working.  Not just working to put a smile on my face, but also to put smiles on the faces of my family.  Knowing that making yourself come first has to be a priority and actually doing it are two different things.  It takes commitment and determination, not to mention a little bit of organization and firmly planted feet.

Based on the comments to Strength to Take, I know you hear me.  But I'm writing this to reiterate that making yourself a priority is not a one-post kind of thing.  It's ongoing.  It's every day.  It's conscious effort.  It's a shuffling of priorities and an ongoing one.

It's not just a good idea.  It's a proactive necessity.

This is a lifestyle change you are witnessing.  You are bearing witness to the murder of the stay-at-home martyr.

Please pardon the blood.  I'll clean it up later.  For now, I've got a life to attend to and I look forward to sharing it with you.  No, I'm no heroine, but I'm a woman on a mission and God help anyone that gets in my way.

Crazies, Critters, Cookies, and Cooters

I'm going to take you for a trip in my rocket ship this morning, all the way from Australia to New Orleans, by way of New York City and Pittsburgh.  We're going to meet some colorful men, some colorful monsters and their round-about friend in a colorful cardigan, and finally a very colorful lady.  Wanna ride?  You can bring all the liquids aboard that you please and I'll only be patting down the men at security.

We watched The Wiggles this morning for the first time.  How it is possible that we've managed to avoid this Australian freak show for so long, I can't tell you.  The fates must have been smiling on me all this time.  Unfortunately, this morning those fates must have still been in bed. 

All I can say about The Wiggles is:  no.  no.  By the blank look on Pants's face, I'd say he agreed.

I am absolutely a Sesame Street kind of girl.  No, not so much Elmo, but more Big Bird and Cookie Monster.  "C is for Cookie!  That's good enough for me!"  Oscar the Grouch is a classic.  And anytime I hear "Hi-ho!  Kermit the Frog here!" my spirit just lights up.

There is just something so satisfying about the classic PBS shows like Sesame Street and, my personal all-time deep-in-the-heart-of-me favorite, Mister Rogers Neighborhood.  I could write pages about what Mister Rogers means to me.  Instead, I'll just settle for a picture of my main man.  Seriously, I love you, Fred Rogers.

I'm not a total PBS snob, though.  I crush pretty hard on Steve from Blue's Clues.  Although his brother Joe may be a bit more little kid friendly, he doesn't have that slightly smirky edge that Steve had. 

By the way, why doesn't anyone talk about how Joe has gotten, well, ummmmm...  fat?  Have you watched Blue's Room lately?  Not my favorite, but it's hard to turn it off once it's started.  I'm fine with folks getting chunky, but the dark circles and puffy cheeks have me worried he's on some kind of medical treatment.  I picture him soldiering on with these manic puppets while he's having some sort of tough radiation therapy or something in the background.  Or he's just been hitting the cookies too hard with that mob of blue puppets that certainly must hang out together in their off-time.

Back to Sesame Street, though.  I do not get tired of Sesame Street.  It is such a well-produced show and is styled in such a way that it absolutely appeals to parents.  All of the classic segments from when we were little (and which still work) guarantee success with me.

Although I get a little suspicious of the motives behind some of the guest stars, I was excited to see Squirrel Nut Zippers on the other day.  I mean, seriously, Squirrel Nut Zippers!!!  How much fun are they?  Man, the last time I listened to them was in New Orleans after we went to that...  oh my gawd, how have I not told ya'll this story?!

While we were living in the French Quarter (before any baby boys), my best friend came down to visit and we decided to check out a bar called the Shim Sham Club.   It was one of those retro-martini clubs, catering to the swing-dancing goth crowd.  Or something like that.  Lots of girls in 40's style swishy dresses, guys in thriftstore pinstriped suits, as well as your requisite French Quarter transvestites and girls in fairy wings.   A feast for the eyes.  And way out of my depth.

