American Girl

She waits another week to fall apart...

If there must be trouble, let it be in my day, that my child may have peace. ~ Thomas Paine

What you need to do, right now, if at all possible, is to call your mom and ask her to immediately write down every recipe for every single thing she cooks for you.  Moms are not the same as us, they don't use paper recipes and cookbooks, but they know how to make everything and as much as you think you know how to cook those same things, you don't.  Of course this is just a snowflake on the tip of the iceburg of everything that's wrong with a Thanksgiving without your mom, but when it comes to comfort, I'm all about the food, so I pass this information on to you.  Don't wait.

I've been thinking that I need to let go of this hurt, and look towards the future and accept all things good bad and ugly, and I've realized that it's all a waste of energy.  Telling someone to "let go" of the pain of loss is like telling someone to let go of mack truck that's about to run them down.  On the other hand, ignoring it and trying to smash it down does no good either.  There needs to be some balance, some shade of gray in there, but I seem to be unable to find it.  It is a tidal wave, for sure.

I got suckered into hosting Thanksgiving this year, which was different.  Ryan, being the most wonderfully supportive person that he is, got up at 3:00 AM to make the stuffing, do whatever you do to get a turkey ready for cooking, stuff it, and advise me not to "touch it a whole lot" before heading off to work.  Then during the day people came and fussed over it, basting, checking, blah blah blah.  Then when the little pokey thing popped up, I took it out of the oven.  It was turkey perfection and I got all of the credit while doing none of the work.  People raved over it, and they weren't even BSing, because I can smell that a mile away.  I seriously need to find a way to package this skill of mine.  This must be what it's like to go through life with gigantic boobs.

The key to a succesful Thanksgiving while your heart is aching is to answer "alcohol" every time someone asks what they can bring.  Lots and lots of alcohol.  As a matter of fact, this Wednesday is our annual treck to Rockefeller Center for the tree lighting, and I'm thinking if I start drinking now, it might just be bearable.

Which reminds me that at some point in the haze, we came up with this idea.  An awful idea.  (The Grinch got a wonderful, awful idea.)   The idea was that we would take this lump of money that my mom left and go to Disneyworld.  Boy did that seem like a good idea at the time.  I probably need to make some calls and find out if we were serious.  And if we actually booked it.  And what was IN those drinks?  Aqua Dots?  It's funny how you really spend your whole life trying to do what makes your mom happy, and then it never really does stop, does it?

This morning I had one of those moments where I picked up the phone and then realized that I couldn't call her.  It's still sore.  I forgot how very much that sucks.  I wanted to tell her this funny thing that Hope did this morning.  We walked the big kids to school (they're the big kids now, much to my dismay.  My kids are the little kids.  Insanity.)  Anyway, Hope brought along a doll, and then set it down to wander around and explore the other kids.   At some point she remembered her baby and went to get it, and it was gone.  Panic set in, more mine than hers.  (This kind of thing can set the stage for the entire day.)  I thought maybe someone thought it was lost, and the office is right there, so we opened the door to see if anyone had turned in a baby.  Hallelujah!  There it was, sitting on the secretary's desk.  I thought Hope would be thrilled, but instead she got this really pissed off look on her face, stomped over to the secretary, snatched her baby and through clenched teeth said "MINE!".  HA!!  She thought the secretary stole her baby.  It kills me because I have no idea where she gets this attitude from.  No one is ever mean to her.  Ever.  My brother told me this weekend that when he dies he wants to come back as one of my kids.  I'm very certain that no one has ever snatched a toy from her and declared "mine".  I guess it just comes naturally.  How wrong is it that these are the things, the comic relief, that bring sunshine to my days?

I wanted to tell my mom that story, and here I am, like the olden days, telling it to my blog instead, and hoping that when I hit that  "Publish Post" button that it actually goes somewhere and I get that same sense of satisfaction and comfort that I used to.  It's worth a try.

posted by: AmericanGirl at 14:01 | link | comments (7) |

How cool am I?



No need to answer that.  I already know.  And I don't want to brag, but I beat Katie Holmes.   She might be prettier, richer, and more succesful, but gosh darn it, I'm faster.  I also have a way better husband.

My brother and I started in differed corrals, because he's fast and I'm, well... not.  I never did catch up to him like I threatened, but it didn't stop either of us from annoying eachother throughout the race.  That person you saw swearing into her cell phone on the Willis Ave. bridge?  Yeah, that was me.  I totally had my big tough story all ready, that he might think he's tired, but I actually ran a whole hour longer than he did, but he ruined it because after he crossed the finish line he ran back and ran me in the rest of the way so we could finish together.  Bless his blackened, shriveled up little heart, there's some good in there after all!

I could go on and on about this strange experience, but I'm trying to avoid that sort of thing these days.  In short, the Verazano Bridge is alarmingly rusty, Brooklyn is a lot smaller than I thought, the Queensboro bridge is freaking long, the streets of Manhattan feel a lot like the floor in a movie theater when coated in Gatorade, and Staten Island is a pit.   We got there at 6:00 AM, the race didn't start till 10:00 AM.  For four hours we sat on the grass in the freezing cold and tried to choke down day-old bagels and weak tea.  I've lived in NY all my life and I have never spent four hours on Staten Island before. Now I know why.  The 26.2 miles was nothing compared to enduring that Hell.  No offense to any ONE who lives there, you know I love you.  Come and live with me on Long Island, you're better than that.

I had a lot of cheerleaders, and at times I felt like a rock star.  This was very empowering.  I laughed, I cried, I ached, I'm so glad I did it, and even more glad that I don't ever have to do it again.

posted by: AmericanGirl at 16:29 | link | comments (12) |