January 1, 2015

Bueller…Bueller…Bueller…

Boy has it been a while, so long of a while that I don’t even remember the last part of my life that I shared here.  I definitely miss blogging, I miss writing, I miss being able to express my thoughts and feelings thoroughly enough.  So much so that I have decided to create an alter ego of sorts, a nomme de plume if you will, and I am going to go back to the old school way of writing, no holds barred no worries about what anyone else thought or anyone else’s opinions of what I do or say.  One thi9ng I have learned, is that other people cherish and deserve their privacy, so for that reason I am going to be completely anonymous. If you’ve been a reader for a while now, or you are my facebook friend, don’t worry you’ll get a personal invite to this new life.  And as for the rest of you out there, if things go as I hope, you all will be hearing something or other about me somewhere in the blogosphere…

But just for nostalgia’s sake, let me tell you what’s happenoing.  It’s a little after one on new year’s morning 2015.  The honey, Uncle Ralph and I just finished a new years breakfast at Denny’s and are using some free wifi.  Earlier today I picked up an ounce of some pretty righteous bud so I am baked, what a surprise.  I talked to Pook tonight but not the girls, I will call them tomorrow.  I owe my dad an email but my laptop is about to die and I forgot the charger.  That is all…

somebody that I used to know

This song couldn’t express my sentiments more precisely!

Valentine forever…

So 12  years ago today…

(This story brings up such primal emotions from the core of my soul that I simply can not bear to read it -but especially, relive it- feeling the way I do about this little girl right now.  I fucking MISS her so god damn much!!  I only say it out loud every so often because, well, frankly, it makes me cry and I can’t spend the rest of my life crying.  But I think about her constantly and there is always a gnawing, longing feeling in the pit of my core that is only abated by her presence.  I wish I could go back…)

I was two weeks overdue with my youngest daughter.  Not only was I overdue, but this pregnancy was considered high-risk because I developed gestational diabetes.  I was sick and tired of taking the bus to my doctor appointments every week, I was sick of the aspartame taste of Diet Coke, I was sick of poking my finger or arm with a needle four times a day.  I was just sick of it all.

The day before, my mom had called me from work with some food for thought.  One of the nurses told her that taking Ipecac syrup would get my labor started enough for them to have to admit me.  If I took some of this nasty crap before my doctor’s appointment, I should be in labor before the end of my exam.  So, you know…if I was really tired of being pregnant there were ways to get labor induced.  When I woke up Valentine’s Day morning, After heaving my enormously swollen body out of bed and into the shower I said fuck it, gimme the syrup!

My mom and I stopped off at Rite Aid at 8:00 sharp and bought this tiny blue bottle of Ipecac syrup.  I got back in the car and mustered all my strength to swallow.  It’s like swallowing thick thick cooking oil but with a sharper taste to it.  And it feels miserable going down, like you can taste it in your stomach.  It’s supposed to make you poop.  The theory is that the stomach contractions for the poop get the uterus contracting too.  We were told that within an hour I would start feeling the effects.  So we hurried off to the doctor.

My doctor’s office was a zoo all the time, and they were always late with my appointments.  Today was no different.  We waited about 45 minutes before being called into the exam room.  I still wasn’t feeling ANYTHING.  No gas, no cramps, nada.  My doctor did her thing and once again shook her head when she looked through my chart.

“I still don’t have that Something-Something test to confirm your due date.”

Ugh.  I’d seen a different doctor at the beginning of my pregnancy, but when I was diagnosed with diabetes they transferred me to this doctor.  They were supposed to send over my chart, which included this test that confirms due date, but in four months they had not arrived.  This was why I was ssoooo overdue; without being able to confirm my due date (other than me TELLING them what it was) they were hesitant to induce.

“Why don’t you go and have lunch, come back at 1 and I’ll get you checked in, this is getting riddiculous.”

The words I’d been longing to hear!!!  I thanked the doc and my mom and I rushed out the office as quickly as we could.

As we walked to the car my mom asked how I was feeling.  I was feeling just fine!  Humph, some great labor inducer Ipecac is, I thought.  We got into the car and headed out to the other end of East LA and had lunch at our old family favorite restaurant, Ciro’s.  We ordered the usual, chicken flauta plates.  I ate 6 flautas, plus rice and beans and a little salad.