I walked by Shim Sham every day on the way to work and would marvel at the posters of their burlesque acts.  Yep, they had a burlesque show!  Their girls were called the Shim Shamettes.    Utterly classic.  I so wanted to go, but I was pretty sure I wasn't cool enough.  For instance, jeans and a Banana Republic shirt were probably not going to fly in there and I had little else at the time.

The night we went wasn't a weekend night so we figured we'd have a better chance of getting in without any fancy 40's style outfits, hooker heels, or fairy wings.  We were mistaken.

When we got to the door, we were informed that it would be something like $20 to get in.  The place seemed to be swarming with elaborately decadent outfits, too.  We were tempted to turn away, but then someone opened the door to the rear dance room and we got a glimpse of what we were missing: 

On stage was a band that looked like they had stepped right out of a vintage carnival photograph.  Rich reds, warm creams, dirty browns, surrounded by sequins and pinstripes, bowler hats and tutus.  And is that a pump organ?!  It sounded like an old-fashioned carnival and I swear this looked like a bunch of carnies on stage, but a rather deliciously flamboyant version.

As it turned out, the band was called The New Orleans Bingo! Show and this party was a benefit for a local waitress named Cherry.  The flyer on the door said "Cherry's Big Gash Bash."  We had no idea what that meant, but we were in.

We took a seat at a table close to the stage, out of the way enough so as not to stick out as the so-not-interestingly-dressed girls that we were, and just took in the spectacle that was this benefit for Cherry.  Shortly after settling in, I realized that I knew the lead singer of Bingo!  He was the delivery guy from Fiorella's Cafe, a fantastic, albeit grungy, restaurant in the Quarter.

I ordered from Fiorella's  all the time as almost all of the restaurants in the French Quarter had bike-riding deliveries, which was awesome and terribly dangerous to an already junk-laden trunk.  I had been lurvin' me some delivery guy ever since he brought in some sparkly Chanel makeup to have gift-wrapped for his girlfriend at the stationery shop I was managing at the time.  People, he saw her admiring this glittery stuff in a magazine and went to Saks Fifth Avenue at Canal Place and bought it for her, then proceeded to have it wrapped in handmade wrapping paper at our shop!  How can you not love that?

Needless to say, I was smitten with Bingo! at the Shim Sham Club.

Finally, after being there about twenty minutes, we catch a glimpse of Cherry shaking her groove thang on the dance floor.  And wouldn't you know it, I knew Cherry, too!  She was our favorite waitress at Angeli's on Decatur, right across from Fiorella's!  But then, what is this benefit for?  Is Cherry sick?  "Big Gash Bash..."  does she need surgery?

As it turned out, no and yes. 

When the next band took the stage (the Happy Talk Band, which sounds like fun, but were incredibly morose yet fantastically popular with the crowd), we found our answer.  The lead singer came up and by way of introduction, mentioned that he knew Cherry from their hometown, way back when she was called "Jerry." 

Mind clicking...  eyes taking in Cherry in a new way...  me reconsidering the large amount of sky-high pink wigs in the room and boys in fairy wings...  aaaahhhhh. 

Big Gash Bash, indeed. 

We had just contributed about $40 to help Jerry take care of his Willy and become Cherry for good.  And we were happy to have been welcomed and included in the celebration.  It was quite the bash.   Although I never did hear how the gash turned out, I hope Cherry is doing well and has made her body the wonderland of which she must have always dreamed.

We have now come to the end of our ride.  I hope you enjoyed yourself and please come again!

Makeover Monday: Director's Cut

A number of posts ago, I mentioned the Elizabeth Stone quote in which she says that having children "is to decide forever to have your heart go walking around outside your body."   The same can be said for your words. 

Once your words are out there, particularly written words, there's not much you can do to control them.  If you are lucky, you can edit or delete them (I wouldn't want to do that to my children, by the way), but that is rare.  More often, they are simply up for interpretation and occasionally editing by anyone who lays eyes on them.  They are out of your control.

