Apprehension

I can’t do my usual end of year round up, nor plot resolutions for 2019. I failed at all of last year’s resolutions for the first time ever, and so don’t feel like making any for this year other than “surviving”.

I’m not doing well emotionally which is why I just don’t have the energy. I’m very apprehensive about this year going forward. My biggest concern is a huge financial crash - which may or may not happen. If it does happen it will affect me directly. Is this the year we finally get rid of Rump? Maybe, maybe not. Most likely scenario is he will finish out his term and do untold levels of damage to the environment, international relations, the economy, race relations, women, immigrants, etc etc over the next two years while we all stand around helplessly. Or we somehow dump him without being stuck with Pence. I’d like to be hopeful. I just don’t dare.

I don’t know what to expect from that other dance event moving away from a week away from me to Thanksgiving. It could have zero effect; it could take away all of my international competitors. I lean towards it not hurting me. But who knows? One good thing is I don’t have to make *quite* so much money this year since I have no major house renovations planned. But I also have a collapsing garage and a foundation in questionable condition. So who knows. 

Ok, I’m going to try to look at the positive things. Closing out the year, my three and a half year relationship is going strong. That’s a huge accomplishment. Also, my children are healthy and thriving. Also, I have a safe, happy place to live, with a kitchen that will be complete sometime in the next few weeks that will be paid for. My band is doing well and we have many exciting offers and trips planned for next year. My business is at its apex and should stay there (or at least return after a brief correction). Everything is going great. And yet I’m not happy, and am, in fact, depressed. Ain’t that a pisser?

It didn’t help that two nights ago while having dinner with a female friend, some psycho guy got all in my face and got super aggressive and rude over an open window. It was really scary and upsetting. I can still see his smug face and aggressive posturing like he was ready to punch me. I asked him why he was being so mean to me when I’d done nothing to him, and he just told me to turn around and eat my dinner. My friend and I were both terrified and angry. And he left all proud of himself, I’m sure thinking, “I told that bitch good” (I’d like to repeat I did NOTHING to warrant this except close a window that was blowing freezing cold air directly on me that wasn’t anywhere near him. I’m still totally confused why he went off on me and thought it was ok to threaten a woman like that). A similar thing happened a couple of weeks ago when I was sitting in a drive thru line and some guy came up to my window and started screaming at me and gesticulating like he wanted to punch me, and to this day I have no idea about what. Oh sure, both of these guys are psychos and I know none of these incidents had anything to do with me. But I’m so sick of being every angry man’s punching bag - and I just have to sit quietly and take it because I’m afraid of being punched or hurt in some way (which both of those guys would have been happy to do, I guarantee). So yes, I protected myself by taking the higher road. But I also allowed them to feel emboldened “I sure told that bitch!” and able to go victimize some other innocent woman just minding her own business. Is that ok? No, no it’s not.

Anyway...suffice it to say that two days later I’m still really upset and traumatized and afraid to leave the house. I’ve had the kids all day alone the last two days and will again tomorrow, and then all weekend, and then for god knows how long once the teachers’ strike starts next week. The thought of this fills me with despair. Still, at least I don’t have to get up at six...?

Anyway, my brain is in full downward spiral mode at the moment. I can’t stop ruminating and feeling afraid and angry and frustrated. I have no positive thoughts going into 2019. What will happen this year will happen whether we want it to or not, and we have zero control over just about anything. 

Happy New Year! 

Christmas - it’s over!

I can’t get those decorations down fast enough, ha ha. Our tree has been dead for weeks, dropping ornaments like bad puns. With all of us cramped and squeezed together not having a kitchen or much of a dining room, the decorations, while festive, have only added to the claustrophobic and chaotic feeling here. I start the dismantling in T minus 30 minutes.

So, I have survived yet another Holiday Trifecta. And they were all good. Bobby is at the age where he may actually remember this one; Theo, not so much. I’m always shocked when I remember just how young Theo still is. I can’t believe I still have a four-year-old. He’s technically a preschooler, only potty trained a couple of years, still needing to be assisted with just about everything. I feel like I’ve been a parent for a thousand years. 