I was gulping down the last of my soda before we left when suddenly…I did not feel so good!!  My belly churned into a tight knot and showed no signs of relaxing.  I could literally feel bubbling in my bunghole.  I told my mom we better GO!!!

(from this point on things are gonna get graphic-read at your own risk!)

Luckily the hospital was only about a mile away so we hurried off as fast as we could.  My mom had to get a wheelchair for me because there was NO WAY I could uncross my legs without a fountain of diarrhea spewing forth. She pushed me into the emergency entrance and within minutes I was in a private birthing suite.  I was in incredible pain, doubled over in fact.  My mom helped me to the bathroom and I sat on the toilet and let it go.  Oh my god, the pain I was in!!  At this point I very well could have been in labor but the stomach cramps from the Ipecac were SO STRONG I literally thought I was going to poop out my organs.

When I was finally finished (so I thought) I cleaned myself up and started getting into my gown and onto the bed.  This hospital was a teaching hospital so there were students of all sorts performing all kinds of procedures.  Soon a nurse came in with a nursing student.  She instructed the student to give me 4cc’s of Stadol to help ease my pain, then she left him to his own resources and left the room.  He proceeded to poke me at LEAST 20 times before hitting my vein.  Finally he got it, and I felt the coolness of the medicine as it traveled through my arm and into the rest of my body…

And that was the last lucid, conscious moment I remember.  The nurse gave me WAY too much painkiller and I knocked out.  I remember trying to wake up, and I remember hearing things going on around me.

“Do you smell that?” My mom asked babydaddy John.

“Yeah where is it coming from?” He asked.  I heard them sniffing around the room.  ”I think it’s Andrea!”

I apparently shat myself in my induced stupor.  I remember feeling John and my mom changing the sheets around me.  I remember the doctor coming in and examining me.  I remember how painful that was!!  I wanted to shout for him to stop but I couldn’t move my mouth.  I remember hearing his ominous words…

“The baby’s in too much distress.  We gotta get it out now.  Get her into the surgical room STAT!!!”

I remember being lifted from the bed onto a gurney.  I remember bright lights above my head as I was wheeled into a surgical birthing room.  I tried so hard to speak but my mouth simply would not work.  The only thing I could even remotely move was my eyeballs.  I saw John’s eyes poking out from behind a surgical mask.

I was strapped onto a table like Jesus was nailed to the cross.  I didn’t feel any pain but I could feel pulling and tugging at my midsection.  The surgeons made some jokes about menudo.  Then I remember looking over and seeing John in the corner of the room holding what appeared to be a giant cocoon of some sort.

Next thing I remember was waking up in a recovery room.  I was in my right mind, finally!!  I tried to sit up but a sharp pain coursed through me right where they sliced me open.  I turned my head to one side and saw a couple other gurneys just like mine, only empty.  I looked to the other side of the room and saw three little newborn incubators lining the wall; one of them had a baby in it.  For a moment my heart lifted but it quickly deflated; no, this baby looked like a doll, it was just too perfect and pink and cute.  And BLONDE!!!  Yeah that was NOT mine or John’s kid!!!  Just then a nurse came in, and I asked her where my baby was.

“She’s right there sweetie!” She said in a thick Filipina accent, gesturing towards the angelic darling little bundle.

“No, you don’t understand.  I had a Mexican and Asian baby, not a white baby.  My baby’s gotta have dark hair.  That’s a white baby.”  Now I was getting worried!   Had they switched my baby???

“She’s yours sweetie!”  The nurse said as she put the bundle in my arms.  I took one look at her and instantly knew that not only did she look just like me, she had a wrinkle in her forehead that matched her daddy’s forehead; it was like a thumbprint.  This was definitely MY baby!

My mom and dad came in shortly afterwards and they too thought she was just the cutest little thing!  The nurse came in and told them what I’d said, and they all laughed and blamed it on the drugs.  No, I really thought that this baby was too cute to be mine!  It was as if cupid had created her himself, just for me on Valentine’s Day…

A SPACE BAR!!!!

I am sitting at my old office making use of the computers and for the first time in I don’t know how long, I have a keyboard that functions properly AND some privacy, so I figured I’d take a stab at a little writing.  Bear with me, it’s been a while.

