Photos, photos, photos

I have been wanting to use the camera, but the batteries have been dead for a long time. As a reasonably intelligent human being I probaby could've solved this problem a long time ago but I am intermittently paralyzed by inertia. Since Sadie and I were going to Ybor City today I decided to apply myself to this minor problem, and voila, fully charged batteries and pictures taken!

I almost gave up on uploading any pictures at all until I pressed forward a tiny bit and found the cable that connects the camera to the computer. More success. Here are some pics. Many are not of very good quality but I figured they are worth a look anyway.

The Girls

Old Kitchen

Old Lady

Shirley Temple

Messy

Evie

Winnie Carlos Winnie

A Little Blurry

Lovey Dove

Some More Words for Today

It almost feels selfish not to say something about what day it is today. Here we are on the sixth anniversary of 9/11 and no one really seems to know what to do about today. Should we mourn as a country, should we move on, what should we do.

Well, damned if I know that answer to that, but I don't think it should ever just go back to being an ordinary day.

The best thing that I can do on 9/11 is to reflect on what was going on in my life and how the events of that day affected me and to feel compassion for the multitude of people who were affected in the worst ways possible. I didn't lose any loved ones to 9/11 but I'm very sorry for the people who did. Such a terrible act of hatred. There's really no way to make any sense out of it that I can see and I just hope that all of those souls and all of their families are finding some kind of peace with the passage of time.

What I remember about that day, in my own very insignificant way is as follows:

I had been living at my parents' house for the millionth and hopefully last time for about 6 months. I sought solace there after a rather heated and violent ending to a dead-end relationship. I had started my prerequisite courses for my nursing degree and life was fairly easy. I was working as a CNA at Littlebrook Nursing Home in Califon-a lovely small facility in the rolling hills of New Jersey, where Hunterdon, Morris, and Warren counties meet.

Rob and I had just met a few weeks prior to this date. We had been emailing and talking on the phone for a little while before we met. I was absolutely head over heels in love with him and trying to figure out how to A) make him aware that I WAS THE ONE, and B) not freak him out with my manic, almost stalker-like habits regarding falling in love. My stomach was in a constant state of semi-nauseousness, I couldn't sleep, I was giddy, I was a little on the manic side-all positive symptoms of me falling in love.

I literally could've talked to him on the phone 24 hours a day if he was game for this. I absolutely couldn't get enough of him. Life was beautiful because I had found an amazing person to pour romantic love towards. He wasn't scared of the idea of dating a single mom and he was very interested in me as a person.

Beautiful.

That Tuesday I dropped Sadie off at school and went for my usual cruise. Let it be known that I am very fond of long drives, cruising, getting lost and then finding my way back home. So this was what I was doing, although there was no getting lost even if I tried. And I did. Mostly I would listen to music or Howard Stern. That morning I must have been listening to music because I didn't hear the news on the radio. Most likely I was listening to Smashing Pumpkins. It would just fit the picture.

I stopped at the Walmart in Clinton for something and I remember thinking it was kind of strange to see a group of about five or six managers kind of huddled around, hearing one say "I don't think it was random." There was a gravity to his voice, when mixed with these words just seemed quite dark to me. The impression was fleeting, so I paid and left.

When I got home, my brother Jon was awake, on the phone, and the TV was on. Considering the fact that he was awake before noon, I became a little bit concerned. My best friend at the time, Tamara, was on the phone and giving him the frightening news that something really awful was happening in New York, in real time.

At that point the first tower had been struck and no one really knew what in the world was happening. My brother and I retreated to the deck out back momentarily. The sky was clear, the weather perfect. When we came back inside, the second tower had just been struck. It was quite obvious that this was intentional. It seemed like minute by minute some new and awful thing was happening. The Pentagon, the plane crashing in Pennsylvania.

I called Sadie's school and was told that they really didn't have any specific disaster plan. The secretary told me if I would like to pick her up that would be fine. Darn tootin' I'd like to pick her up. It's the fucking end of the world, thank you.

I tried to call my mom, I tried to call my dad, I tried to call Rob. All circuits busy. For a LONG time. Just my luck, I meet the guy of my dreams and it's the end of the goddamn world. If you know my abysmal history with relationships you'll get the humor in that.

Thank you God, for not making it really be the end of the world. For me though, on that day, it truly felt like it could've been. I've never been so frightened by anything in my life, at least not in a global sense. Over the next couple of days not a plane was to be seen in the sky. Everyone I knew or knew of made it out of the city and back home unscathed. The little country airport by my parents' house let no planes into the sky for quite a while. The air was simply inhabited by the birds and insects while everyone tried to make sense of it all.

***

Some pics for your enjoyment:

At work, looking cute, with a really nice shirt (I love a man who wears good shirts)

Pleased as Punch

My Girls

***

Do I always have to hear that song "How to Save a Life" by the Fray when it is totally inconvenient to just break down and cry? How long is this going to go on for? I mean, can I please just go in to Staples and buy my things without hearing this song and having to walk around really, really slow, and try not to cry (which is impossible) and not even be able to concentrate on what I'm supposed to by, much less where these things are located while I can't even see with the tears in my eyes, lump in my throat, and my new friend named Nausea?

Is that a run-on sentence or an obnoxiously long rhetorical question?

The Eternal Search for Answers

I hope that in twenty years when I look back on this time I'll feel confident that I did the best I could. I'm trying to tune every step I take to fit that wish. Most tasks are slow-going and I've found that I really can't do much more than perform one or two administrative tasks and unpack one or two boxes every day. Some days I only get a fraction of that done. Between toddler-tending, desperately trying to meet the needs of a fourteen year-old daughter, and maybe just trying to do one good thing for myself each day (mentally or physically) I have my hands full.

And the dogs! Don't forget the dogs! They have needs too. Mostly they just need lots and lots of love and affection. They have been SO good these days, getting along famously without a bit of friction. The good thing about the dogs is that when I've exhausted Sadie and Penny's quota of doting I can turn to them. They are bottomless pits when it comes to receiving all of the extra love I have right now. In return they give me their silly dog smiles (um, yeah, dogs DO smile) and can dish out every little bit that they can take.

