Quiet

View from my porch yesterday, May 15, 2015

There is a quiet up here after it snows.  Interrupted only by the occasional squabble of the birds at the feeder, a scolding from the squirrel  My knitting needles clicking.  The fire crackling.  The slide of snow off the roof.

The footprints in the snow are mine, coming and going to bring in wood or feed the birds. The other prints are from the other creatures that belong here.

This is what sobriety looks like to me.  Quiet. Unsullied by unnecessary trodding and stomping around.  Unbroken by relentless unnecessary babble.

Only me and the creatures that belong here.

What If There Was No Such Thing As An Alcoholic?

Hey, do you know this guy?  I do, he's the guy I used as my yardstick to gauge whether or not I was an alcoholic.  Okay, maybe not this guy, but I definitely had an image in my head of what I thought an alcoholic looked like.  The blowsy bar fly with smeared red lip stick and blinking reindeer sweater lined up at the VFW potluck on Christmas Day because none of her kids invited her to their houses, her red solo cup of beer and smoldering cigarette waiting for her at the bar.

Yep, that was my vision of an alcoholic.  She gave me great comfort.  I wasn't her. And just as long as I didn't become her, I could happily keep on drinking.  Right?

Nope.  I was miserable.  And I knew the cause.  But as long as I wasn't an alcoholic, I didn't have to quit.

What if there was no such thing as an alcoholic?  What if that word had never been coined?

What would we have to defend our drinking against?  What excuse would we have to keep pursuing so fervently an activity that makes us unhappy?

If we could no longer console ourselves with the fact that we're not alcoholics, what excuse would we have to keep drinking ourselves miserable?

If I hadn't spent all those years assuring myself I wasn't an alcoholic, would I have just quit drinking just because it was making me miserable?

I think maybe it would be a good idea to abolish that word from our vocabulary.  Although I wear it these days as a badge of courage, I'd surrender it if it meant  people would quit using the excuse that they're not one, so they can keep on making themselves miserable.

Happy Mother's Day

Seems like I start every Mother's Day by going back.  Back to that last one before I quit drinking. When I worried whether my boys would even call, thinking that I deserved it if they didn't.  They always called.  I never felt like I deserved it.

Yesterday, I got this facebook message from my youngest, Matt, in response to a message I sent him about my concern for him and my daughter-in-law who are sergeant's in the Air Force. (For a little bit of my history with Matt, click here. A Day For Remembering )

Hey mom. .... I love you more than you'll ever know. As far as this situation goes I wish America would figure it out before it's too late. Id rather go fight them there and have civilian casualties there than here. If some thing doesn't happen it is going to end up on our door steps. But all that bs aside I love you and don't tell you enough and I'm glad you worry about me.

Yes, I'm bragging a little.  I deserve it.

P.S. For all my fellow mothers out there who are feeling undeserving out there today, don't give up on them, but most of all, don't give up on yourself. Love you, Kary

Whatssup Doc?

Warning to all male readers! Clang! Clang! Clang!: Female stuff ahead.

Note to all Gynecologists out there:  Please don't tell your patient that you think she might have an STD until you get the results back!!

So here's how it all went down.  I finally followed through on my promise to go and get everything checked out this year.  Boobs, Butt and Bunnykins.  Boobs are fine, I have them checked every year.  Butt's dandy too, not due for the next voyage up the old poop chute (sorry, don't know what's come over me this morning) for a year or two.  After my last colonoscopy, my doctor proclaimed that I have the colon of a fifteen years old.  One of my smartass "real" friends told me I should give it back.

But the Bunnykins, well, the poor thing hasn't had a good looking over in about 4 years and it's been through some changes. 

MENOPAUSE!

 Hey, you there, you nasty bitch with your dry withering lips and your parsimonious precipitation, I will not let you steal this one last guilty pleasure of mine.  Okay, I have two guilty pleasures, ice cream and sex, sometimes a combination of both.

And you can't have them!!

So girls, you know the drill and the position.  The doctor's down there with the sheet over her head, like one of those old times photographers trying to get the best shot.

Her:  "Do you itch?"

Me: "Not in public." (Not really. I said, "Uh...no...")

Her: "Have you had any discharge?"

Me:  "Uh...no..."

Her:  "No green, smelly discharge?"

Me:  NO! (Hell, it's been like the Sahara Desert down there. I think I would have noticed.)

Her:  "Hmmm...You know my husband is a gynecologist too.  And one time he sent me off to a conference for a week.  When he got back, he didn't want to be with me.  Then I found out he had a girlfriend.  But now I am just concentrating on the good things. (Imagine this in broken English because this was in Mexico.)

Now imagine this: Me, legs spread, thought bubble floating above my head.  Why is she telling me this?  Poor her, she obviously can't get past this if she tells a brand new patient all about her husband's affair.  Boing!! Light bulb!

Me:  "What is it you think is going on down there?"

I see her shoulders shrug under the sheet.  Then her breezy reply floats up.

Her:  "I thought you might have  Trichomoniasis, but you said you didn't have green stinky discharge, so no worry. We'll know in a week."

A week!!!  Whattt???

Okay, I'll cut to the chase.  The test results are in and  I do not have Trichomoniasis, which is a sexually transmitted disease.  I never really thought there was any possibility that I did.  I knew that I hadn't done anything and I was pretty damn sure that the cap'n hadn't done anything, but you know what they say, "Do you ever really know another person?"

Let's just say it was a week of hell and suspicion and ups and downs and both of us eyeing each other as if we were strangers and then reassuring each other with, "God knows what you can catch off the toilet seats down here."

The test results came back fine, just some minor abrasions because I'm still a living breathing sexual being, dammitall, even if it is dryer than nuclear winter down there.

Now what does all of this have to do with drinking?  Well, there were a few times I might have thought,  God, I could really use a drink right now.

But I ask you, what in the above scenario would have been made better by getting drunk.  Use your imagination here.  Me, drunk, pointing a snarly one-eyed finger (yes, I know fingers don't have eyes, but I'm drunk remember?) at the cap'n.  "You dirty, rotten sumbitch!  I knew I should have listened to my ex-husband about you."

Nuff said.