We had a relaxed day, just opening presents and futzing around the house, then going to see the Transformer movie at night, then the boys to bed and the BF and I watched a surfing documentary. It’s a lot easier than what most people deal with on Christmas - travel, dealing with contentious family members, etc. But I have to admit even with the low expectations put on me this year I was surprised by how disorganized I was; I had made no plans at all for what we were going to eat all day. I guess not having a kitchen, the thought of meals was furthest from my mind. And believe it or not, I never cook for all four of us; the BF is pretty much never here for dinner, and if he is he typically orders out for us. So with most places closed yesterday we were stuck with shitty fast food for lunch and dinner. Also, a kitchen would have given me something to do - I could have engaged the kids in some cookie making and/or spent most of the day blissfully on meal prep, maybe invited some people over. Instead I sat on my phone pretty much all day until I had a headache (something I do not enjoy doing, btw) while the boys played with their new toys and the BF played with the sound system I bought him. I wish we could have gotten in the hot tub, but my pool is not functioning at the moment due to a broken filter system (yet another thing that was supposed to be fixed by Christmas but wasn’t). Oh well. Let’s hope in future years I’ll have more emotional energy to invest in meal planning and inviting people over and things like that. This year, for many reasons, I just wasn’t up for any of it. I’m sure nobody noticed but me. 

Today I have a training session for my new registration system, then I have a Skype session with the guy revising my website so I can finally put up the information for next year and start hyping up my registration open which is merely a month away. This should have been done a couple of months ago and I feel like I really dropped the ball - with all the buzz around my viral video clip, I’ve had some interest as far as emails asking for information, and it’s very possible many people went to my website, saw no information, and forgot about it. Also, with the other event I was next to moving months away and 2019 most likely the scene of a huge financial crash, I’m ready for it to be a bit of a down year, or worse. At least I have no major home renovation plans in the works - I would like to get my garden in working order, but that’s about it. It will be nice to have a break from all that, as much as I do not relish the prospect of financial insecurity.

So now two more weeks of school break, New Years (again, no plans for four days of weekend/no winter camp, sigh) and then probably a teachers’ strike of indeterminate length. Well, at least the kitchen will have some progress by mid-January...right?

Everything is poop, part 2

So I spoke too soon about things getting better. It’s been a rough week. I’m battling depression every day. If I can finally get back to exercising - maybe tomorrow? - I know it’ll help. Things will get better. Things could be worse. Things aren’t that bad. I don’t know. It just feels like a thousand hornets stinging me at once.

First - Bobby. His constant pooping in his pants - which has gotten worse and worse lately - has pushed us all to a breaking point. I finally got him in to see a doctor today. Appointment with GI specialist coming later. Thankfully, the doctor was very supportive - although she told me about what I expected; that his encopresis (for that’s what we’re dealing with) is going to take a long time and a lot of work on my part to “fix”. Mainly, keeping a poop diary, keeping a tally on his daily fiber, and involving his school (which may mean my having to go up to school every day after lunch and literally force him to sit on a toilet and try to poop since he refuses to do it himself). So, even more than it already is, my entire life is going to have to revolve around my almost seven-year-old’s poop schedule. And it will be months, maybe even years, before this is “fixed”, if it can be fixed at all. It’s not like there’s a surgery or a pill that will fix this. It’s mostly behavioral - and Bobby just doesn’t care. He thinks it’s perfectly ok to poop in his pants every day and is convinced nobody notices. Part of me is glad he’s not traumatized by it...that would be awful...but it only fuels my rage because he just doesn’t care, and if he just went to the bathroom after eating none of this would be happening. But he refuses. This cast a shadow over our trip to Hawaii because every single day was endless battles over making him sit on the toilet - resulting in screaming and crying and shouting - and then him pooping his pants multiple times every day and me of course having to clean it up. It was a fucking nightmare. This issue has our whole family kept hostage, and I am absolutely beside myself. I want to strangle him and I want to hug him. For now he’s been prescribed laxatives to get cleaned out and we’ll work on making him poop every time he eats (good luck). I may have to pull him out of winter camp; we’ll see. Anyway. That’s what’s happening.

In other news, nothing will happen in the kitchen for at least another month, probably more. The windows were made wrong, and have to be remade, which means I get to live another month with giant holes in the side of my house. The cabinets are lagging and won’t be installed until late January. Now I have to order a new sink and try to get rid of the one I already ordered since we discovered at this late date that it’s going to make the back door impassible. I’m so upset about all of this I can’t even talk about it. I keep telling myself another month is no big deal; we’ve made it this far. And I knew to expect delays. But it sucks. The only thing that doesn’t suck is now I most likely won’t have to pay everyone until after January which means I won’t go broke before I start to make more money. So that is one good thing. 

Winter camp, although being enjoyed by the boys, has turned out to be quite the nightmare for me. It’s well over an hour drive each way, which means I sit in miserable non-moving traffic for four fucking hours every day, with only a few short hours at home before I have to turn around and go pick them up. I can’t get anything done, and those long drives with two rambunctious boys yelling and flailing around make me go homicidal. Yesterday I canceled Bobby’s violin lesson because I couldn’t cope; for the remainder we’re on a strict home-dinner-bed schedule and that’s it. That’s all I have the energy for. Luckily the BF offered to take them in the morning which is going to be a huge help. So hopefully starting tomorrow this stuff will get easier. Short of that I was considering just canceling the whole thing and forfeiting the money. And luckily we’ll never have to deal with this again since in three months Theo will be five and can go anywhere. Phew for that. 