Desperately I look for meaning in everything-in my environment, in my interactions with people, in dreams, in the things I read, and the songs I listen to. I stretch my imagination to its limits. I have returned to the younger version of myself-the one that looks for signs in everything, who talks to spiders and birds, who believes that thunder is God's way of letting me know he's still there.

Lately...

We are starting to form some kind of routine. This is the only way to survive. Without the girls I think I would be a total mess-undisciplined, nocturnal, drunk, and probably suffering from poor hygiene. With the girls I make meals, loosely adhere to a sleeping schedule, find reasons to smile, and occasionally crack the whip.

People ask how I'm doing and my basic response is: up and down. This is true. There are moments when I am lost in total despair and then there are moments when I am totally confident that I will remake our lives into something that is happy and full of meaning.

There is a lime tree in my backyard with ten or twelves limes ripening on it. I keep on checking the biggest one every day and it still feels too firm to pick. I know nothing about growing fruit, but maybe I'll learn a little bit more about that through this tree.

Penny has taken to climbing on top of the dining room table every time I'm not looking. She likes to shake the salt and pepper shakers. This morning she got to the table while I was doing something and broke a bowl that I had in the middle of the table. I was nice, part of my Noritake Colorwave set, a large, shallow bowl that I used to serve vegetables or pasta during holidays and other special dinners. She cut her thumb while doing this. It's just a small cut but it was bleeding a lot. She ripped off the first band aid and started bleeding again. We're having more success with the second band aid.

Sadie is doing pretty well in school and with friends. She's tending the rabbit that my father-in-law found and it appears to be thriving. We are anxiously awaiting her new bedroom furniture. She has a lot more homework than she is used to but she's taking it like a champ. If she keeps her GPA in a decent range she will be eligible for a trip to Germany with her German class in April. It's really nice for her to have something like that to look forward to.

We are also getting ready for my sister-in-law's wedding. The three of us got our dresses, had them fitted for minor alterations, and just need to pick them up about a week before the wedding. In the meantime, I need to watch what I eat so I can look as awesome as possible in this dress.

Which leads me to another thing-we all joined the YMCA. I haven't actually gone and used the facilities yet but I can see it in my future. Perhaps we'll go this weekend. They have a child care area that will watch children for 90 minutes while you do whatever it is you do there. I am very interested in taking spin classes. I heard that it's intense and burns a lot of calories. I like the fact that I won't have to actually jump around with other human beings. I am not ready for that yet. At any rate, it looks very clean and everyone seems very friendly.

Time to start another weekend. I really have no internal distinction between weekdays and weekends. It's all a blur to me. In some ways it feels like only yesterday that Rob passed away-so much of my feelings are still very fresh. Every morning when I wake up I feel so sad that I will not see him today. Then I realize that it's been five weeks. Still close, but yet so far from the last time I ever saw him.

Sending a prayer into the atmosphere
Answered by the crickets and the frogs
The air responds to me
Wrapping around this soul of mine
An equal exchange, give and take
As the warmth comes into me
Mingling briefly with all my tiny pieces
And swiftly retreats back to home

Today is our anniversary. Four years ago today Rob and I got married. I started this post by typing "today would've been our four year anniversary." The italics I have just added as an after thought. I deleted that line and rewrote it. It is still is our anniversary.

Not would've been, but is.

It is impossible to really celebrate this day, at least today, but I can honor it. I started by cleaning my engagement ring. I haven't done this for months and months and it had accumulated all kinds of gunk around the area where the stone meets the setting. Months-worth of soap residue, latex glove powder, hand lotion, and whatever else lurks beneath had gathered underneath the diamond and it didn't sparkle as brightly as it should have.

So I got myself some jewelry cleaner and soaked it and scrubbed it. It's much better. I love this ring as much now as the day I got it and maybe even a little bit more. Any ring would've been a lovely choice but he put so much thought into this particular ring that it breaks my heart to look at it again and think of it's story.

The way I was told was this: JH went with him to the diamond district in New York and he was able to hand select the stone which is just a perfectly round cut diamond just a hair over one karat. It was a loose stone among others that he selected for whatever reason, probably a combination of price, size, cut. He decided to have it placed by itself in a simple Tiffany setting on white gold. If you know me, you know that this solitaire arrangement is exactly what I am about.

A few months before that he asked me a few vague questions about what kind of rings I liked and what I pictured an ideal engagement ring to be. He also took me into a jewelry store and had my finger sized. This lead me to believe that something really good was headed down the road, but I maintained my patience and never pressed him for anything. He surely must have known how much I loved him and wanted to be with him forever without me having to nag him for a ring or drag him into jewelry stores pointing out what I liked.

All I ever told him was that as far as rings go, I preferred solitaires with one really good stone. Because of my profession I needed something easy to don and remove gloves and to keep clean. I am also a simple person with very simple wants and needs-the ring really fit me perfectly. I feel like it also fit our relationship perfectly. I see it as a symbol of us. It is one singular, beautiful thing.

Four years ago it was a lovely day for a wedding. Together, we did a fine job of coordinating the event in five month's time. Our determination was to throw the best party that either of us had ever put together. I really think we pulled it off.

There are so many more memories I could pull out regarding August 23, 2003 but I will have to revisit them another time. The baby is finally napping and I have to find something productive to do. Task lists are weighing heavily in mind and deadlines are breathing down my neck. Until I return to this topic, enjoy a picture or two or three...

A scan, not the best quality, but I will never get over the look on his face. So happy.

Getting ready for the big event with JH

Honeymoon in Cozumel

I don't even know where to begin with this post.

Or with life.

I have so much unfinished business to take care of. On the other hand I have rushed through so many vital tasks that I can hardly catch my breath. We are in the middle of major, life-changing shit here people.

For starters, Sadie started high school yesterday. She was worried sick about it the night before. So was I. That morning was a little rough getting organized. Somehow we managed to get there on time.

When she got out of the car I told her I loved her, as is my habit. She told me she loved me too and shut the door behind her. As she rushed off to homeroom I watched her for a few moments and then felt so acutely lonely. This was a moment that someone else would've liked to have been there for too. I let a few tears go, but the baby was in the backseat and she needed breakfast.

