The Toxic Housewife

This is the first Christmas in which Mr. C has been old enough to partake.  It's really the perfect age: he enjoyed the Christmas lights, knew to get a little excited when that "Sanna Cause" was mentioned again, had a great time ripping up wrapping paper, but was still too young to fully grasp the concept of Christmas.  Hence, I did not feel the pressure to get him a bunch of gifts. I took him to see Santa Clause at the bookstore a few weeks ago, and -- I am proud to report -- he did not cry.  Of course, he wasn't exactly happy about it, either.  He sat quietly on Santa's lap and kept to himself; our photo memorabilia came out looking like a twisted version of American Gothic , with Santa and Mr. C looking impassively straight ahead.  All they needed was a pitchfork. It's like when we took him trick-or-treating

Sometimes I'm so domestic that even I'm disgusted.

This would be our Christmas tree this year, of which I am pathetically proud. It is just the perfect size for the few ornaments I've collected since my childhood (or the few of Bee's that he hasn't chucked over the years). It is just tall enough to hold a single strand of lights without being overwhelmed by it. And (can you tell?) it was free:

  Today is my birthday. Thank you. I am thirty-two years old. I'm telling you now, out loud, not out of pride, but to get it out of the way. I have finally reached the point where I'm offended when people ask me how old I am, instead of being ambivalent. It seems a rude question, when only a few short years ago it was just an ice-breaker. I wonder when things changed? When a 'good day' was one where I woke up without hip pain. When I'd rather take a five-minute detour than work up the energy to hop a fence. When my new boss was younger than me. When getting carded at the grocery store was no longer an embarrassment, but a bona fide compliment. When did I actually start feeling old?

I am a cynic at heart. It comes naturally to me to think the worst of people, long before I've gotten to know them. I suppose it's a bi-product of those adolescent years of low self-esteem; back then, rather than feel better about myself by learning to love myself, I coped with my awkwardness and poor social skills by feeling better about myself via internally putting down those around me. I'm trying to get better about this. Now that I've come to accept myself and therefore have higher self-esteem, I am more open to others, and therefore I usually wait closer to five minutes into a conversation with someone new before I write them off as a loser.

(November 2006) My Thanksgiving this year will be another Sick And Twisted affair. That’s what I call those occasions where I do loving family-type things with those family members not related to me. These people aren’t even related to my husband. They are related to my husband’s ex-wife. How sick is that? 

Last night marked our very first Emergency Room visit with Mr. C.  And, NO, it wasn't brought on by my cooking, thank you very much.

  Ta-DAAAHH! Have you ever seen anything more beautiful than my homemade grape jelly? I think it's pretty much perfect. And I don't even like jelly. This gorgeous set of seven jars is only my second attempt at making grape jelly. My first attempt did not turn out. After consulting two professional cookbooks and getting differing expert opinions on the proper way to make grape jelly, I promptly overcooked my first batch, causing it to have a delightfully unspreadable 'taffy' consistency.

Remember those stories your parents always told you about how hard they had it as kids? How they had to walk miles to school, and didn't have a TV, and worked two jobs in the summer to save up for college? You know, those wonderful stories of invention, perseverance, and triumph over adversity? All those stories that, if you were anything like me, you thought were sooo boring ? I have this mental picture of me as a stringy-haired, gawky pre-teen, rolling my eyes behind my huge 80's owl glasses – the ones with the three-inch-thick lenses, due to my terrible nearsightedness – trying (but not trying too hard) to stifle a yawn at the commencement of another such story by one or the other of my parental units. Of all the ways to make me work, I thought, boasting about how hard they had it was not very effective. I didn't understand why they felt the need to keep bringing up their woe stories when my eyes clearly glazed over each time it happened.

Mr. C and I stopped by my former workplace this morning to visit all my co-workers.  These people had become important friends in my 8 years at the job; everyone I worked with, in fact, was sort of a deranged extended family member. One of the reasons it took me so long to decide to quit and stay at home was that I was worried about leaving this job I loved so much and missing these people I'd come to care about.  I sat with some of them today and caught up on current events, and it proved to me that I am SO HAPPY NOT TO BE THERE ANYMORE!

