Dear Roger: Picking At The Edges Of A Wound

I survived the meeting the other day. It wasn't particularly fun, after all, I had to ride the bus all the way down to hell and gone to get there, and that is always and interesting symphony of smells and experiences, but I got there and then filled out all the paperwork. I then had to wade through a personality survey and a psyche profile that is a "one size fits all" piece of garbage that seeks to discover just how twitchy I am at this point in the game. I was pretty blunt about things. There is really no point about trying to hide or blow smoke up anyones ass about how I feel about my life at this point, so I got all that done and I am sure they will find it pretty interesting. Not having a relationship with your parents and being pretty open about telling them you only live for your kids, is like a "BAM" this person has ISSUES kinda indicator.

I had to talk to the psychologist next. Its her job to assess if I have healed well enough from my PTSD to be able to enroll in an educational or job training program and get on with my life. Its a program with will help me get a bit of a nudge into getting a decent job as well, but I have to jump through all these hoops and some of them are a real pain in the ass. This was the worst of them. She asked me about pretty much everything guaranteed to get a rise out of me. The only thing that really got a dramatic reaction though, was when she asked about you. I still cant talk about you. I can talk about my ex and all the shit he did to me, and I can even joke about it with a sort of gallows humor. I can talk about my parents and all the crap I went through with them. I can talk about the death of G to some extent and keep it together. I was even able to talk about Robert and grandma and grandpa, but then she asked about what I did to vent or relieve stress and I said I write this mess here, and she started asking about you and I lost it. I am so tough and hard core about most things. I dont hardly cry over anything anymore, but when she started flicking at the edges of losing you and I remembered that day and that damned phone call, I couldn't breathe. She said I need grief counseling in a very serious way. Haha! Yeah, maybe about what? 16 years ago now? Its just my pain to bear. I mourn all of you and sometimes I think that is my lot in life, to be the one who remembers and mourns for you and all the ones who are gone. It seems like everyone else has forgotten.

I got through the rest of it. It was like having your guts ripped out and dumped on the floor and poked through, and then when they were done they just tell you, "Okay! we will tell you in a few weeks how twitchy you are." I stayed home yesterday and put myself back together and just did some writing and thinking. It was no surprise my back hurt, I was so damn tense all day that it was hard to relax to sleep. I must have looked pretty pissed off and stressed on the bus, no one messed with me or sat next to me and it was crowded!

Another good thing about living in Portland, I get to wear all the black I want and no one gives me a sideways glance over it. If we get to move to where I want to move to this summer, we will fit right in. The SE area is pretty funky and interesting and its where I had wanted to be in the first place. I am looking at apartments down there and if all goes well, we will hopefully find a place we can afford that is on the bus line and a good fit for us.

Dear Roger: Ignore The Blood On The Floor, Ill Be Okay

I have an appointment today that I would much rather not keep, but since the wonderful state of Arizona managed to lose all the supporting records for my umm ahem...history? regarding my issues with knives, razors, large men holding me by the throat, crowds, my tendency to react violently when Im approached in what I perceive to be an aggressive manner by a man, my insomnia and my other fun little glitches, I have to go and meet with a person who will evaluate how well or(not) I have been doing at getting over these issues. They are also going to evaluate my suitability for various career fields. How they do this is by making me dredge up all the fun things that made me the fun person I am today. I get to relive all the wonderful experiences that I had over my life for this person, discuss with them how or how they dont affect me any longer and then I get to walk out of that office, get back on a bus and come home and try to shove all that stuff back into the storage locker in my head that I had it locked in so carefully. It promises to be a fun day.

I sat up quite late last night debating how to even get to the office. Should I take the bus or the train? Should I leave early? Should I take the route that has the most walking? What if I am late? I dont have enough money for the later fare on the train if it runs past 6 hours. I just wish I could blow it off, but if I want to get into a different schooling program, I have to cooperate. I did not sleep well last night, so I am pretty jangled this morning. I have chewed my nails to the nubs and the sides of my fingers are looking like I need to be sure to carry my guitar pick with me so I quit worrying them to death. The kids know I am tense and they are just letting me be this morning so I can stew and think about things. I charged my ipod last night, dug out my 100 Monkeys hoodie,(my erstwhile security blanket) and I have changed clothes 3 times. I dont like talking about some things. I am pretty open about most of it, but these people have a way of getting under my skin and making me admit things that are hard to admit. Its weird for a former cop to admit that they wanted to kill someone. Its weird to say those words and to know that you meant them. Discussing the "Feelings" about things are the worst. I have some far from much of that. I socialize, I talk to men, I enjoy their company in limited and controlled amounts, I get out and go visit different places, but I want to put the past behind me and keep moving forward , but meetings like this keep dragging me back into the morass that was misery and it is showing this morning.

