it's 2:30 in the afternoon

And my boyfriend is still asleep in bed... What The Fuck? I have cleaned the house, done the dishes, unloaded and reloaded the dishwasher, made coffee, checked my email, facebooked, called a friend, folded 3 loads of laundry and STILL... he is asleep.

This is not alright with me.

On another note, it was sort of nice outside this morning and now it is just grey. Grey grey grey. I am so sick of the grey. This is the time of year that I start to get really sick of Washington. I just don't understand why it has to be like this. I miss the days in the

middle of winter in California when it would be sunny and warm and you could go on a bike ride or a walk and maybe only wear a T shirt. Those days are so rare here.

Tara, my roommate and I planted a potato we found in her compost pile over the summer before I moved in. We pulled up what we could find the other day. They are small potatoes, but I think we are going to let them sprout and plant them again this year.

well shit

It's been awhile hasn't it?

I apparently am no good at writing on here very often anymore. I all of a sudden have a really busy schedule and I guess I just keep forgetting to get my ass on here. However, in the spirit of new beginnings.... Here goes nothin'.

Update: The kids are great. They're 4 and 5 respectively. It shocks me, Adrien is a good marker for how long I've been here in Washington. 5 years. 5 years away from my family and the life I knew so well. Now, I can't imagine living back in California away from the family I've created here.

Me, I'm no longer at Whole Foods. I could not stand that job one more second and instead I found a really amazing job working with a local coffee roaster and tea company. They needed a baker and well, I needed to bake. I am living with my best friend Tara, Brandyn and a friend, Matt. We have a pretty large house and there is enough room for the kids. I know this seems unorthodox to probably most of the readers here but what would you do if you couldn't afford a place on your own? Would you rather live on the street? Nope and me either!

Well, I am going to sign off for now but I will be on here again soon. I can feel it. It's time.

Absent

I am obviously not very good at writing on here very consistently and I'm not all that sorry about it. I just get caught up in my life and the details of it. The people, the love, the excitement and the adventure.

This morning, I woke up to my phone going off. I had recieved a text message from Scott saying that there was fire at his apartment building and that the building right next door to his is completely gone, but he and the kids are OK. SCARY and not something you can sleep well after reading.

Apparently though, everything is fine, someone brought there bbq inside... I know right?! Fucking dumb ass. The kids think it's awesome though because there are fire trucks and police cars and news vehicles everywhere. Scott couldn't get his car out so I am sure that he is just enjoying the kids for the day instead of having to work. I feel bad for the people and families in the other building but there isn't anything I can do about it. I'm just fiercely happy my family is okay.

Losing a friend

I've been feeling like I am losing a friend for the past few weeks. Not in a harsh or angry way. There has been no fighting or disagreements. It's just the passing of time and people growing apart.

The problem is that this friend means so much to me and we hardly see each other. Our schedules are different, we live far away from each other and our lives are going different ways as well.

When I was younger I feel like things like this happened more often and much easier. As I get older I realize that I am building stronger more meaningful friendships with the people around me. To see that those friendships aren't working is tragic. Particularly this one.

I'm deeply upset by it and feel like if we could hang out and talk to each other a little bit it might be different. She would see why I love her so much and why I'm missing her. But, maybe she doesn't want to right now and that's okay too. We all get to make decisions and even though I want her in my life maybe she doesn't want me in hers.

Megan is the first friend I made up here in Washington. She knows all of my history with my family, with Scott. She knows my kids and they know her. They love her. I love her. I have considered her a sister since day one. We get along so well, we challenge and support each other. It is a unique and beautiful friendship.

I feel like I'm grieving someone who has passed. I am so sad right now.

Sunny

Finally it is spring here. Warm 70 degree days (almost... it is the Pacific North West afterall.)

I went rock climbing yesterday morning and finally, finally made it to the top of the rock wall! Tara had to talk me through the whole thing, but I was able to trust her enough to hold the rope and anchor me.

It is amazing how much I truly fear trusting someone else with my life. I absolutely freeze up and demand to be let down. I've done it twice and yesterday was no different, except I didn't demand to get down. I just shook and scared myself the whole way but I made it up. The view was beautiful.

And even though it was a small achievement as far as rock climbing goes, I feel like it was a good step forward for me in a personal way.

My whole life I have basically taken care of myself. My Mom is not someone who ever thought to be actively taking care of us especially when she was in her worst state and on drugs. A lot of things fell to the side and that included my siblings and I. Samantha, to her credit definitely took care of me as best as she could but she wasn't that much older than me. We were kids taking care of ourselves and each other in one of the worst environments. To see us now and know us, you would have no idea what we went through as children.