It dawned on me that I have hardly written anything about Reyl and I, on a personal level.  Recently many of our friends have asked me what it is that I love about him or why is it that I love him so dearly.  So many people want to blame my downward spiral on him and that is so terribly unfair.  First of all if anyone is to blame for my life’s nosedive into oblivion…BLAME HAYDN.  He knows me better than anyone else on this earth, even to this day, and he knew damn well how fragile my mental state was.  He knew that his actions would only make things worse.  He turned his back on me, and he was the only one on the planet who knew me well enough and loved me truly enough to take care of me.  Shame on Haydn.

What is it then that is sooooooo fabulous about my Potato??  Where do I begin??  Ok first of all I think he is THE cutest thing on earth.  I’ve never felt my mate was as physically attractive as I find Reyl.  To me he is totally dreamy, and just looking at him excites me.  But that’s superficial.  What I love the most is the passion he has for art, specifically his art.  He has so much talent, so much vision, and such enthusiasm to learn more and develop himself more.  I am constantly and consistently amazed by each new project he undertakes.  I love how he is thirsty for more knowledge, more inspiration, to add to his never-ceasing vision of perfection.  I love that even though he could recreate the mona lisa with crayons and line paper, he only likes to work with the best possible mediums and tools because he has that much respect and expectation of himself and his artwork.

So I guess you could say I love the artist in him.  But wait, there’s more!  He has just about the same mistakes to make up for as a father to his children that I have to make up for as a mother to my own.  We both want to spend the rest of our lives being as involved with our children as possible.  We both need the same things in order to make this happen.  We both just want our kids to let us into their worlds, from this day forward and forever more.

And that was just how I felt during our brief yet enthusiastic courtship.  Despite what anyone may believe to the contrary, it took several weeks of my constant badgering and begging and pestering him to give in to me and just kiss me once.  But from the moment our lips first touched…it was beyond sparks flying and fireworks exploding.  The way he kissed me…I’ve never been kissed that way before in my life but it’s as though we’ve been kissing each other and only each other since the beginning of time…

Puppy…

There are about a billion things I could wish for that would drastically change my life for the better.  But if I were ever ever EVR ever ever given thje opportunity to have one wish, any wish but just one wish to be granted, it would be…To have twenty minutes of Haydn’s attention just once more in this lifetime.  Not with my ex-boyfriend Haydn, no siree bob that asshole died the day he threw me into the trash and carried me to the curb.  No, twenty minutes with the Haydn that I’ve known for eighteen years, the Haydn who fell in love with me the moment he first laid eyes on me, the Haydn who would have sold his soul to the devil if I would just give him a chance to be my guy, the Haydn who patiently waited all those years with a broken heart simply because, well, I was that girl in his life.  Pardon me, I AM that girl in his life.

He doesn’t have to say a word to me.  I simply have so very very much that I simply need him to hear.  I need that man, that man that I truly and purely loved, to know how terribly sorry and ashamed of myself I am that life with me was so bad he had to end things in the way he did.  I know that life with me was at best difficult on my good days, but as my mental health has steadily and rapidly declined, I know that this put an tremendous mental strain on you as well.  You put up with so much for so long, and you simply can’t deny that the reason you did it was because I’m Andie, you love me, that’s just the way it is.  I want him to know how grateful I am for all the wonderful good fabulous fat times we shared.  I want him to know that despite what he may think to the contrary, the little girl he helped me raise for six years loved him and feels his loss in her life.  He needs to know that every time she and I have seen each other, some way or another we always bring up Haydn.  We’ll be watchtogether lipping through the guide and evertimer we come across a show we used to watch, Pooky always says with a sigh ” aaaahhh, Haydn show”.

Puppy, losing you as a part of my life is a devastation I will never recover from and will haunt me every day until I die.  You are truly a good man and what a fool I was to have done what I did to lose you.  You deserve better than I can ever be.

 

Hope and happiness

Hello folks.  I have no idea where I left off in my tale of Taurus and Reyler, but suffice it to say things have gotten insane.  How to begin…

About a month ago things started getting tense with the honey and I.  He felt I was smothering him and he wanted space and felt like I wasn’t giving it to him.  Mind you I was gone out of the house for 12 hours a day so how I wasn’t giving him space I don’t know.  Anyway, I came home from work early one afternoon and there was an argument among the adults in the house that turned ugly quickly.  Police had already been called by the time I arrived but they ran everyone’s name and just as we predicted, Reylz had a warrant and they took him in for it.  I also had a small warrant, not even worth their time.  As soon as they put Reylz in handcuffs, I was told in no uncertain terms to take as much of my shit as I could carry and get the fuck out immediately.  So I packed a small suitcase and walked to the nearest bust stop and headed out of dodge.