Dear Roger: Why Yes, Yes That IS A Monkey In My Pocket

This will be the first Easter that I wont be cooking a family Easter dinner. My youngest sons are still in AZ with my ex, my eldest son is going to dinner after church services with his girlfriends family, and daughter and I will be staying home. Apparently the differences that have existed between Sus and myself have finally become to much to bear and what started off as a miscommunication has more than likely put an end to our tenuous hold on friendship.

She had invited daughter to the churches Easter Egg hunt on Monday. In fact, son and daughter had gone over to her house and had helped to dye eggs for the hunt. We had met up again on Wednesday when we went to the grocery store together, and we had firmed up plans even more, as well as the fact she had sent me a couple of text messages letting me know it was a go, so I did not see the need to check in daily to make sure it was all still as we had discussed. I had figured if anything changed, she would let me know. My daughter was expecting to go, she was excited and we all got up, got showered early, and I even did her hair up pretty so she would look extra nice. I was planning on going with, and I sent Sus a text at 0830 let her know we were ready. We got no response. At 0930, when it was too late to attend the egg hunt up at the local elementary school, I sent a message to Sus, asking if we were still going or if things had changed. Asking that she please let us know so that we did not spend our entire day sitting around waiting. It was a rare sunshiney day and there was no way in hell I was spending it stuck inside. Sus called me back and she said that her husband had told her that if we were planning on going then we should have called and confirmed?! What the fuck? Since when does someones husband get in the middle of an A&B conversation? Then she tried to claim that the only time I call is when I want daughter taken somewhere! That is soo not true! She takes my daughter to church. I have called to invite her to lunch or to other places, but she doesn't get up until HOURS after I do. I am out the door and down the street before she even gets out of bed. I have called to invite her out, but she doesn't like to go the same places I go, and other times she has been up her husbands butt or doing stuff at the church or with her parents or something like that. We lead two pretty different lives. But what really got to me was how often when I am with her, she is on the phone or she gets into long, involved, phone conversations with people. We aren't hanging out with each other, we are just keeping each other from being alone and thats dysfunctional. It also really hurt my feelings that her son has never once spent the night at my house. He wanted to last night my son told me, but she told him no, as if we aren't good enough. I have raised a good kid. He has had to to without a lot of the things that her son has had, and he is still doing good in all his classes, still participating in sports, hasn't been detention, hasn't been in serious trouble. I dont treat my son like an inmate, I trust him to make informed decisions about what he watches on tv or the computer and I know hes not some kind of deviant.

So after we exchanged rather heated words over the phone this morning, I had to deal with my 7 year old in tears because not only did she miss her churches Easter egg hunt, she also got screwed out of the one up at the school. I had a long heart to heart talk with her and we reached a couple of decisions. She is no longer going to burden them with her presence by needing a ride to their church because after we are going to finally find the Methodist church we have been looking for. We aren't going to take a step back and look at making some new friends. We know we can do it, after all, we have already found a few that think like us and have some of the same beliefs. We believe in,"Live and let love" and we like different people and cultures, and we think the boys that walk by holding hands are cute and okay, not,"Gross or disgusting". There are lots of music fans around, who dont mind tattoos and or who think looking and acting different is just fine. Im still a punk at heart, and I may send my kids to church, but I have issues with faith for myself that I really dont want to get into with a minister that I dont like, or in a church where I dont fit in because while I may be over-educated, I am waay the hell poorer than 3/4 of the membership, but I still consider myself to be a better citizen because I am not suborning breaking of laws or supporting of those who continue to flaunt the law with the indulgence of the ministry that on one hand begs nickels and dimes from children before they are allowed to participate in church activities, yet has a better sound system for its band than many professional rock bands. We will be seeking a humble church that remembers the message and the roots from whence it came, and I will seek my friends there.

We made some new friends in the park today, which is where we ended up after I got lil girl to stop crying. We walked down to the nearest ice cream place and I bought her a cone. We walked over to the park and she ate her cone while I played lizard on one of the benches out in the sun. When she finished her cone, she started running around and she encountered one of her friends from school. They had a good time on the swing while the mom and I chatted for a bit and it turns out we have a lot in common. Both of us have dealt with a bad ex and domestic violence, kids that have had a hard time adjusting to all the trauma, and we have had to deal with the whole shame and self doubt of even trying to start our lives over. We ended up exchanging phone numbers and planning on talking more. So maybe today happened for a reason.