When we moved in with my Dad and Jen when I was 9, it was different. There was just so many kids and our parents were working and going to school that even when Grandma was around we still had to fend for ourselves a lot of the time. It isn't to say that they weren't taking care of us, but there is only so much one person is capable of and when you have 5 kids, it becomes more challenging. However, the stability in that house allowed us to become competent people in the world and to learn right from wrong.

I've only ever had one other incident in my life when I've had to trust someone else and that is my marriage. That didn't go so well. I trusted Scott with many things including what our life was supposed to be like and in the end he just sat on the couch and let me do most of the work.
Now, I'm paying for that. I have to work so much harder because I chose to stop school and he continued. He has more resources available and I don't have any. He has family and I don't. It's not a bad position but it's just different. Now I am again fully trusting myself and no one else.

It's a weird spot to be in.

water

I went kayaking again on Monday.

The water was a lot faster and there was a lot more of it.

Tara and I paddled well and got through the first stretch, it was rough and after we both said at the same time "That was hard!" Then we laughed and kept going even though we were nervous and a little worried about the water levels. It was making it really hard to paddle through unless you have a lot of experience and Tara and I are both new to this sport.

We needed a rest and Matt pointed an eddy out and said shoot for the eddy and take a break. Well, we got there but not quite in time. There was a tree at the bottom of the eddy poking out of the water. We got stuck and the boat flipped. I saw this was happening and went to take a deep breath before going under, but I was already under.

Water in my lungs. Instinctively my body takes another deep breath... of water. Fuck, Jessica Stop. Stop breathing water.

I open my eyes to see the yellow inflatable kayak above me and there's water. Water. It is silent and I think "Alright this might be it, but you have to try either way." I push myself down to catch the current to go under the kayak. I pop out, I'm breathing again. Tara is in front of me, scared and throws her hand out to me. I grab it afraid to let go and get stuck again. Our group got us immedietly but the fear still sits in a little bubble of my brain.

The weird thing is that when it was happening I wasn't really scared so much as calm and accepting. It was so quiet. It wasn't cold. Time moved a little slower and I was able to think clearly. The water felt natural in my lungs.

I can see how people say that drowning is one of the most peaceful ways to die. I don't feel like it would have bothered me at all to die that way the other day. It was so peaceful under the water.

The thing is is that it wasn't. The water was raging, moving so fast and when we finally did connect our cold, shocked hands with the handles on our friends' catamaran we were still being pulled with the river until we got into the boat.

I still want to kayak but I want to be safer and smarter about it until I get better. I have two beautiful babies that definitely need this Mama around.

OH. MY. GOD.

I literally have just had the best day of my entire life.

I went kayaking today with my dear friend Tara and her boyfriend Matt, along with another coworker from work. It was my first time and I am absolutely IN LOVE with it. I can only compare what happened to me today with the way that I felt after giving birth to my children. Ecstatic, Elated, Scared Shitless, Crying, laughing and Screaming all at once.

I was screamin' and paddlin' and just going down the river. Tara and I shared a "duckie" kayak and had a blast. Tara is pretty scared of water and even though Matt has been getting her out on the river a lot lately, she still has fears. Today however was different. We were a team and I know rivers and she knows how to paddle. Together we made it and we didn't have to flip or swim even once.

We kicked ASS! There is no other way of describing this and Oh God, it was so so much fun.


On top of that, we were going near sundown so we were able to catch the sunset as it went down behind the mountains behind us at one point. It was so absolutely beautiful and inspiring that I cried. I cried so hard and so happily, I have never done this before.

I just got through reading a beautiful book, called Modoc. It was is about the greatest elephant that ever lived and by the far the most amazing elephant trainer in the world. These two had been born in the same hour, on the same day on the same farm. They were connected and literally spent their entire lives together. They had ups and downs and some insane adventures. At one point in the book, they are at an Elephantarium in Calcutta, India. A man tells the trainer something about their spirituality. He says that man needs to remember to listen to the song in nature, that every little thing is something and that we are all connected as one and with nature.

I have always tried to do what is right by the earth and by myself at the same time. Today however changed me. I felt that connection. I cried as I tore through the waves and laughed at exactly the same time. I wasn't sad or scared. I was happy, I felt my spirit had connected with my friend and with the water and with the sky. I felt complete the entire trip.

And now.. I am back home and sitting here on this computer so completely removed from that situation. However, I am going to carry it with me. I am going to dream about it and relive it as often as I can. If I could, I would be on the water absolutely everyday like I was today. I have never felt so good and so alive.

well

Here it stands.