Teachers’ strike set to start on Jan 10th if an agreement isn’t reached. Here’s hoping the strike can be averted. Apparently the last strike was in 1989 and lasted two weeks. I’m interested to see how this goes. 

Bah Humbug

It’s been a brutal week. For the first time in nearly fifteen years I got completely blindsided by horrific jet lag - popping awake at 1 AM and being completely wired until it was time to get the kids up for school, every day, whether I napped during the day or tried to push through without napping and felt like dying. It was horrid. Everything had to be canceled or pushed to next week. Last night I finally rallied and made peppermint bark and coconut balls for Theo’s teachers, my cleaning lady, my six band members and a couple of friends I’ll see this weekend. Luckily another parent coordinated gifts for Bobby’s teachers. Phew! Thank you other mom for taking on that physical/emotional labor.

It was a week of kids’ Christmas shows and winding down the school year. Now three (!) weeks off for Christmas. I hope the kids like the sports camp I signed them up for. Three disadvantages of this camp - it’s pretty far away, so we’ll have to leave early and drive a long time; I have to make lunches (currently both boys eat their school cafeteria lunch); and pickup is at 3:30 each day. But right now I’m going to try to be grateful for the small things - they have a place to go each day, and it’s paid for. Most of my labor other than website stuff is done for now, so it should be a fairly relaxing time. Fingers crossed. 

Talk among LA parents is of the probable upcoming teacher’s strike. They’re saying it’ll likely start the first week the kids should be back in school in January. Apparently you can still take your kids to school, but there will be no instruction, and there will be just a handful of former office workers with no background checks loosely supervising the kids with zero training - uh, no. I’m extremely fortunate to be in a position to keep my kids home with no economic consequences. I intend to do that to show support for the teachers. But yeah...it’s going to be brutal. I hope things can be resolved quickly. 

Last night I finally got *some* sleep so I feel up to resuming normal functions - get some work done today, try to go out for a rare night of dancing, sing tomorrow. I have yet to do any Christmas shopping or wrapping; this is all going to have to happen next week. No activity on the kitchen at all this week; no word about next week, either. *sigh*

Thailand

I’m back from Thailand. We all survived! I can breathe a big sigh of relief. The last of the big trips is over and now I can focus on Christmas, work, and home things.

As to Thailand, it was a good trip, but not great. I much prefer traveling to places that far away with a tour group - having to negotiate restaurants, getting around, and sightseeing all on your own is difficult. Luckily the friend I traveled with had just completed a dance workshop there, so the people who hired her were more than happy to entertain us for our days in Bangkok, then we went to Phuket on our own. 

The best day was the tour of the Phi Phi islands we booked - the water was crystal clear and the beaches white and clean. But the beach at our hotel wasn’t great, nor was the nearby city beach in Patong. We spent a lot of time at the giant shopping mall (don’t judge - the heat and humidity were so oppressive it was the only thing to do that didn’t make us want to pass out). My friend was really into getting massages, which to me was really just a half hour or hour of pain followed by not feeling any better than I had when I walked in. What can I say, I’m just not a massage person. 

So to be honest the trip for me was a bit meh. I’ve been to Cambodia and Vietnam before, so the exotic element wasn’t new to me, and if you’re looking for tropical and beaches there’s really no beating Hawaii in my opinion. Mostly it was just hot and dirty and exhausting, and I feel like I spent most of the trip in expensive cabs or in airports. I got sick one day but thankfully some medication helped; but the fear of being sick was with me always. And of course being away from the boys was stressful even though everything was fine here. 

I’m glad I went, but it wasn’t “amazing”. The last couple of days I have been struggling with jet lag and the shock of being thrown back in to caring for two rambunctious boys. I’ll lie down for a short nap and wake up four hours later. In my absence the kitchen floor was put down, but that’s it. Nothing this week. It’s a little frustrating, but I know when it starts up again it’ll happen all at once - the windows should be ready soon, and the cabinets.

Right now I’m playing chicken with my bank account. I still don’t know if I’m going to make it to Feb 1st. My sister is sending me a few thousand from our mother’s closed out bank account, but I’m not sure if it’ll be enough. My credit score has dropped 50 points because of carrying a high balance on my credit card, and I hate it. But I keep telling myself it’ll all be fine once registration opens and I can pay everything down. The kitchen will be done, the kids will be halfway through school, and everything will be better. 

For now, I’m gearing up for the final act of the holiday trifecta and trying to get my new website together. Maybe after one more nap.