Daughter and I walked on down to Kmart and of course I ended up carrying her goofy monkey,"Jackson". I dont even really question it anymore when she grabs it up before we leave to go somewhere, I just tell her to be sure to not lose it because I am not hunting over hell and half of Portland for him if she lost him,(though we all know I damn sure would), in a heart beat. I always end up stuck with him hanging out of my back pocket, getting the funny looks from people as we wander up the sidewalk, as if people aren't quite sharp enough to figure out that the monkey belongs to the lil blonde kid that is dancing up the sidewalk in front of me like she doesn't have a care in the world.

Dear Roger: Im Old And The World Is Getting Smaller

Well, I survived my birthday, but just barely. I decided to celebrate by going to the gym with my bestie, Chels, and of course I overdid the hell out of it. I put on my ipod and got on a machine an elliptical machine, its like a combination of cross country skiing and snow shoeing. You can set it so that it has different tensions and makes you work your ass off. I was feeling a bit cocky so I let it go on 'Work your ass off" setting, turned my Ipod to my most raucous 100 Monkeys mix and I hit it hard. I am pretty proud of the fact I lasted 20 minutes on that torture device without having a heart attack. It has a monitor that keeps track of your heart rate and when mine hit 174 I figured it was time to get my goofy ass of the thing and take a break. I made it through the end of "Orson Brawl" by sheer cussededness, but I had jelly legs getting off of it.

I stood there, leaning against the machine, trying to look cool, but the fact of the matter was, if I had tried to walk away from it, I would have ended up face down on the floor. It took me a little bit to get so I could walk around without my knees buckling, but once they got back to normal, I hit the weights and worked my arms and abs until I was good and exhausted. I worked my glutes and such as well and I was glad to see I can still push 140 with my legs, but I would only press 75 more than 5 times. I have really lost my upper body strength, and it was mainly due to the lack of stability in my dang left shoulder. I am going to get some tension bands for the house and start working out at the house as well so maybe I can get that better, but I was able to to some pull ups, so I am not a total marshmallow, except in my former color, before I went into the tanning booth, for too long.

I discovered the hard way that I am what was "Pale" and that I should have only spent about 2-3 minutes in the booth. 8 minutes for my first time was not wise at all. Lobster is not a good look and burning your butt as well as your boobs really kinda stinks. I learned my lesson though and will be more careful the next time. I saw a real improvement on my skin though, so I will be going back.

It was a great birthday though. Chels got me a dvd player and the Harry Potter dvd! I was tickled to death. I hadnt expected to get anything from any one so that was quite a happy surprise. Its nice to have a friend that gets me and I enjoy hanging out with her.

I got a message from a friend back home the other day and it reminded me that its a small world and the threads that tie us all together sometimes cross and interwind, creating new and powerful connections that change things for the better. The stories that were shared made even more of a difference when I shared them with my son. As I read the letter I had gotten about a miracle that had happened, he was reminded that powerful things are afoot. He added a few extra people to his prayers last night and that was interesting to hear, because for a boy with a world of problems of his own, he takes on the fears and worries of others and prays for them to be lessened. He is a big brother too and knows that nothing is worse that the thought of something happening to his baby sister, even though she may drive him crazy by stealing his guitar and loosening the strings on the ukulele just to mess with him.

I had to give up coffee and I am not doing so well without it. But a heart rate of a hummingbird on speed is not conducive to a good life, so I guess I have to listen to the doctor for now.

Dear Roger: Reflections

So I wake up this morning legally another year older. I have kinda adopted another day as my unofficial birthday because honestly, April 19th is just a day fraught with too many bad memories. I remember most vividly 1995, seeing the picture of Firefighter Fields carrying young Baylee Almon out of the wreckage of the Murrah building in Oklahoma City when my own child was just 4 months old, and I remember hugging him close and vowing that I would never take him for granted. I say a prayer for the 168 lost that day, at the start of every morning on my birthday, the 18 other children that were in that daycare and all those innocent people that were just trying to do their jobs. I was a firefighter back then and it left such a mark on my soul.

I remember the stand off in Waco and all those people burning. Its just not a day of really happy memories so I changed the day I celebrate to July 28, that the day we, as a small family, started living again, so we will celebrate then.

Daughter is insisting I do something today though because she is small and unwilling to allow me to wallow in any form of maudlin misery on what she considers a day to party. I will indulge her somewhat, by maybe picking up a small cake and letting her blow out some candles for me.