Spring 2007 You’ve taken my husband from me, and I thank you for it. And it’s not because I don’t love him. It happens every year: as soon as winter begins to fade and the snow and mud is no longer a risk, as soon as the weather warms enough to grip the handlebars without his hands freezing in that position, as soon as his work for the day is done (and often even before), my husband is strapping on his helmet, zipping up his coat, and hopping on his bike. Occasionally, I’ll beg him to take me with him. At his insistence, I change into my long pants and put on an extra sweater, even if it’s eighty degrees outside. I’ll manage to stuff myself into a leather jacket, suspecting I look a little like the Michelin Man’s long-lost sister. I shove an old helmet with face guard over my head, feeling like a Storm Trooper. I wrap a scarf around my neck and squeeze sunglasses under the helmet, then struggle into gloves. By the time my routine is complete, I’m sweating and out of breath, an...

I used to hate it when people gave me advice with my newborn. I mean, I appreciated the sentiment, and all, but – really – what did they know? Suddenly anyone who had ever had a child, no matter how long ago, had an opinion on how I was Doing It Wrong.

Mr. C has started talking quite a bit now. It still shocks me when he speaks: after all that time of having a gurgling, cooing alien in my home, having him say something nearly intelligent is almost like having your faithful lab look at you one morning and spontaneously bust out a bad-ass rendition of the Gettysburg Address.  “I want . . . to eat . . . meat,” Mr. C will eventually get out, and Bee and I will look at each other proudly. “He wants meat. Did you hear that? Get that boy some meat!” And we scramble to comply. “I want a popsicle!” the toddler continues, and Bee and I screech to a halt for a conference on the merits of popsicles before breakfast. Sensing our hesitation, Mr. C switches tactics.

Once I got married, I assumed my dating days were over. I figured I'd never again have the reduced self-esteem, the chronic self-doubt, or the fatigue that comes hand-in-hand with all those sleepless nights kicking myself for saying something stupid or being too eager or not being eager enough . I had found my partner, so The Dating Game was over . Boy, was I wrong. Now that I am a full-time, at home mother, I have begun to try to ooze my way into A Playgroup. This has been something I've looked forward to since becoming pregnant: hanging out with other parents, gathering tips, bitching and crying together as our little hellions tear up each other's houses and terrorize domesticated animals. But gathering a playgroup is hard . People aren't as sociable as they used to be: they tend to eye you with suspicion if you run up to them on the street and -- quivering and blubbering -- beg to be friends.

Bee and I just celebrated our four-year wedding anniversary. Which is like twenty-eight years, if you're 1) a dog or 2) a working-class couple with two (at the time) jobs, two mortgages, a teenager and a toddler. I'm actually not complaining. And I adore being married, despite how my previous statement may sound. It's just, doesn't it sometimes seem like you just got married yesterday, but at the same time, you're so comfortable with your life that it could have been ten years ago? We celebrated our anniversary by not celebrating. Truth be told, our month anniversaries, the ones we celebrate on the 6 th , are more significant to us than our wedding anniversaries. And since our wedding anniversary comes just three days after one of those month anniversaries, it kind of snuck up on us. “I didn't get you anything,” Bee warned me the day before.

Fantastic news: I haven't gone stir-crazy yet!! I've had a pretty fun week, hanging out with Mr. C and and doing house-wifely things in my own, Toxic House-wifely manner. I finished sewing a diaper cover for Mr. C out of an old pair of jeans, for instance. Unfortunately, since I'm a terrible seamstress, the jeans are ever-so-slightly lopsided, not too mention the fact that they're a little too narrow between the legs, which results in the cloth diaper peeking out quite a bit more than is necessary (or sanitary). Thankfully, Mr. C is not particularly fashion-conscious yet, and Bee really isn't fashion conscious (unless one considers knee-length shorts, navy socks pulled firmly to one's calves, paint-spattered shoes, and a large straw rancher's hat to be fashionable). Therefore, the only person embarrassed by the pathetic attempt at a diaper cover is me, but I'm too proud of it to be overly-humiliated. I also cooked several dinners this week. And I m...

