Feeling Guilty...

"Guilt: the gift that keeps on giving" - Erma Bombec


I seem to be having a lot of conversations lately with people about guilt.  It seems like we are all inundated by it and don’t know how to respond.  Guilt is a gift you don’t want; it’s like someone giving you an ugly Christmas sweater.  You accept it graciously and hang it in your closet for years on end because you just aren’t sure what to do with it.  Sure you can give it away but you are pretty sure no one else wants it either.  You can’t wear it for fear of judgment.  So time after time you open your closet and there it is staring you in the face.  We can hide it far from view, of sight out of mind, but we know it’s still there. While most of the time the guilt is a gift from someone else, we have all heard the term guilt trip, sometimes the guilt is only from ourselves.  In a moment of weakness we buy the sweater, we feel we need the sweater for some reason.

Then there are people who seem to have no guilt about anything, they just wear their ugly sweaters all year round for the world to see.  Am I jealous of these people? Sometimes yes, I would love to not have a care in the world about how my actions affect others, but never the less I think there is a fine line between not having guilt and not having a conscience.  So where do we draw that line?  Eventually we need to let go of some of the guilt before it takes over our lives.  We need to clean out our closets, maybe only keep a couple of ugly sweaters and grab some wine and some friends and have an ugly sweater party!

Grown Ups...

          When my daughter tells me she can’t wait to be a grown up I have to laugh. Maybe I’m laughing because I remember wanting to be a grown up also, or maybe I’m laughing because her reasoning behind this is so that she can watch TV whenever she wants, because apparently that’s all grown ups do! It’s so easy to say “if I knew then what I know now” but without the flux capacitor rarely will we ever be able to experience this and children of every generation will grow up wishing to be adults and then spend the rest of their lives wishing away that responsibility.

          Don’t get me wrong I would not want to go to school all day and deal with the drama of who likes who and who is mad at me today (although sadly some adult relationships can resemble this playground scenario as well). I don’t want to do homework and be told when to go to bed and when to get up and when to clean my room but…I could do without the going to work and paying the bills thing so in that case I would be willing to compromise. I would actually love to go to bed at 7 o’clock some nights, sure I’ll clean my room and you go sit in a cubicle for 8 hours and then mail the rent payment on the way home. Don’t forget to put gas in the car…it will only cost you about 8 weeks allowance!

          Sometimes I think the most complicated part about being a grown up is the decision making process. Sure we all want to grow up and make our own decisions considering these decisions are solely based on if we want to watch Spongebob or Phineas and Ferb, but unfortunately as “grown ups” our decisions tend to be a bit more complex. The one thing I miss now about being a kid is that rules were rules. You don’t talk to strangers, you don’t run with scissors and you look both ways before crossing the street. As adults we tend to make our own rules. Things aren’t as cut and dry as they used to be, just because something seems right does it make it right? If something works for someone else does that mean it will work for us? As adults we have the ability and the freedom to make our own choices and cut our losses but at what expense? I guess I will ponder that as I watch some TV.

Stressing Out...

            Google the word Stress you will find 530,000,000 results.  Google the word Happiness you will find 274,000,000 results.  Are we that much more stressed than happy?  Or do we just need more help dealing with our stress than our happiness?  We know when we are happy right?  I mean we don’t need to search for Symptoms of Happiness.  Try it…you’ll find it right there between Symptoms of HAPE and Symptoms of Hepatitis with a whopping 20,300,000 results compared to Symptoms of Stress with 91,500,000 results.  Although Symptoms of Hepatitis only has 14,800,000 results, which makes me feel a little better thinking that more people are happy than have Hepatitis!

            How do we know when we are stressed?  I mean aren’t we supposed to be stressed, aren’t our lives completely worthless if we aren’t doing 300 things at once? I once was at a meeting for my daughters’ soccer club, it is a volunteer organization, and the woman who runs it was trying to get more people to volunteer.  She gave a speech on how she works two jobs, has a family and also finds time to volunteer.  She sometimes only gets 3 hours of sleep at night.  Ok and this is your selling point how?  I don’t know her whole story as to why she works two jobs and I know she is volunteering “for the kids”, but don’t try to guilt me into your hectic lifestyle.  I can stress myself out all on my own thank you.