I am but one measly person in this world as are you and everyone else, right? So why do we ever think that the things we do will affect so many?

Simply, because it does. That's why.


I am still pondering my dilemma. In the meantime I have been enjoying the sunshine that has finally and thankfully hit the Pacific Northwest after many, many long months of gray days filled with rain and cold.

I even feel like maybe a few freckles returned from their long lost California days of peaceful afternoons spent on the river as a teenager. No cares in the world besides how I was going to take care of the sunburn soon to come. (don't worry a quick phone call to Grandma and I learned that you can bathe in vinegar or green tea, apply Aloe Vera liberally and with abandon as you should have applied the sun screen and at last, she suggested drink and pass out because the pain isn't going away)

I miss those days on the river. I wish there was a way I could bring it back and soak it up if even for a few short hours. Alas, my time will come. There has been talk with Tara about a possible river trip on Tuesday. I'll be in a dry suit and kayaking but hey! Water is water and you take what you can get up here.

I have an adventure packed camping trip planned with some friends in July and I got myself a spiffy new back pack for the occasion. My next purchases will be a bike and a sleeping bag... maybe a tent if absolutely necessary but I'm hoping to borrow.

The babies and I are going to do some camping this year as well, probably just a few small overnight trips here and there with some friends, but it will be an introduction to the adventures they are sure to have as the years come.

I had a realization today about my children. They are nearing the age of accidents and danger. The point where they will soon discover they can get hurt and pretty badly at that. Adrien has already begun having told me just the other day "Mom! Look! I got hurt while walking in the woods!!" as he shows me scrapes, band aids, bruises literally from head to toe and on his little pale tummy too. Oy Vie! How is one supposed to set aside a mother's worries and fears to let them run about and do these things?!

Oh... that's right. It's part of growing up. After all, haven't we all been hurt a time or two?

Love is a funny thing

It can make people do things that they never thought they would do. It can cause the biggest worst fight you've ever had. It can be the best thing to ever happen to you.

Typically though, love is something that can be a struggle, a fight and completely utterly blissful.

For me, in this moment love is both amazing and complicated and a bit evil.

I've had this moment coming to me. Really if I start to think about it and I have. Oh I have! There has been two men in my life for a few months now. One I have loved for quite some time but I had given up. The other, Mr. Wonderful I could feel myself starting to fall to let go. Then something happened. Man number one stepped up, unexpectedly and it's thrown me off.

I've already made one decision... this also came unexpectedly and quite painfully. It hurt someone dearly and I can never take that back. It is something I''m going to have to live with either way and I wish I could go back and do it in a kinder more compassionate way. I just wasn't expecting it to be so different. I thought I could carry on and think clearly. Life had other plans and now I just feel like a pile of shit for what i've done. It was cruel. If I had known how that was going to go I would have made a drastically different decision.

And as odd as this sounds I hope that door isn't closed forever. Maybe this is just a point where I need this time and need to clear myself up and get it together. Maybe this is actually doing not just me but him a favor as well... maybe there is a reason just maybe.

But now I have other things to think about. What should I do? Should I take this proclamation of love and run with it? Is it trust worthy? Is it something I can rest my hopes on? I won't know unless I try but that doesn't mean I should try...

I dont

Have anything to say today. I know that I should but I'm not in the mood. Perhaps tomorrow.

Emotional

I hate being a woman sometimes. All the hormones, the constantly thinking and thinking and thinking about everything, the bleeding, the hypersensitivity. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. I know there is a reason we are the way that we are but once in a while it would be nice to have a break from womanhood and be able to just be a person.

Other than that, a good weekend filled with friends I hadn't hung with in a while and oh I do feel refreshed after a weekend like that. I have some of the most amazing friends and am always grateful for them. Megan is probably the single most amazing lady I know. So opinionated and so full of life that I can't help but let her rub off on me when I hang out with her. Her zest is quite catching you might say. She approves, greatly of said Mr. Wonderful which I will call him here, he has a name but it's not for you.


As a side project, a good friend in my life and I are doing this: http://www.smartassfoodies.wordpress.com

No this is not Mr. Wonderful, this is He who shan't be named and he is a friend. Probably my best male friend ever. I love him more than I can explain. Either way I am super stoked on this and I feel like everyone should be. This is my worst and my best side all wrapped into one interesting, creative, fun and entertaining idea. We start tonight so check it out.