As of 5 p.m. today, I am officially a full-time mother, and not a 40-hour-a-week professional. I have been building up to this moment for over two years now, though it has only been about four months since Bee and I decided to actually make it happen. Since turning in my resignation four weeks ago, I've felt a little nervous about our decision, but mostly I have been excited. As of 5:00 this morning, however, I've been terrified. It's a difficult thing, in this current economic climate, to willingly give up a stable job and depend on Bee's consumer-driven business as our sole source of income. It's a difficult thing to give up a satisfying career I've had for ten years, knowing full well that I will never get it back (and that's not just dr amatics). When your career has so fully defined you for so long, it's easy to feel los t when it's gone. How will I introduce myself to people and still sound interesting ? It's a d...

In a past life, I suspect my husband was an explorer. A passionate disciple of Stephen Ambrose and similar biographers, Bee’s read up on the exploits of such men as Magellan, Shakleton, and -- above all else -- Lewis and Clark. He was so deep into a Lewis and Clark phase that, for awhile there, I was nearly convinced in one past life he’d actually been Lewis. And Clark. A quasi-nomad as a child, he spent his boyhood trekking through the desert and the forest, finding adventure where he could. Sometimes it was deep in a canyon in Arizona; sometimes it was forced from a golf course in Connecticut. Had his life taken a different turn, maybe he would today be charting a little-known river in South America, or graphing an ice cap in Antarctica. Maybe. Of course, what with freeze-dried food and satellite phones, exploring is so much less risky than it once was. Your chances of frostbite or death-by-angry-natives are much slimmer than they used to be. And, honestly, what’s the fun in that? Si...

(Spring 2007) On the sixth of every month my husband and I celebrate the anniversary of our first date. It’s really just an excuse to take one day out a month to remind each other that we aren’t just parents or employees or homeowners; we’re also a couple. I usually get him a silly present to commemorate the event. The first time, I wrapped up a box of Pop-Tarts. He initially thought Pop-Tarts was a traditional present to give someone when you’ve been dating for two months, but he figured out over the course of the next few months (after receiving a pitcher of Jell-O, a much-needed laundry basket, and a few cookbooks) that the presents were more personal than traditional. For our eighth-month anniversary, he surprised me with a ten-dollar gift card to a candy store. The man was catching on. Three days after our twenty-month anniversary, we swore in front of our friends and family to love and be loyal to each other for eternity. Apparently, many couples no longer wanted th...

(June 2007) There are acorns on my coffee table. They aren’t there to be eaten; they’re just there because one of the boys in my house -- either my 12-year old stepson or my 42-year old husband -- took the time to bring them in and deposit them there instead of in the trashcan. There are BB gun pellets on that same coffee table, along with a generous scattering of them on the hallway floor that I keep stepping on and that results in my continually doing a deranged sort of sliding dance whenever I enter that part of the house. There’s also a BB pile outside in the backyard. Next to the rusty beer cans that are now embedded with holes. There are clothes piled everywhere: in the basement, on the arm of the living room couch, along the stairs to the second floor, in the guest bedroom, and on my side of the bed. And they aren’t even my clothes. There are mounds of Kleenex on the floor and dishes that made it to the kitchen counter but -- for some unknown reason -- eluded getting into the di...

(April 2007) I was never the type of girl who dreamed of a fantasy marriage. I suppose when I was younger and was truly a girly-girl, I had some idea in my mind of a Barbie doll-type, Cinderella-esque match made in heaven. I hoped for a He-Man prince to sweep me off my feet, but never quite knew what that involved. All I knew was that I’d better be prepared with a rather poofy dress so there was never any danger of my Rainbow Brite underwear showing when the sweeping took place. As I grew older, I shed all those mincing girl fantasies and concentrated instead on the type of man I felt I could partner with for life. My husband would have to be funny, of course, and he’d have to enjoy doing the taxes, the ironing, and the cooking, since I hated all three. It wouldn’t hurt if he were rich, either. But the most important thing about our marriage, I decided at fifteen, was that we’d be partners: he’d wash, I’d dry; he’d sweep, I’d vacuum; he’d clean the car, I’d fold the clothes; he’d buy t...