Turns out that Sadie had two good days of school in a row. She is taking German and Geography as her electives and the rest of the classes are just the usual required courses. She has made a few friends. She told me today that she "loved" this school. This helps to mend my broken heart just a little bit.

Also, friends help mend my broken heart a little bit too. I have had some good visitors, good email, good conversations, good communication in general. I've had one or two bits of drama but I cannot let things like that overshadow the good will and intentions that have been poured into our lives.

And it reminds me that people are mostly good.

Taking it One Day at a Time

Today was the first quiet day we had in a long time. I took a ride around the neighborhood and it's not so bad. I took a walk around 2 o'clock but it was pretty hot so I cut it short.

I think swamp ass was invented in Florida.

But by the same token I like it hot outside. Everything feels very alive and thriving down here. There's a lot of green wherever I look. Lawns are wide and trees are dripping with Spanish moss. What do they live off of? Tree bark and humidity I guess. Lizards crawl all over the lanai screens and sidewalks during the day. Frogs are abundant at night. Sometimes I spot sand cranes in pairs in the backyard here.

Also, the people are nice. In the drive through and at the stores they call me honey and I think they actually mean it. If a stranger were to call me honey up in Bergen County I'd either be running for my life or in a rage over their sarcasm. But here-I think they actually mean it. And I miss being called honey so I will not only put up with it but cherish it too.

St. Petersburg Times Article

The St. Pete times ran a nice piece on Rob with a beautiful picture that I knew he would've liked. He had commented many times "damn, I look good in this picture." The online article doesn't feature the picture and there will come a time when that online piece either expires or otherwise becomes unavailable so I just wanted to put it all together in one place where it will always be accessible. I'm pretty sure that everyone reading this blog has already read the article, which isn't 100% historically accurate but it's still a really nice tribute and I'm very thankful to the author Andrew Meacham for doing a very nice job.

Human trivia bank embraced computers, '80s songs
By ANDREW MEACHAM, Times Staff Writer-Published August 7, 2007

He might never have moved to Florida.

Rob Shaw liked the house in Wood-Ridge, N.J. It was a place where he and his wife could bring up their two daughters. But at the end of the walkthrough, his Tourette's syndrome kicked in. The sudden tics and utterances took the Realtor by surprise.

"Oh, do you have that strange disease?" she asked.

Rob told the Realtor he would rather die than buy a house from her.

He found a warmer welcome in Spring Hill near his parents.

Shaw and his wife had recently picked out a house. They were set to close on the home soon and planned to celebrate by touring Florida: driving to the Panhandle, then to the Everglades and finally hitting South Beach.

They never got the chance.

Shaw died Thursday at his parents' home in Spring Hill. He was 37. Last year he had heart surgery.

As a student teacher at Jersey City State University, Shaw had briefly managed to get inner-city high school students engaged in Hamlet.

But he passed on a teaching career and found a niche in computers. He had thousands of '80s songs in his iPod. A human trivia bank, Shaw inhaled movies, often lacing his conversation with lines from Tombstone, Die Hard, Porky's or American Pie.

He was a diminutive neatnik at 5-foot-4 who favored khakis and Polo shirts. He took out everyday frustrations with rants that reminded co-workers of George Costanza in Seinfeld. He needled them, too, sometimes hurting feelings, but making up for it later.

"The humor was not to cover his Tourette's," said Robert Lotz, who worked with Shaw at a marketing company. "But the attention was already on him. Instead of people staring at him or feeling sorry for him, he wanted to connect with people."

Shaw liked surprises. He proposed to his wife by hiding a solitaire diamond in a plate of fruit. And when she passed her nursing boards, he gave her a Dalmatian puppy.

"My life was chaotic before I met him," said Elizabeth Shaw, 32. "He brought a safety and peace and the hope that everything would always be okay."

The moving truck with all of their belongings arrives tomorrow.

Andrew Meacham can be reached at 661-2431 or mailto:ameacham@sptimes.com.%3C/p%3E%3Cp%3E%3Cp%3E.biography%3C/p%3E%3Cp%3ERobert

Biography

Robert Alan Shaw III
Born: March 23, 1970
Died: Aug. 2, 2007
Survivors: A wife, Elizabeth; daughters Sadie and Penelope; parents, Robert and Audrey Shaw; a sister, Nicole Shaw; and grandfathers Robert Shaw and Nicholas Lisanti. Donations should go to the Tourette Syndrome Association, accessible online at www.tsa-usa.org/; or the Harvard Brain Tissue Resource Center, www.brainbank.mclean.org/.

A Review

I was re-reading some of this blog just now and going over the last one I wrote in NJ before the teary train ride to FL. In a way the subject matter in the beginning of that entry pains me to read-talking about my old aspiration to be a mortician and then how I wound up caring for the departed later on in life anyway. How cold it might seem to some people. I'm not really here to apologize for that because it is what it is and anyone who knows me knows I am not a cold person. Still, I wanted to make it clear that that sort of work is really an act of love-at least, it was on my part. I know that is a difficult concept to convey, but it is true.

But still, when I wrote that entry, how innocent I was to the heartache that comes from this kind of experience. And I can't help but feel chills regarding the timing. Chills.

I have talked with a few people about the coldness I felt when I found out about Robert's passing. A blast of coldness and my blood literally turned to ice. That is the only way I can describe it. I wish I could erase it from my memory. I wish I could just banish it and make it go away.

Now this is the paragraph where one usually shows the brighter side or the blessing in disguise. I am afraid that that is probably going to elude me for quite some time. However, I will say that everyone's support and good wishes and positive vibes are keeping me afloat. This may be the worst thing I have ever experienced, but I try to remind myself that the children are healthy, I have a roof over my head, and a lot of good guidance from those older and wiser than me.


Robert was my Doc Holliday. He was my Captain Miller. He was my huckleberry.

Now I just have to earn it.

(JH, Thank you in advance for allowing me to blatantly rip off a few very beautiful things you said about Robert in his eulogy. You are a daisy...)

The Best of Times

Ocean City

The Pool in Spring Hill

Better Together

by Jack Johnson

There's no combination of words

I could put on the back of a postcard

No song that I could sing

But I can try for your heart

Our dreams, and they are made out of real things

Like a, shoebox of photographs

With sepiatone loving

Love is the answer,

At least for most of the questions in my heart

Like why are we here? And where do we go?And how come it's so hard?