Luckily I found a friend to take pity on me and let me crash at his place for a while until I got straightened out.  Then wouldn’t you know it, I got laid off from my job the week before Rey;z was supposed to be let out.  When he came home I had enough money for a motel room for two nights and that was as far as I could take us.

Of course I bought him phone cards to call me while he was away.  Of course in jail he was a changed man.  But I went and did the stupid thing.  I went snooping into his private accounts and found exactly what I didn’t want to find.  I didn’t find him cheating, but it felt worse.  When we were at our roughest patches and I’d be laying next to him in bed just praying he’d pay attention to me and he was too busy in his video game, he’s chatting with some gal pal or another.  I’m not jealous of his friendships.  Despite what he says he’s a flirt and that’s all there is to it.  I’ sad that I’m just waiting for his attention and he’s intentionally throwing it elsewhere.

I let it get to me while he was gone and I didn’t say anything until he got home.  I am his one and only, I believe this.  The man he is with me now isn’t the man I was living with a month ago.  This is the man I fell in love with.

Today we’re on yet another bus adventure.  We’re enjoying out time together again and missing each other when we’re apart.  Yes, we are definitely falling in love again…

 

When the lil black raincloud pours rays of sunshine…

 

Usually my ever-present little black rain cloud is pissing in my Cheerios.   Within a mere 48 hour period, a plethora of rays of sunshine have come bursting through, giving me a renewed confidence that my life will in fact turn around and make me happy instead of drowning me in misery.

After being given a put-up-or-get-out ultimatum, I chose to revisit the feasibility of going back to school.  This time however I decided to go to an actual physical real school and not an online for-profit institution like I had in the past.  Yesterday I headed over to East LA College to start the whole enrollment process.  One of the things I needed to do was take an English and Math assessment test.  It was supposed to take me anywhere from 2-3 hours; I finished in about 45 minutes.  When the results came back, I’d scored high enough on the English part to earn myself a spot in the Honors English program.  My Math scores weren’t as good but I wouldn’t have to start at the bottom; closer to the middle.

Just as I was about to start my exam I got a phone call from an unfamiliar number; I let it go to voicemail.  Later on on my way home they called again and this time I answered.  A man was responding to my résumé.  He chatted with me for about five minutes before asking me to come in for an interview the following afternoon.  I agreed, but it was hard to get excited after all the rejection I’ve been subjected to on this most recent job hunt.

It was a bit of a mission to get to the other side of L.A. and as I transferred from bus line to bus line the little devil on my shoulder kept making fun of me for making such a trek when I was only gonna get rejected.  But I carried on and arrived exactly at 1:00 as scheduled.  I was greeted by a friendly gentleman and was quickly joined by his partner/wife for the interview.  They asked me some pretty specific questions about my previous experience.  After a mere 5 minutes they asked me how soon I could start.  I was shocked.  Floored.  Dumbfounded.

I have a job!!!  I have school to not only occupy some time and give Reylz a little breathing room,  but also to give me an opportunity to make some friends and socialize.  It’ll just be a matter of weeks before I have enough money saved to pay for the deposit and first month’s rent on a place of our own.  SEX WITH NOISE HERE I COME!!!!!

 

A tie that binds…

 

Of course, being a female, I’ve always dreamed of my wedding day.  I always assumed that I would marry.  In fact every relationship I’ve had, I assumed that marriage was inevitable.  With my first babydaddy, his mom gave him her wedding ring one day, telling him “just in case”.  But I left him long before he figured out what she meant.  When I was with Paul, I dreamed of it every day despite his telling me early on that he felt no desire to ever take on a bride.  That is actually the only thing that kept me going when he left me, knowing that he wouldn’t marry me or anybody else.  When he called me to tell me he was getting married, it devastated me even though it had been years since we parted.  With Haydn, I just knew it was going to happen because I’d picked him as a partner for all the responsible, intelligent, adult reasons so marriage was simply the next in a series of logical steps.  We all know how that ended.