Roommate is set to move in next Saturday. I am excited that my rent is going to go down with the added person. Disappointed that I have to have a roommate. Living by me lonesome has been wonderful and I can't wait to do it again someday. Have a place that is just mine. A place I can walk around naked in the middle of the day, leave my towel on the floor in the bathroom if I'm done with it. A place that I can truly be quiet and alone in. I crave that once in a while. I just like to sit and listen to music, draw, paint, bake all at the same time with my babies. I like it when we all get creative together. I feel a certain amount of magic when that happens. Maybe it's just a sense of awe. My children inspire so much in me while simultaneously demanding so much as well. It's a sort of painful bliss, being a parent. I can't wait to have more babies. I feel like it's what I'm supposed to be doing, making babies. (Not too many mind you! Just one or two more... large families are wonderfully awful)




p.s. I like it here again. This space is so good for me and I am going to try very hard not to abandon it when I get stressed out and overwhelmed again. That was a mistake and I hope I learned from it.

content

Hello, it's me at peace and content. Things are still a little sketch, what with the car and all but I feel like I am finding a groove. There is a potential roomie in the midst as well and I think that he might just be what I need right now. He sounds like a very peaceful dude, a Buddhist in nature is how he describes himself. How could I have found a more perfect roommate than that?!

We have this new thing called Green Mission at work and the goal is to get our store to have no trash. We want to recycle, compost or reuse anything we possibly can and I am so excited. Ridiculously excited, to the point that the other day I had to talk to my team about it and when I did I got so into it that my team leader had to interrupt me to make me stop. On the bright side though, due to my enthusiasm the team is excited too! Which means that they will finally and hopefully continue to walk the extra 100 feet at the end of the night to put the recycling in the proper bin instead of in the trash bin and will pay more attention to what is compostable and what is not.

It does remind me as well that I need to get a compost bin for my little house and try to remember to take my trash up to the street on Wednesdays! I haven't been home and have missed it for a month now. The only reason it's okay is because I haven't been home.

Oh, remember that man? That beautiful, wonderful man? Yea, that's right it's been a few weeks and I still think that he is quite amazing. I am quite twitterpated. (definition here: http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=twitterpated) *yes, you I used your word.


The babies, oh the babies! I will post pictures of those little munchkins tomorrow. They are becoming flat out ridiculous in their conversation lately. Bella, upon my asking if she had to go poop the other day promptly responded that yes, she does and it is HUGE mama. (as she demonstrated to me the size, which by all means would have been elephant sized) Adrien then piped in that he didn't know if it was going to flush it was so big.

The other day we went to a birthday party for one of their friends and as we were toy shopping, Bella peed right in the middle of the aisle without even suggesting that she had to go at any point. Then, Adrien taking the gift picking process quite seriously finally landed on a Transformers toy that I had suggested. He asked me what it was and I told him that it was a car that turned into a robot. "A CAR THAT TURNS INTO A ROBOT?! WOW! CAN WE GET CAMERON THAT?! A CAR THAT IS A ROBOT!!!" His enthusiasm was outstanding and I am pretty sure that this only heightened his love for cars, which he has recently taken to storing in his underwear for safe keeping. I am debating about sewing pockets into it so they don't actually have to be washed after he uses them.

my blog title is so appropriate

To my life. Everyday I feel a little confused about something or other. I think this applies to everyone though. We all have moments in our day when we need to stop and think.

This morning I couldn't sleep (big surprise, I know). But I started to think about my schedule and how much I like it paralleled with how much I hate it. The two really are equal to each other I think. I like that I am able to get as much done as I can possibly get done everyday, it feels good to be successful, physically at work while also knowing that the work I do is helping the rest of our team get their work done successfully. Unfortunately there is also this looming cloud of just sheer frustration with this schedule. I have a hard time sleeping, I hardly see my friends anymore and the worst thing is that when I have my kids I'm exhausted. I still do everything we want to do with them but I'm just so tired when I have them that I feel like half a parent. Wierd image in my head now of what I would like like as half a parent. I would be just my upper torso, there mentally but not quite able to do everything physically and sometimes it would switch. Go brain for some odd visuals.


I have been missing my Grandma a lot lately. It seems to be a theme in my family though because one of my aunts sent all of us a recipe question and now my cousin, Amy started a blog dedicated to her recipes and other family recipes we all love. It's here, called Love, From Grandma's Kitchen. It is truly beautiful. Grandma's food was her way of showing us all that she cared and wanted us to be happy, healthy and well fed. She made sure we all knew the recipes she learned as a child that she loved. She passed down little tricks and things that I use in my everyday cooking. I use the same techniques that she did with me as a kid with my kids. I can remember sitting at our kitchen counter on a bar stool watching her cook and looking through a cook book and saying that I wanted to make something. Grandma would go to the store and the next day we would be making it.