This is unfortunate for me because I am a control freak.   I recognize this.  That's probably the reason I use so many words to express even simple opinions or events.  I try to control for all possible responses and interpretations, effectively heading off the reader at the pass.  Doesn't make for great dialogue, I know.

Today I am celebrating a bittersweet accomplishment.  I submitted an entry to TopBlogMag and it was chosen for the featured post of the week and my site for the featured blog of the week.  I am flattered and excited about this.  It's a great site, a fantastic idea, a generous editor, and I'm proud to be a part of it.  However, everything didn't go precisely as I had planned.

Hopefully some of this may be corrected, but basically the editor accidentally misspelled my title, used an old screenshot of my site, and omitted my introduction.  For obvious reasons, I'm embarrassed by the misspelling, I'm sort of disappointed that my sad old blog design is splashed out there for all to see, and I'm curious as to why my introduction was omitted.  (***edited to note that, in fact, the misspelling and screenshot have been fixed.***) Here's where those control issues come in. 

Since I can't control what gets put on the TopBlogMag site, I'll just have to control what gets put on here.  I can already feel the power going to my head.  Consider this the DVD version of this week's issue of TopBlogMag.  The Director's Cut where I talk a lot of smack.

My post is titled Pour Your Misery Down On Me.  The assigned theme was "I don't understand why..."  I deliberately made sure I did not start my post with that line, because that's just redundant.  Instead, I wrote a three line introduction that set up my direction, which would then be referenced again later.  Since I am literally the master of my domain, here's the omitted intro:

Whole months in my journals are represented by a single line, "Everything has been fine."  It is after that line that things get interesting.  It is when everything is not fine that the writing flows again.

Later on, I reference that bit about my journals, however without that intro, it doesn't make as much sense.  Now, I'm not an editor for a reason.  I'm not the editor.  I knew she might edit my piece, my only hope was that she wouldn't misspell anything or change my intent.  However, I can't help but be curious as to why she omitted that introduction, particularly because it then left my post to start with "I don't understand why..."  Argh.

I would find it very challenging being famous.  All those rumors and mis-quotes.

This is entirely a control issue.  It is my problem.  It is a problem that reaches far beyond one little online magazine entry.

For this reason, I am going to participate in MoodSwingingMommy's MakeOver Monday
experiment.  If ever I needed to try to change something, it's this control freak issue of mine.

*            *            *            *            *            *

Here's what to do:

1. Choose a goal.  (It can be a new one each week or something more long-term.)
2. Write a Makeover Monday post to share your goal for the week ahead. State whether or not you accomplished your goal from the previous week. It's okay to brag! If you are working towards a long-term goal, report on your progress.
3. Link your Makeover Monday post in my comments and/or in MoodSwingingMommy's Mister Linky.
4. Spread the good karma by visiting other Makeover Monday participants to encourage and congratulate them on their own makeovers.
5. Feel the love coming right back at you!

Don't let Monday be a downer!
Start your week off right by celebrating your accomplishments and those of fellow bloggers.

Other Makeover Mondays participants:

1. MoodSwingingMommy
2. Smiling Mom
3. Crunchy Carpets
4. Blooming Marvelous
5. Lene @ Mommy Brain Victim
6. Pass the Chocolate

*        *        *        *        *        *        *

My goal is to try to step back and release some of my control issues.  Just let it be.

Seeing as my goal will apparently be one of those long-term ones, in the meantime, let me tell you that I am sincerely grateful for the featured pick over at TopBlogMag.  Be sure to check them out and submit your name to be a writer.  It's a good challenge, the editor is very laid back, and absolutely fun.  Pay no attention to my control-freakiness.  Well, I would like to look like I can spell, but other than that....  okay, stop the control freaking.  Gotcha.

***See, both the "misery" mess and the screenshot have been fixed.  All that jibber jabber over just 24 hours of minor embarrassment.  All the more reason for me to meet my goal.  Wish me luck.***

Let's celebrate instead with some mood music!
The real misery pouring invitation:  Only Happy When It Rains by Garbage