          No matter what our lifestyle it seems stress becomes our norm. We think we are “happy” or at the very least content, or we are looking for happiness but yet don’t have the time deal with our stress. Maybe that is why we can’t find our happiness; maybe if we can’t find the time to deal with our stress why should we have happiness, what are we going to do with it anyway?

Clearance Dating...

I can’t help but thinking when dating someone…”what’s wrong with him?”  I will think this before we ever go out.  When we do go out I will still think it, I actually want to ask but I know I won’t get a straight answer since most men (and women alike) don’t know what’s wrong with them.  My best friend is recently divorced not due to any fault of her own, her husband decided to no longer be an active participant in their relationship.  Therefore she is being forced into a dating world that she is unfamiliar with against her will.  I can’t even say she is “getting back into the game” she was never part of the game, she was with her husband since right after high school and as she mentioned to me the other day, dating in high school is a lot different then dating in your 30’s.   Getting back into the game is an understatement, she is playing a game she never played before a game where rules aren’t included in the box, and if they are they are most likely not in English.

            So she asked me “is dating really worth this?”  My response was simple…dating is like shopping in the clearance section you have to spend a lot of time looking, and usually you won’t find what you are looking for and if you do happen to find something worth while 9 times out of 10 once you bring it home you will find out there is something wrong with it.  I am pretty sure this was not the motivation she was looking for.

Gold Star for Mom!

All parents have guilt or at least I assume they do and this helps me sleep better at night.  Does any parent actually go through the motions thinking they are doing a great job?  If so I would like to meet them and ask them for some pointers. Although I’m thinking ignorance is bliss, we can all follow that rule if we try.  Now by guilt I mean the ever present thought of “how badly am I messing up my kid?” I think single parents have more of this guilty feeling because they feel like they need to make up for something.  All the statistics say something negative about children of divorce.  You never see a headline on Yahoo saying “Researchers find that children raised in single parent homes have higher IQ’s”.  But all media bullshit aside, we were raised to believe that a family consists of a mother and a father, sometimes brothers and or sisters and a dog all living under the same roof preferably, or at the very least in the same state.  Therefore when we look at our families and realize we are not following these guidelines we feel…well guilty.  Naturally we wonder what else we are doing wrong.

Every once in awhile though our kids surprise us, and not only are we proud of them, but we are proud of ourselves as parents.  We have that “I guess I’m not doing such a bad job after all" moment, and that might not sound like much but at that moment your kid may as well have just handed you a gold star for your behavior chart and said good job!  

Since she could walk my daughter has always held doors open for people, I have noticed as she has gotten older and has friends over she is a very gracious hostess (this is the same child who cannot bother to get herself off the couch to get her own glass of milk when she is home with just me but hey…I will pick my battles).  Just the other day she wanted to go to McDonalds with my mom.  My mom is currently in between jobs and doesn’t have a lot of disposable income.  My daughter knew this and offered to use her birthday money to buy her and Grandma dinner, when I told her she didn’t have to use her birthday money (feeling the guilt and going to offer to give her money to buy dinner for her and Grandma), she looked at me and said “I don’t mind using my birthday money if it is to help my family.”  Translated to “Good job Mom…here’s your gold star!”

The EX Factor...

Can you remain friends with an EX?  This is an age old question.  Funny thing about age old questions they are age old questions because no one has ever found a definitive answer.  This is not a black and white subject there are some serious shades of gray (or just shady areas).  When we say “I think we would be better off as just friends.” What we mean is “I don’t want to have wasted all this time and effort and come away with nothing.”  It’s a consolation prize. “I’m sorry that Happily Ever After didn’t work out…but please take my friendship.”  Who are we trying to make feel better, the other person or ourselves?  

            There can be so many factors in trying to remain friends with an ex, the duration of the relationship, how things ended, jealousy, the fact that neither one of you can actually stand each other.  Sometimes the friendship is not imminent but eventually it all comes together and you do actually end up with a great friend…after they leave a dining room table in your work parking lot!  