It's not always easy and

Sometimes life can be deceiving

I'll tell you one thing it's always better when we're together

It's always better when we're together

Yeah, we'll look at the stars when we're together

Well, it's always better when we're together

Yeah, it's always better when we're together

And all of these moments

Just might find their way into my dreams tonight

But I know that they'll be gone

When the morning light sings

And brings new things

For tomorrow night you see

That they'll be gone too

Too many things I have to do

But if all of these dreams might find their way

Into my day to day scene

I'd be under the impression

I was somewhere in between

With only two

Just me and you

Not so many things we got to do

Or places we got to be

We'll sit beneath the mango tree now

It's always better when we're together

We're somewhere in between together

Well, it's always better when we're together

Yeah, it's always better when we're together

I believe in memories

They look so, so pretty when I sleep

Hey now, and when I wake up,

You look so pretty sleeping next to me

But there is not enough time,

And there is no, no song I could sing

And there is no combination of words I could say

But I will still tell you one thing

We're better together

Tagging Myself

Jean posted this on her blog yesterday. I cannot resist things like this. Too bad my other 2 readers aren't bloggers. I know f0r sure that their 8 random facts would be a very good read.

I've been tagged by “You-know-who-you-are-and-you-know-what-you-did!”

Here are the rules:

1. We have to post these rules before we give you the facts.
2. Players start with eight random facts/habits about themselves.
3. People who are tagged need to write their own blog about their eight things and post these rules.
4. At the end of your blog, you need to choose eight people to get tagged and list their names.
5. Don’t forget to leave them a comment telling them they’re tagged, and to read your blog.

Random Facts and Habits about Liz:

1. I seriously contemplated being a mortician when I was too young to even know what goth was. I wasn't even trying to be cool, I actually wanted to do this until my father told me that he couldn't live with the idea of me washing a dead man's penis.

2. I have gone on to wash more dead men's penises than I can remember...for, like, way less money than a mortician.

3. To me, the best smell in the world is the smell of amniotic fluid and newborn baby all mixed together. I wish they made a perfume that smelled exactly like it.

4. Once in nursing school, I had to pick up an obstetrician's yarmulke and put it back on his head when it got knocked off by a forceful jet of amniotic fluid. That was kind of wild.

5. When I was a child, about 8 or 9, there was a good 6-month period of time where I became obsessed with even numbers and symmetry. I would tap one leg and be compelled to tap the other. I would move one hand and have to do the same movement with the other hand. I would think a thought, then think it again to keep everything even. I guess I was stressed out or something.

6. I enjoy cleaning up really big, bad messes-if they don't belong to me. I have often thought about abandoning my career for work in cleaning up really awful messes-the kind where you need to don biohazard suits. I could also see myself successfully running a very nice ice cream parlor.

7. I love every fruit and vegetable known to mankind.

8. Like a true Scorpio, I thrive on change. I enjoy creation and destruction. Beginnings and endings. I get bored in the middle.

Resolutions

We've all hear of New Year's resolutions, and yeah, I made a few this year that I've loosely adhered to. They include:

• Gossip Less-I've kind of failed miserably at this
• Lose Weight-I've done this, thank you very much, but I'm not done yet
• And something else that I can't think of at the moment

How about some relocation resolutions?

• Exercise more
• Reach my goal weight within the next year
• Read more
• Write more
• Get a new tattoo over my old tattoo

Today was a great day. I wasn't nearly as productive at work as I should have been. It's hard to concentrate. I get side-tracked easily. I get wrapped up in conversations that I don't want to bring to an end. I want to cram every bit of friendship and dialogue into each moment that I possibly can. Chances are high that I might not see any of these good people again.

I have a goal for one day next week and I hope to fulfill it. For years now I've been wanting to photograph certain areas of Hackensack that I feel really attached to, places I don't want to forget. They aren't necessarily the most beautiful sights in the world and my camera skills are very much limited to pointing and clicking. Still, these places have a special meaning to me and I should capture a few shots before I go.

More Reminiscence

This week is turning out to be quite manic. Not only in the running around like crazy sense, but in the swinging pendulum of emotion sense. I have been talking too much, but not enough. I have been missing New Jersey as I stand in the middle of it. I have been thrilled with the idea of basking in the warmth of Florida, yet in the back of my mind have been terrified of the hurricanes I am bound to endure.

And I've been using the word "I" way too much.

Explaining to my clients that this will be my last week has been very emotional for me and for some of them too. They're used to staff turnovers, but that's no consolation. Some of them seem genuinely upset to see me go and they've been letting me know. And I can't help but feel a pang of guilt when I explain my situation, that I'm going to go live happily ever after with my beautiful family 1000 miles away so we can all be together. I feel so incredibly fortunate to be able to do so, but it feels kind of awful explaining this to people who, for the most part, have very strained family ties. In many cases this agency is the best family they've ever had and it hurts to leave that.

*******

On a different note, I dug up some goodies from the past that I'd like to share:

From PA with Love

A little too into fire-building, perhaps? Bet you didn't know that I was more than a novice fire-starter.

I will always be very proud of this fire creation. We used a huge cardboard tube to craft this baby. Save all the big cardboard tubes you ever come across and wow your friends with a fire tunnel. Go ahead, take the credit for the idea!

Sisters-in-law gone wild

A cool pic of me and JH

Running at approximately 25% capacity

Recalling and Building Intensity

I've moved around a bit. It all started when I was an infant. We moved to Washington State when I was a baby so that my dad could attend Gonzaga Law School. I don't remember that move because I was so young, but earliest memories start to take shape there. I do remember leaving and a few subsequent visits that followed.

We came back to New Jersey shortly before kindergarten began. Relatives who remembered me and not necessarily vice versa welcomed us back, acted like people who knew me in a past life. I think that might be where my fascination with reincarnation began. Surely I had seen this kind people before, but where? when? Answer: my infancy.