The marriage fantasy that I have is certainly not as whip cream as it was when I was younger, but it still rages inside me.  I still want to find a man who loves me so much he has to lay claim to me.  I want a man to want me so much he makes me his obligation.  I want to belong to someone.  I want to be responsible for someone.  I want to grow old with someone.  I want to take care of someone.  I want someone to take care of me.  I want to adore and be adored.

Of course, as my luck usually goes, I find myself in a relationship with someone who’s already stated that he doesn’t believe in marriage nor does he see the need for such a commitment.  At the same time, he’s also told me that he hasn’t said no to the idea of marrying me.

Right now is certainly not the time in my life that I need to be worrying about getting married, this I know.  Reylz is most definitely not in the position to take me or anyone on as a bride.  But I am so conflicted.  I’m not getting any younger.  A part of me tells me to get out now so that I can find someone who wants to get married, even though I’m madly in love with him.  Then another part of me tells me I’m madly in love with him, give it time and it will happen.

I’m certainly not looking for that fluffy white wedding that I once longed for either.  Nope.  In fact if I did marry Reylz, it would just be him and I at the courthouse tieing the knot.  Well, if he wanted any of his family or friends there I wouldn’t object but after the way my family’s made it clear they think he’s a loser, why would I want them to be a part of my special day?  No thank you.  Ok, I take it back, I would want my kids to be there.  But other than that just us.  I used to dream about designing the perfect wedding ring too, but I’ve all but given up on that fantasy.  So long as I get some sort of diamond I will be more than happy.  But I do want to wear a white dress.  Lately I’ve fantasized about a rockabilly style wedding dress…

And of course Reylz would have to wear a suit…not a tux, but a suit and tie…

At this point it’s all just a pipe dream…

 

Third party opinions

So I’ve been seeing a new therapist for the past couple months at my parents‘ insistence.  They want to see me straighten my life out, at least that’s what they say.  And it’s true, they do want that, but I think me seeing this new therapist was more in the hopes that an outsider would convince me that Reylz is a bad idea and I should leave him.  FAT CHANCE!!!

We have both group sessions that include both my parents as well as one on one sessions.  Since our first session, any time my parents could throw the blame in Reylz’s direction they have.  They’ve made it seem as though I threw away this Life of Riley that I was living in order to live like a street urchin with Reylz.  They make it seem as though I am under some spell.  They only say negative things about him and refuse to acknowledge any of the positive things that I’ve fallen in love with. Shit, I haven’t even been able to share what it is about him that I love so much.

My mom was the one who first brought up “this boyfriend” that I had to Dr. Joe.  She of course painted the history of our relationship as antagonistically as she possibly could.  After hearing her out, the Doc asked me point-blank “why is it that you need a boyfriend at this stage in your life?”.  My only answer was that I loved him and he loved me and we each filled a void in each other’s lives.  Everyone humphed at that.  Every session after that, whenever my relationship with Reylz was brought up, it was to let me know that this relationship was inevitably going to end and that it wasn’t meant to be.

Not only are my parents and my therapist against my relationship with Reylz, but other members of my family feel compelled to tell me their unfounded opinions of him.  My godmother gave me a ride a few weeks ago and spent the entire time telling me what a loser Reylz is, and detailed dozens of reasons why she was right.  The next day her daughter my cousin texted me asking to get together to chat.  I responded with “if all you’re going to do is tell me to leave Reylz, I don’t have the time”.  This started a barrage of texts from her telling me what a loser he is and why do I insist on keeping company with scum like him and I can do better…yadda yadda yadda…

I get it.  Believe me, I get it.  The thing is, none of these people have ever actually met Reylz face-to-face.  No one has bothered to get to know him and what he’s all about.  They’ve taken what’s on the surface, the cover of the book so to speak, and judged.  They see nothing more than a bald-headed tagger with no job or home.  Period.  To these people, that’s all he is and all he  possibly can be.  They don’t care to see why I fell for him.  They don’t see the tremendously talented artist.  They don’t see the loving devoted father he can be.  They don’t see the man who’s trying to turn me from a pigpen to a neat-freak.