I went to the doctor yesterday and she was not overly concerned about my eye twitch, but she was concerned about my heart rate. I seem to have a resting heart rate of a hummingbird. I find that a bit worrisome considering I am in pretty damn good shape. I walk constantly and I dont just trudge, I haul ass. My legs are toned, and I am underweight for my height, so its the stress that jacking me up. Her strict order was for me to quit coffee. I am not happy! I am also supposed to cut back on all other caffeine, which really isn't hard considering I dont drink that much stuff with caffeine in it, but that was quite a blow to me. I had quit for a month as an experiment and it was miserable. I missed it and even dreamed about drinking it,but now to be told I have to quit it? Gah! I am doing this whole diet and exercise program for a month and then I go back to see if things have slowed down and little, if they have, then we know thats the problem if they haven't, then they are going to look at drugs. I dont want to use any medications, because once you start on them, then you end up stuck on them, plus things that mess around with the heart just freak me out, especially after what happened to you. Im going to be a good doobie, do my exercises, drink my pissy tasting hippy tea and try to mellow the hell out and hopefully get this shit dialed back in before things explode, but I think once I have my boys back with me and my ex vanishes out of our lives, things will slow down.

No birthday cards for me. Didnt really expect any from any family back home, but still. Someday those wounds are gonna have to heal I guess. I miss getting a card from grandma and you. I would hang it on my fridge and it would make me laugh for a few months. My sis will probably call and make fun of me sometime today, I am expecting nothing less from her. Daughter drew me a nice one with monkeys all over it, it was quite cute.

Its another year older, and I just think about all the people I miss. I think thats a true sign of getting older.

Dear Roger: As If Things Couldn't Get Any Stranger

Rog, I think I'm "mature". When the hell did that happen? Maybe there is another name for what I am? I mean, I still do all kinds of stuff that could be described as,'Immature", because I will stick my tongue out at folks, flip the bird, make weird faces, dance inappropriately, and I made some really bad choices in all kinds of things. I wear my jeans too tight,I like to jump in puddles on occasion and do all kinds of other stuff that could be described as 'Immature", but I did something last night that I never thought I would do! I had a conversation with my sons girlfriend. I was kind. I didn't go off on her for daring to try to corrupt my darling little boy,(snort), noo...when she texted me first, I responded politely. When she seemed to need someone to talk to, I did. I was kind and I reached out to let her know that I really had nothing against her other than she was my baby boys girlfriend, and that kinda freaks me out because I have goals for him that having a girlfriend put at risk. We talked about all that. She seems like a really sweet girl. I think I could like her. She is very pretty,(a model, no less), so he could do worse, but her family situation is tough and that concerns me quite a bit. I know he is not going to be happy with me for talking to her, but she seemed to need an ear last night, so I was it.I even invited her to go to the 100 Monkeys concert with us, which I know will probably freak son out because he doesn't want his girlfriend anywhere near those boys, but he will just have to deal.

I dont know if thats the mom thing or what, but I worry about kids and their happiness. Its like the young fella that my baby girl loves soo much. Yeah, she loves him much, but she is 7 and that aint happening, ever. She is going to go to college and have a career and a life and marry a good boy from a good, old, Texas family and she will run things like my granny did. There were pictures of that boy out with a girl from sometime over the weekend, and the girl he was with was soo cute, and they made such a cute couple! My first thoughts were, "Oh HOW SWEET! Now get married you scamp and have lots of pretty lil babies,(a good portion of which I hope are daughters so you get a bunch of grey hairs in payback for all the ones you have caused all the parents of daughters), the sooner the better! But it was shocking how many of the nutballs on twitter and such were pissed off. Jeesh, its kinda scary how weird some folks are nowadays about that, especially the girls. I would lock my daughters in a convent if they said 1/10th of 1% of the stuff that I hear or see some of the weirdos out there saying. I show that kinda stuff to my son. I want him to see exactly what kind of world he is wanting to get into when he claims he wants to get into acting or being a rock star. There is really no way in hell I want any of my kids to do that. The art or the writing and such is reasonable. You dont get quite the level of insanity unless you are a King or a Rowling, but still...wow! I would never have imagined saying the things that kids seem to feel its okay to say to people nowadays. Manners and decorum seem to be really lacking in the world in most places.