Through various apartments in Central Jersey to our first house in Kendall Park to our last house in Alexandria Township to now, I have had a lot of practice with breaking my life down to it's basic elements, sorting, filing through, discarding, and neatly fitting it all together. I know that books are heavy and they go in small boxes and that you can use your socks to fill in the gaps in between your fragile items. I know how to configure my personal items together like a jigsaw puzzle. I know that it's a really good idea to be liberal with the packing tape and to reinforce the box on the bottom before even loading it up.

After leaving the family home in Alexandria I wandered over to Phillipsburg and back to Alexandria on several occasions. The last residence I had in P'burg was not half bad actually, one of my better apartments. My boyfriend at the time and I had the top 2 floors of a 3 story home with 3 entire bedrooms, 2 whole baths, a cute kitchen, a balcony overlooking our quiet street, an extra loft-type room, lots of closets, and full use of the basement for laundry and hanging clothes. Oh yeah, plus a garage. And the yard was good.

But even all of that space, for $750/month, no less, couldn't save the situation.

I returned home for the last time. We kind of made it work. I enjoyed cooking dinners for my family and being in a very comfortable house with all the trimmings but try living with your parents after years of carrying on your own stupid life and all of your stupid habits and ways and see how well that all fits together. I dare anyone to try it for one day. You'll look for any reason to occupy yourself outside of the house. Anything.

Shortly before 9/11 I met my husband online and then in person. March of 2003 we were engaged. Sadie and I joined him in Lodi in May of that year. We married in August 2003 and spent the next year in that house as I finished nursing school

We moved to this house in Wood-Ridge in September of 2004 and here we are, a baby, a major surgery, and many bouts of laughter and tears later. We have had 2 tenants under our roof. We have hosted many holidays. I have cooked several turkeys, a prime rib, an infinite number of mashed potatoes, and several birthday cakes. Hundreds of presents have been opened under the Christmas tree that magically appears in the corner after my husband wakes up from a nap, a fake tree that I have lugged up and down 2 flights of stairs, even when I was ready to pop with pregnancy. But in his defense his heart was so bad he could barely maintain a healthy pink color, much less lug around a Christmas tree. And I needed the exercise badly.

So very shortly we are going to be leaving New Jersey for good. I can't imagine ever returning. I have spent most of my life here and I feel like I have absolutely made the most of it. I have loved this state like you wouldn't believe, and there have even been times when I thought that I couldn't possibly live anywhere else.

Most of that feeling came from living so close to the Delaware River for so many years. I have loved that river for a long time. I have fished it, swam it, tubed it, thrown countless roaches into it, contemplated it, fallen in love in it, water skied it, driven along it and over its bridges, skipped rocks into it, dipped Sadie's feet in it when she was just a little tiny baby. I will miss it. I hope I can visit it one more time before we go.

What's another word for update?

Gimme a break, titles are hard.



Next week starts my last week of work at my happy little outpatient mental health center. When I gave notice a few weeks back, I completely broke down during the conversation with my boss. I have poured my heart and soul into this job. And I have had the opportunity to treat myself to some of the most amazing lunch breaks of my career.



I have no idea how I could ever capture this experience somewhere else.



Time marches on. I will find something that brings me great joy in the future. I have to tell myself this over and over to avoid feeling swallowed up by the great, black unknown.



One thing I have decided-if it feels like shit, run in the opposite direction. I had a phone interview that made me feel like shit and I'm not pursuing it. It was not in behavioral health care and it wasn't terrible but it wasn't that typical feeling mommydawg gets when it's meant to be. A feeling that maybe only complete and total flakes like myself feel. Something akin to the stars being in perfect alignment, or the sum of the numbers on my social security card adding up to the address of the future job's headquarters, or some other eerily similar detail that I invent.

C'mon, you know you do that shit too. Everyone does. Everyone looks for similarities, things we share in common with the things we really want.

*****

Sidenote: Blogger NOW will autosave your post as you type it. This is genius. Thank you, Blogger. You read my mind.

*****

Carl Hiaasen writes a very sharp column for the Miami Herald. It's really just Florida news, but Florida is blessed to have such a great journalist and author exposing it's sordid details and making art of it all. If you haven't read any of his books yet, not only should you, but you should also just read one or two of his columns to get a flavor for his attitude and his stance on things. He's definitely one of the good guys. And then you should rush out and get one of his books. They are kind of a quick, easy read but incredibly entertaining without being...I don't know...commercial-novel fluff.

*****

So yeah, we're moving. And this takes a lot of figuring out, but we're getting there.

*****

Next time-pics. I am on the wrong laptop and it's not configured to share files with the other laptop. Which husband is playing Boggle on at the moment. He's sitting next to me finishing a bowl of ice cream. I am finishing a glass of Pinot Grigio. The baby is sleeping. Sadie is talking on the phone. Life is good.

3 Months

I've been so bad about keeping up with this blog for the past three months but I've been pretty pre-occupied with Sparkpeople. I am amazed that this website is free. If you are like me and you have absolutely no will-power, very little self-control, and love to lay around and eat cheese and drink wine then you should give it a try.

Can I also just say that we are having some really annoying problems with the connection in our house? It makes it so very hard to log in all of the food I eat and exercise I get, plus anything else fun I might want to do through the internet. One second you're connected the next *poof* the connection is GONE, baby. I was wrongfully accused for many week over doing something "wrong" with the computer. Excuse me? I have been on the internet since, like, 1996 or something. I think I know how to click a damn link by now. Silly me, I didn't know that there was a wrong way to DO that.

My husband now believes that it is the router. Yippee. We are not getting a new router any time soon. We have a house full of everything to pack up and move to Florida.

Let me just say that I wrote a good post yesterday that I was unable to upload due to the problem I just mentioned. It told of my weight loss, dietary changes, exercise, and a few other things with some funny stuff thrown in. Part of the entry was bulleted and, I like to think, mildly amusing.

Sorry. Sorry for taking so long to write and sorry that the network administrator in this house is failing miserably at his job.

Still, we have done SO MUCH in the last 90 days. We have sold a house. We both gave notice at work. We have watched Sadie graduate from eighth grade. We have had a lot of fun and been under a lot of stress. We ate lots of good meals and we did some yoga.

Good times.

illnesses, meltdowns, and dogfights

It seems like forever since I've written in this blog. About a month has passed. You can imagine from my lack of entries that it probably hasn't been the best month on record. We're having big problems with our dogs and trying to sort out what to do. We've all been sick off and on and for a working mom that's always a really rough deal.