            One of my good friends is an ex. He is my voice of reason for lack of a better term.  He is my male perspective when I am going into “crazy chick mode”.  The hardest part for most people to comprehend is that we dated a lifetime ago.  No we don’t hate each other; we actually have a mutual respect for one another that is hard to come by in an ex.  He is currently is in a long term relationship, they have a dog and just bought a house. We rarely see each other and are more like pen pals; our typical Monday morning emails consist of “how was your weekend?”  Most recently he told me his Saturday night consisted of him and his girlfriend going to a drive thru getting shakes and going home and doing nothing.  She asked him if this was their life now, getting shakes and doing nothing, his response…”yup”.  He seems happy and I am happy for him.  Am I jealous?  Yes.  Is it because I want him? No. Is it because I want someone to get drive thru shakes and do nothing with on a Saturday night? Yes.

The Facebook Effect...

            As if dating weren’t difficult enough we now have things like Facebook to add to the mass variety of things we can judge and be judged for.  The questions you used to ask yourself would include things like, when should I call, where should we go on our date, what should I wear, how long before I sleep with him (depending on your mindset), things of that nature.  Now we throw in how long before I allow him to be my Facebook friend?  This in itself does not seem like such a big deal but OH I beg to differ.  Maybe it’s my over analytical side but letting someone be your friend on Facebook is the equivalent to letting them come into your house and watch you get ready for your date.  They only need to see the end result, not how you got there.  I don’t know about you but my Facebook page is not filled with pictures of my glamorous lifestyle, although I am aware that some people thrive to make their pages seem that way.  Mine is filled with trips to the zoo and theme parks and trick or treating in 40 degree weather, most of these are not my finer moments.  I also have the few random posts from friends from High School/Junior High years and the random drunken bar photos…again not my finer moments!   Isn’t this just my fear of intimacy, my fear of letting someone in? No.  Don’t get me wrong I am aware that all of these things will surface eventually but the question is when?  I think these are things that one should gradually introduce to a potential relationship partner, but on Facebook they are all thrown right out there at once.  Like saying here’s a book of my life look through it and tell me what you think?  If you approve please click the like button.

Happy Fathers Day to ME!

My best friend sent me a text this morning that her ex husbands sister wished her a Happy Fathers Day. My sentiments exactly. Why shouldn’t she wish her a Happy Fathers Day? Why shouldn’t someone wish me a Happy Fathers Day? Which my best friend did by the way. There are men out there who are technically “Fathers” although I believe the correct term we are looking for is “baby daddies” who look forward to this one day of recognition for their accomplishments. Personally I don’t think that just because there is living breathing proof somewhere that your penis works gives you the right to claim recognition on Fathers Day.

I am 34 years old and my daddy is and always has been there when I need him. Whether it be emotionally, financially or just to give me swift kick in the ass when I am going off the rails on the crazy train! When it snows I can call my dad to come snow blow my driveway, unless it’s over 20 inches then apparently I’m on my own! In the spring when the dandelions have taken over my yard I can count on him to come over with the Weed and Feed and take on a personal war with them. When I’m sick he brings me Cocoa Puffs if that is the one thing that will make me feel better. My daughter does not have that luxury with her “father”, and it saddens me greatly to think that she never will.

In this day and age I think traditional gender roles are hard to come by. I know very few families whom the father makes the living, mows lawn, takes out the garbage, and fixes things, while the mother stays home and takes care of the children, makes the meals and knits in her spare time. Although for those of us single moms who work 40 plus hours a week, make the meals, do the laundry, take out the garbage, get the kids to soccer, football, drama, etc., do the grocery shopping, clean the pool, mow the lawn, fix the sink, shovel the driveway, unclog the nasty hairballs in the bathtub drain, kiss the boo-boos, clean up the vomit, listen endlessly to the crying and whining and everything else not covered in this job description…Happy Fathers Day to you and me! I’m going to get a pedicure!