I find it so insulting and hurtful that the love I have in my life is basically shit on by those I love.  Just because Reylz isn’t a millionaire no one will give him a chance.  I know and I agree that his not having a job right now is a big strike against him.  And even though money isn’t everything I know that in reality it is.  But you take that one little character flaw away and there’s still an amazing person standing there.  It hurts so much that people don’t love me in such a way that instead of being so negative, they take my word that he’s worthy of my love and get to know him before forming an opinion about him.

Like I said even my therapist was against the relationship from the get-go.  But a couple weeks ago, after asking me some questions about my relationship with Reylz, I finally got him to say “Hmmm…maybe he is the right one for you.”  My perseverance is beginning to win, methinks…

 

A bright day out of darkness that gives me new hope…

So I’m sitting in the backyard with Reylz; he’s painting and I’m, well, obviously I’m writing.  Today’s been another great day but yesterday, man…yesterday was simply the best day I’ve had, even with everything looming over my head in this moment of my life.  For the first time since coming to the unnerving reality that we may have to part ways til we have our own place, I felt like I was going to be alright because in fact he does love me and will miss me and long for me and will still see me as much as possible because he too can’t bear to be apart from me.  I won’t fall to pieces because he’s not going anywhere.

So we got up early, around 830, and started getting ready for the day that lie ahead of us.  He just wanted to get out of the house because he’s been so cooped up without a car, we both have.  And we didn’t want to make a nuisance of ourselves at home, so Reylz made us some huevos con soy-riso and hash browns and we headed off with destinations unknown.  We jumped on the first bus that passed us and headed towards the El Monte Station.  We then hopped onto the Silver Streak and got off at Cal State LA.

This whole day so far Reylz has been uncharacteristically indulgent with his affection towards me.  He holds my hand and pulls me in close to whisper in my ear how much he loves me then he leans in to seal it with a soft but powerful kiss.  I in return just shut up and quit begging for attention and just let him lavish me with it.  Today when I gazed longingly at him he wasn’t telling me to stop; he was looking longingly back at me.  This wasn’t a man who didn’t genuinely love and care for me.

Well, our sudden outburst of PDA came to a bit of a pause as we trekked our way across the Cal State LA campus towards Valley.  So far Chris was our guide, but where we were going he hadn’t decided.  We got off near Chinatown and headed towards Union Station.  Along the way we had sandwiches and pretzels and held hands and stole amorous tender smooches here and there.  It was decided we would take the subway to Hollywood so we could window shop at some spray paint store.  I wasn’t exactly jumping for joy about this part of the adventure but it thrilled him so that made it worth it for me.

So we hop on the Metro Red Line headed towards Hollywood.  We sat tucked into a quiet corner of the car and he insisted I rest my head on his shoulder and snooze until we reached our destination.  Of  course we missed our exit, but we didn’t care.  We stopped at a Ralph’s to get something to quench our thirst and found these soda-can size cans of Budweiser Straw-BEER-ita on sale for $099 so we got some cans and began walking back towards what was supposed to be our destination as we sipped.  We stopped at a little farmers market set up on the sidewalk and fed each other samples of juicy sweet peaches.  They were so delicious I had to bring some home.

We scoured a six block radius of Hollywood Blvd. looking for the Ironlak store.  We’d only read the directions up to where to exit the bus before both our cell phones died so we couldn’t look up a number or address.  I knew he was disappointed, but you couldn’t tell by the look on his face.  He simply kept whispering “Creep” and kissing me somewhere on my face.  Did I want to go to Griffith Park?  What did I want to do?  As long as the adventure didn’t end.

We planned a route home from where we were and hopped on the 181 headed towards Pasadena.  There wasn’t any room for us to sit next to each other so instead we sat across from each other.  We caught each others’ eye and were caught in a wistful gaze when out of the corner of my eye I saw the huge IRONLAK  sign above a store front we must have passed at least three times.  As it always seems with Reylz, it was kismet.  We jumped off at the next stop and spent  the next forty-five minutes poring over the latest colors of spray paint out this season.  I loved listening to him  brainstorm out loud about which color he’d use to fill in and which one to outline and how many to make it pop and which shades and where…

I know it may not seem like anything remarkable or even remotely intriguing happened today.  It may seem like nothing more than an ordinary day in a mundane world.  But it was so much more.  Today Reyl assured me with actions that he does love me and has no intention of letting me get away.  He is trying to save what we have.  I feel secure, not like a piece of trash tossed carelessly into the garbage.