Ugh. Forget about that for a second though. What are the good things that have happened?

• I inherited my husband's old iPod since he got a new one. I listen to this in the car during my fairly short commute. I like it well enough but I've found that I actually have too many songs on it. You know me-hate superfluous anything and like everything super-duper organized. So every single morning when I start up the car, with the way things are configured, I hear the opening bars of Blackened by Metallica. This in itself isn't a bad thing, but if I feel lazy for a minute...well, I wind up hearing 50% of this song twice daily. Or if I switch to Playlist mode and get caught up with, say, watching the actual traffic around me, I wind up hearing California by Tupac Shakur at least once daily. Don't ask...I have eclectic tastes...
• Just remember this...California...knows how to party...Cal-i-for-ni-a...knows how to paaaaar-tay-ay...
• Other than that, I only have these playlists created: All songs (blah), Dave Matthews Band (about 5 zillion songs that I just DON'T NEED-do I honestly need a 16 minute version of Dancing Nancies?), Reggae (no complaints, a good mix), Sublime (fine), Tori Amos (way, way, way too many songs), White Stripes (no complaints) and that's it. I need more time to whip this little iPod's ass into shape!
• Organized by artists, we have lots, lots, lots more that are mostly contained in the All Songs playlists, but dammit!-why in the hell did I let my husband convince me to retain all of his old crap that I hate??? Scorpions? Fucking Styx? Hello? I'm NEVER going to listen to that stuff! It's all immediately GONGED as soon as it comes on when randomly shuffled onto my stereo! Barry Manilow? GONG! Gap Band? GONG! Do you know how long it takes me to queue up something I truly want to hear, such as Snow by RHCP? I'm practically in Hackensack by the time I get this song going.
• Buddhism-even reading about it makes me feel more relaxed and optimistic. Cannot commit to not eating animals, but most of the rest makes sense to me. Don't lie or exaggerate, don't be a douchebag to others, avoid promiscuity...I agree!...well, now that I got all of that shit out of my system and realize that it totally sucks in the long run...
• Exercise...been getting my abs on lately. And dieting too. Although today was a total dietary meltdown which I will expound on in a second...For the most part I have been so good about dieting and exercising and have even lost a little weight. Yay!
• Cooking-holy shit, you should've eaten at my house tonight. Baconless Clams Casino? Yeah, we had that tonight. Cod cakes? Yep. Freakin' shrimp cocktail? Check! (I even de-veined those raw buggers myself and poached them in court bouillon-same court bouillon that poached the cod.) Can you say Braised Baby Bok Choy? We can. How about fresh strawberries on the side? Maybe some Gavi di Gavi with that?
• Chuck steak-made this twice. It is extremely cheap which is VERY important in our house right now. Cook it for an hour in some liquid and root vegetables. Sear it first. Delicious.
• McCormick & Smick's-kind of a rip-off but oh so good. Consider this for an annual splurge. Do not expect a large portion when it comes to the seared Ahi tuna. They made a nice dirty Martini though. Very olive-y. For dinner I got 2 crab cakes, broccoli rabe and rice pilaf and it just shouldn't have cost close to $30 for the plate.
• Bonefish Grill-LOTS of bang for your buck. Spaghetti squash? Nice... Lots and lots of seared Ahi tuna with this order. Crusted in black and white sesame seeds too. Very lovely. Dirty Martini just as good as M&S's and the wine list is pretty broad. I got the salmon pan-Asian style (teriyaki marinade, grilled, wasabi cream) with vegetable sides for way less than my crab cakes at the other place, a glass of white, the Martini, shared some sides, and it was all delicious.

Enough about food...but seriously...that's kind of been the best thing going lately between the illnesses, meltdowns, and dogfights.

Turned out to be...

...pneumonia.

But she seems to be a lot better.

Along with the antibiotics she got a lot of hands-on tender loving care. For 3 days straight we pretty much just held her in our laps and coddled her. She wouldn't let us lay her down for a nap for a couple of days, insisting on sleeping in our arms, fitfully tossing herself around periodically. Her breath was hot, heavy, stinky. I did a lot of clapping and cupping on her back to break up the rattling mucous. Clearing your own mucous by way of coughing is a skill that's lost on an infant/toddler.

A day or two ago she sneezed up this huge blob of mucous that I'm still swooning over. It was sort of a huge thing that seemed to have a life of it's own. I couldn't believe it came out of such a little person. It dawned on my that this was the pneumonia, the physical manifestation of the infection, and that she would probably be a lot more chipper having shed it.

And she was! She took a great nap a little while later and woke up with SO much energy. She was all over the place. I couldn't sit still on the couch for 2 minutes without her bolting not only upstairs to the bedrooms, but all the way up to the attic. She did this, like, 5 times that afternoon. She was into everything.

Something about it made me miss working at the hospital. I haven't seen a booger that big in a really long time. It made me remember doing suctioning on my patients, and the satisfaction I felt when I helped someone clear their airway, breathe a little bit better.

So yeah, the biggest booger has been strangely inspiring. Go figure.

Seems like...

...the little one has some kind of illness. For the past two days she's woken up in a fairly decent mood and then slid into big, pile of tired, feverish, crankiness. She was tugging at her ear a few times today so I'm wondering if it's an ear infection. Poor thing.

So it looks like tomorrow is another day off for me, getting her to the pediatrician and probably filling prescriptions for antibiotics or what have you.

Watching a couple of minutes of Edward Scissorhands. The part where they show the montage of weird hairdos he does for all of the neighborhood ladies. Good movie.

Superbowl Sunday

It's about so much more than just football.

It's about gathering together with friends and family.

It's about good snacks.

It's about the entertainment.


It's about cute babies and the dogs who love them.

Meatloaf Muffins!

Wish I had a picture of these cuties, but they're gone already.

Ingredients:

1.25 lbs of ground meat, either beef, turkey, pork, or any combination thereof
1 egg
1 cup of seasoned bread crumbs
2 tbsp of bbq sauce, ketchup, or a combination of both
pepper to taste
seasonings to taste
6 cubes of cheese such as cheddar, mozzarella, gouda, swiss, 3/4" by 3/4"

(Yesterday I used turkey, cheddar cheese, and fresh thyme leaves. Awesome!)