Son thinks I go a little over the top on manners and decorum sometimes, and maybe I do, but my family honor is important to me as well as appearances, so I will not have my son running around with his pants hanging off his ass, acting like he is some kind of hooligan with no home training. He is Southern and Texan and comes from a long line of Texans, not a bunch of jackasses with no more common sense than God gave a billy goat, so he knows that you hold the door for the elderly and you dont burp or fart in public or act a fool without pissing me right the hell off and causing an immediate cessation of whatever fun or trip was going on. We went to Target the other day to get some things and he needed some new shorts. I was gonna buy them for him, but he was being annoying and a bit disrespectful. The icing on the cake came when he farted, loudly and intentionally in the middle of the aisle in front of his sisters face. He knew he was bought and paid for before I even had to say anything. I just hung up the shorts, turned the cart to the front and paid for what we had and we left. He tried to claim it was an,"Accident", but im sorry, a 15 y/o with that poor of bowel control? I shoulda took his rotten young butt to the hospital right away! I was fit to be tied I was soo mad and embarrassed. He got in trouble for what he did and then he got in trouble for lying about it, so it was a tense night. He did apologize, but ill tell you what, if he didn't tower over me and I wouldn't have had to stand on my tippy toes to reach that ear of his, he would have got drug to the car by his ear. I am hoping that his girlfriend will be some assistance in helping him to remember his manners.He is a perfect gentleman around her, opening doors,serving her first, all kinds of things, so hopefully she has good home training too and can remind him that without that nowadays, you are just one of a herd.

Dear Roger: "Rattle and Hum" Has Turned Into "Wiggle and Smile"

Music has always been soo damn important to our lives, from the first song that I really remember hearing which was "Whiskey River" by Waylon and Willie, to the snippet of what I am sure is going to be a song I love called,"Time" by my favorite funky little band the 100 Monkeys, its been a part of my life that I wont do without because its as vital as air. I felt pure joy yesterday hearing that little snippet of that song, and it made me smile because I recognized the guitar chords as the music from the dvd that daughter got for Christmas. She came running out when she heard it playing and laughing said,"That song makes me want to smile and wiggle at the same time!" I had to agree with her, I felt the same way. Good music just has a way of doing that, making you want to smile and wiggle, so we did. We hopped up and danced crazily around the living room for the short amount of time that snippet of music played, laughing and enjoying the fact that we have made it. We are still hanging on. Nearly a year has gone by and we are still laughing and smiling and wiggling and our boys of summer are coming back with the sunshine. It was a happy day yesterday, in spite of the fact it rained all day and was a bit chilly. Music does that. It helps me to let go of all the fear and the stress and the worry for just a little bit. I forget that I never have enough money to take care of everything, that my knee is getting worse and the twitches and tremors now have a more ominous meaning possibly, I forget that my ex is screwing up and that has repercussions for me and my kids and all the others stresses and fears and things that make me rage leave. They just float away on the notes and I am free to just indulge in the notes and roll away on them.

My writing coming in fits and starts again. I have 3 chapters on paper for the sequel of the one story and I have written some more bits and pieces of a song that I am working on, so I just have to force myself to sit down and take all the notes I have scribbled in my notebooks and organize them into some semblance of coherency, and then maybe I will be able to do something with them. Typing them into my computer has become an issue because my ADD tendencies come out to play and I find myself wandering off into reading or talking to people or trying to do several different things while trying to write and then I lose my train of thought and it just gets distracting. I had 19 tabs open yesterday and I inadvertently discovered that is the tipping point for my computers sanity. It crashed on me last night and I had to spend a couple of hours defragging and cleaning out the cache as well as talking really sweetly to it. I have become quite the tech nerd and losing my computer would be quite a blow to me, so I try to treat it kindly, but like most things in my life, it suffers by proximity. Its already missing keys, and it has some wonky habits,(much like me), but it gets the job done most of the time.

My tattoo has finally, mostly, healed, or at least the monkeys butt has finally stopped itching. The flames seemed to have scarred as the roll up around the side of my wrist, but thats okay, it fits the whole theme of the tattoo.

I haven't been to the gym yet. Its not that I haven't wanted to, but with son gone to Idaho and the rain and all kinds of candy assed, whiny excuses, I just haven't gone yet. I plan to hit it every day this next week and develop a work out schedule like I had when I was 25 and see if I can get back to close to where I was back then. My knee is going to be the main problem with my work out plans, but I have a doctors appointment on my birthday to see about the eye twitch and tremor in my hand, so I will see what she wants to do about the knee. If she thinks its time to go ahead and replace it, its going to have to wait until after August, because there is no way in hell I am going to be on crutches at a concert. I have a brace that will get me through as well as pain drugs and what ever crap I need, but the whole, "No car" thing will be a real problem when I go ahead and get the knee done. I hope to get that whole issue handled before then.