My first experience with Red Velvet cake was with her. She even let me make orange butter frosting for some reason and I accidentally put so, so much food dye in it that it looked crazy. No one would eat it. But it was delicious.

It's funny because I was thinking to myself the other day that I can't help but think of her and my family every time I step into my kitchen to cook. I feel best about it when I am cooking for my family, my friends. I feel like I am passing on something that she gave me, a priceless gift. Something that will move forward in everyone, because who doesn't love to eat?!

It's amazing how one woman affected us all so deeply.

Oh my god

I SLEPT! I slept all day, it was beautiful. I woke up and it was 6 pm. Insane I know, but I did not have the kids today and I was exhausted!! It's been a week between kids, work, a root canal, a car accident and some hiking thrown in as well I needed the sleep.

This weekend the kids and I are going to my best mom's friends house for a birthday party for her son. He is turning 5. We are excited. Clair is just about the sweetest, funniest gal I've met in a long time and I love her. To top off our wonderful friendship our kids like each other! This always makes it easier and we have plans to force them into a lifelong friendship just so that we can hang out more often.

I think it's going to work.

I need to find a roommate ASAP. So if you know of someone who might be good, tell them to go here: http://seattle.craigslist.org/see/roo/2285217168.html and contact me.

Tired

I always always feel so tired these days. I don't think it's that I'm not getting enough sleep. I think it's more that the sleep I am getting is riddled with my brain and it's urge to be constantly thinking and pondering how my life is going to work the next day.

I'm curious to know if everyone does this. Do you lay awake at night for hours and think and think and think about what you are going to do the next day about situations that are stressful, exciting or sometimes even unimportant? I do, I do it every night and not even writing it down is helping.

I wonder if I need to paint again or at least be creating again... Maybe next week I will pick up some paints and see. I do have my watercolor I need to finish anyway.

On a seperate note, it is finally spring here in Washington. If you live here you know that is no small thing. It means that we can all pretend that the dull, grey, snowy winter didn't happen. It means beer on the porch, BBQ, Daffodils, Tulips, Cherry Blossoms, Lilac.... oh the lilac!! I can't wait to see the lilac, it is by far one of my favorite flowers. So beautiful and they smell so good.

I for one have already pulled my birkenstocks out of the closet. I am going to wear them the second I possibly can without being too cold!

Falling

I am falling in every direction these days. My car, the car that my Grandma gave me, got in a wreck on Saturday. Kid had no license, no insurance and no job. Yay. My insurance won't cover all the damage done and now I am without car. I live 45 minutes away from my work. I have two kids that I have to shuttle around. I can't afford to get even a crap car until the end of next month. Doubly Yay, here. Life it seems is being topsy turvy.

On the bright side, I have beautiful friends who live close and are helping, a lot! I don't know where I'd be without them and the fact that they are helping and supportive is worth more than anything right now. In the mean time, I am a bus rider now and so ensues some interesting stories, I am sure. Especially since the busses here have WiFi! Oh the joy, the joy!


Working overnight shifts is both a blessing and a curse all wrapped and tangled into one. I have more time with my kids but I am less awake and more grumpy. Is it worth it? I'm not sure I know the answer to that yet. I never get enough sleep, but nothing new there I have always had trouble sleeping.

I met a man. I met a beautiful wonderful man and I can't wait to see how it's going to go... Cross your fingers, hold your toes.

Starting Fresh

Its a new day and a new year (well a few months into the new year anyway). And I am a newly single lady. It's been a while since I have visited this space or even checked up on it and I'm sorry.

I haven't been feeling it lately. I've been on another journey, I don't know where it led me yet or why I went down that path but I did. It's been unusual. It's been wonderful. It's been time to say goodbye to it for a while, I just wasn't ready.

Isn't that interesting, when we need to stop or finish something but we aren't ready so we just keep chewing on it until we just can't chew anymore. I think a lot of us do it and noone really talks about it. We talk about everything else but that. We talk about all the things we should be doing which is all the things we aren't doing.

So, i am going to try to be here more often, not for you. For me. This place helped get me through some things that I don't think I would have gotten through otherwise. If you read it that's great and if not that's great too. For me though, this is therapy. I'm writing what I feel and what I want to do with my life here in a place that is both safe and yet not so private that when I close my computer I won't feel like noone has heard me or understood me. That is part of life, being understood and heard. It makes up more than we ever want to admit. Being alone, being quiet aren't things that anyone ever wants forever. We all need someone to listen to us and to listen to.

At least here there is the illusion of someone listening. Someone's understanding.... somewhere.