Directions:

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Spray a 6-muffin tin with cooking spray. Mix all of the ingredients in a medium bowl, except for cheese cubes. Add more bread crumbs a little at a time if the mixture seems too moist to hold it's shape.

Divide the mixture into 6 equal pieces and form the pieces are one cheese cube each into ball shapes. Place the meatloaf muffins into muffin tins and bake for about 40 minutes. When the muffins are done they will be sizzling and firm to the touch. The tops of some might break open and a little bit of cheese might ooze out. This is another good sign that they are done.

Allow to cool slightly for a few moments before removing. If they stick, slide the back of a butter knife around the muffin.

Serve with ketchup, mashed potatoes, and a warm vegetable such as stir-fried broccoli.

Enjoy!

Butternut Squash Soup

Soup is good food, especially when it's a fresh, homemade, pureed vegetable soup. Lately I've been experimenting a little bit with leftover vegetables as soup The baby especially enjoys velvety smooth veggie soups. Sadie will reluctantly agree that they are Ok.

Using a handheld immersion blender makes this recipe very easy to make. You can certainly use regular blender or food processor, but you'll wind up with some extra dirty dishesIf you don't have a handheld blender, consider getting one. It's a really fun gadget and you'll find a million reasons to use it.

Without any further ado:

• Bake an unpeeled butternut squash in a 400 degree oven. Prepare the squash by bisecting it lengthwise and chopping the halves into 4 equal pieces. Drizzle with olive oil, sprinkle with salt and pepper. Bake for about 40 minutes or until pieces are tender.


• Allow squash to cool and then scoop the soft flesh away from the skin.
  
• Place the squash meat in a large saucepan or small pot over low heat or flame. Begin using the immersion blender to break down the squash while slowly adding chicken stock.


• When enough stock has been added to reach the consistency of thin mashed potatoes, it'll be the right time to add the milk. Add enough milk to reach the desired consistency, a thick soup.


• Nice seasonings for this soup are salt, pepper, thyme, and cumin, all to taste. Less is usually more as far as seasonings go.

Some afterthoughts:

• I quartered an onion and added it to the tray of squash. This resulted in the onions getting a little charred and some of them had to be thrown out instead of incorporated into the soup. A tiny amount of charred bits turned up in the soup, but it sort of just looked like coarsely ground pepper. This was fine for my own personal consumption, but it didn't add much to the soup and will be avoided next time.


• Baking time for the squash might vary. Just keep an eye on it.


• It doesn't take long for the squash to cool off enough to comfortably handle. However, premature squash handling could cause burns so do use caution.


• It wouldn't be too hard to adapt this recipe to blender usage. Just put some or all of the squash in the blender, add some chicken stock to thin it out, and blend. Transfer squash puree to a large sauce pan or pot over low heat and continue to add stock, milk, and seasonings as described above.


• Let your imagination and taste buds be your guide when seasoning!


• Enjoy!

Other possible pureed soups:

• Potato-asparagus


• Potato-spinach


• Carrot


• Corn (very good with a small dollop of pesto)


• Fresh artichoke (delicious but EXTREMELY high in fiber-enjoy in small portions on a Saturday or Sunday that you plan on spending at home)

Penny's B'day Bash!

Happy happy, Joy joy!

The Spread

Having a swell time being the birthday girl!

Birthday Gift Radar

There were real live gangsters at our house too, you know, making gang gestures and what not. It was sort of intimidating.

A little help from a very adorable cousin is always appreciated.

Family Shot

Nothing Like It, No Sir-eee

There's nothing quite like being pregnant to remind you that we are, in fact, animals...

And nothing like an emergency C-section to give you the opportunity to get your head on straight in a real hurry...

But there's really nothing quite like the heart-melting warmth, the sweet smell, the softness of a newborn baby.

Happy first birthday day Penelope Lynn!

Posting-Latest, Not Really Greatest, But Here It Is...

So in between doing interesting things like complaining, procrastinating, feeling sorry for myself, getting irritated with everything, bitching, and just being a waste of space I've been doing some reading. Both on and off the internet. And that has been good.

On the internet-is it just me or is McSweeney's website just chock full of good reading? I'm positively addicted to it.

Off the internet-shame on me for never reading any work by William Faulkner earlier in my life. I've just started Light in August and I'm enjoying it a lot. It's much different than the books I usually read, which are, well, easier to read. I do not mean to imply that I am a dolt who reads romance novels every chance I get. I mean to say that the books I read are usually fast-paced, frenetic jaunts through a plot which reveals itself in the first 20, 25 pages (think Tough Guys Don't Dance, Vonnegut, Sedaris). This is not that kind of book. It is slow, deliberate, painstakingly detailed. It's got it's own mood and pace that you must surrender to. And I'm finding that I enjoy that.

Off the internet and through my ears-I am currently enjoying the audio CDs of John Hodgman's The Areas of My Expertise. ITunes was running a promo or something, offering it for free. It caught my eye and now my ears are hooked! I've been listening to it during my commute to and from work and in between different places I go during the day and it's just the best. He's done work for The Daily Show and McSweeney's. Most recently he has played the personification of the PC on the new Mac commercials.

The Sweet Art of Procrastination

Plan-

-Instead of preparing for work I am going to sit here on the couch and make another very important list. The blog muse is whispering in my ear and I just can't bring myself to enter the real world until I get a few things off of my chest, out of my head, and into my blog-

Small List of Male Vocalists Who I Believe to be Smackalicious*

1. Chris Cornell of Soundgarden and Audioslave
2. Mark Wahlberg (was the vocalist for The Funky Bunch)
3. Billie Joe Armstrong from Green Day
4. Chester Bennington of Linkin Park

*******************************************************************

Well, thank God I got that off of my chest. I had better get ready for work now.

*Smackalicious=Attractive

Ways to Amuse Babies

• This Little Piggy
• Pretending to Eat Various Body Parts (hands, ears, toes)
• Smelling Their Bare Feet and Saying "Peeeeee-yooooooooh" in a very exaggerated way
• Blowing Raspberries Where the Neck Meets the Shoulder
• Letting Them Grab and Throw Around Two Loads' Worth of Clean Laundry While You Fold Said Laundry (Over and Over Again)
• Facilitating Sock Removal (and Subsequent Sock-Tasting)
• Singing Various Songs with Much Enthusiasm and Clapping (Bingo, Peas Porridge Hot, On Top of Spaghetti, etc.)

Happy New Year to You!

On New Year's Eve...

~The baby had her very first pony tail~

~And~

~I survived my first raw oyster experience with the help of Sadie and JH~

(and they were actually quite good with a martini)

A Merry Christmas Indeed

Some pics from our holiday

Welcome in, 2007

1. What did you do in 2006 that you’d never done before?

Most notably, had a C-section. My first surgery ever!

2. Did you keep your new year’s resolutions, and will you make more for next year?

I didn't make any resolutions in 2006. Too exhausted I guess. My new year's resolutions this year are simple-be nicer, gossip less, and simplify everything. Sort of vague, but I think I can actually stick with it!

3. Did anyone close to you give birth?

Ah...yes, I gave birth this year, 3 people at work did too. Most notably, Free had a baby 2 days before me and we didn't even know about it until September. Very amazing!


4. Did anyone close to you die?

No family, but a handful of patients.

5. What countries did you visit?

No foreign travel for me in 2006. Boohoo.

6. What would you like to have in 2007 that you lacked in 2006?

Patience. An exercise regimen.

7. What dates from 2006 will remain etched upon your memory, and why?

It would have to be January 20th, the day Penny was born. Also January 18th, which was my due date. Just sitting around feeling sorry for my big, fat, pregnant self...feeling the lack of contractions or any other unusual activity of the uterus and just knowing that I was going to be pregnant for the rest of my life :-P

8. What was your biggest achievement of the year?

Surviving day to day life as a mother of an infant and teenager.

9. What was your biggest failure?

Sheesh, I don't know. Letting the laundry pile up? Not saving as much money as I would've hoped. Having another bad hair year in my bad hair life...

10. Did you suffer illness or injury?

Well, I recovered from my C-section. No major illnesses, thank God. I come from a hardy Slavic stock of people, so generally we are resistant to disease until old age :-P

11. What was the best thing you bought?

Best thing I bought? Probably the Medela breast pump.

12. Whose behavior merited celebration?

Let me pick some unsung heroes-social workers.

13. Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed?

George W. Bush.

14. Where did most of your money go?

Mortgage, daycare, car payments and insurance, the usual.

15. What did you get really, really, really excited about?

Whenever we took advantage of rare opportunities to get out for the night, just the 2 of us.

16. What song will always remind you of 2006?

Crazy by Gnarls Barkley.

17. Compared to this time last year, are you:
a) happier or sadder? 
b) thinner or fatter? 
c) richer or poorer?

Happier, Thinner, Poorer (but only because we've both been on disability 3 months a piece during the past year!)

18. What do you wish you’d done more of?

Chilling out, not being a tightly-wound ball of nervousness.

19. What do you wish you’d done less of?

Worrying

20. How will you be spending Christmas?

We had it at our house.

21. Did you fall in love in 2006?

With Penelope.

22. How many one-night stands?

This question is just ridiculous. None. Would anyone even answer this truthfully if their answer was yes?

23. What was your favorite TV program?

The Office leads the pack of favorites, but I also love CSI Las Vegas, House, and every single program on Food Network and HGTV. I can't get enough of those real estate shows. Oh, wait, the ones where they go into total pig-sty houses and make the occupants throw out a bunch of crap, and then rearrange everything so it actually looks like it's not inhabited by bums or squatters? Those are MY kind of shows. I love when they tell the people that their junk isn't doing anything positive for them and it's time to get rid of it, thin it out, let go of the past.

24. Do you hate anyone now that you didn’t hate this time last year?

Ain't no time to hate, barely time to wait! Oh ho what I want to know, where does the time go?

25. What was the best book you read?

Unfortunately I didn't read enough new books (re-read a few old favorites, as I am apt to do) but I guess The Bonesetter's Daughter by Amy Tan is the first one that comes to mind. It was a gift from JH last Christmas and I read it on my maternity leave.

26. What was your greatest musical discovery?

Rediscovering Metallica. (Sounds like the title to some MTV show 20 years in the future where they resurrect Lars, James, and Kirk, all balding and paunchy, and launch a contest to appoint the "next" bassist, who will probably be a female this time around."

27. What did you want and get?

A healthy baby, teenager, and husband.

28. What did you want and not get?

Horseback riding lessons.

29. What was your favorite film of this year?

Well, since I don't usually see any movies until they hit Blockbuster, my favorites weren't from 2006. Most were 2005 or earlier. And the winners are:

Crash, 40 Year-Old Virgin, Batman Begins, Wedding Crashers, Sin City, Everything is Illuminated, V for Vendetta, Jarhead, Brokenflowers, Transamerica, The Jacket, The Matador.

30. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?

Went to work-it was a Friday-injection day, which is my favorite. Went out to dinner. Had a nice evening. I turned 32.

31. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?

Less obnoxious traffic.

32. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2006?

Hide the flub as much as possible.

33. What kept you sane?

Humor.

34. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?

Fancy as in think was hot as hell? I've already gone over that. Or fancy as in admire? I liked the former acting governor of NJ, Richard Codey. He tried to do a lot for the mentally ill of our state, including his war on stigma. He came to work to speak, but I didn't get to hear any of it because I was stuck in the back doing injections. A lot of the clients got to hear him speak, so it was nice for them.

35. What political issue stirred you the most?

The politics of health (i.e. stem cell research, Medicare "reform,"), women's rights, the war.


36. Who did you miss?

Everyone I care about who isn't part of my day to day life.

37. Who was the best new person you met?

Some really interesting clients, but I haven't really "met" anyone new in my personal life in a long time.

38. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2006.

Less is more, especially when I'm the one who's talking, especially if I've had a couple of glasses of wine and the audience just doesn't get it.

39. Quote a song lyric that sums up your year.

In another time's forgotten space
your eyes looked through your mother's face
Wildflower seed on the sand and stone
may the four winds blow you safely home
~Robert Hunter