Dear Roger: And So The Crazy Begins

The kids are off school for the next couple of weeks. Oh God. I know this is supposed to be a time filled with joy and celebration, but picture this if you will...4 kids,(though my eldest disappears with his buddies to work on their "Band" for hours), stuck in the house due to rain, cold or lack of willingness to wrangle all of them on the busy Portland sidewalks it the combination of the aforementioned. It should also be mentioned that my shoulder has decided to go out again. I had it rebuilt about 5 years ago and apparently that is the extent of the warranty on the rebuild. It has slipped out of socket on me several times over the past few days, leaving me feeling like cursing, crying and barfing while I try to slip it back into place, or a combination of all three, so trying to deal with recalcitrant kids who often reenact battle scenes from Fight Club in public,is not within my capability at the moment. The ex has been working long hours at his new meat selling job and while that is a blessing meaning that he is gone away from us for vast stretches of time, its also a bit of a pain for trying to get out and get anything done.
I know the inevitable will happen and I will have to brave the maddening crowds with them sometime in order to keep them from getting cabin fever and doing horrible things to each other more than they have already done. We are hardly into the first full day and already I have two boys with painted fingernails and one who woke up with a drawn on mustache and unibrow. Daughter has spent most of the day racing around the house in her panties with a blanket tied to her wrists and ankles proclaiming herself to be a,'Sugarglider".
She made her brothers dress up as a raccoon and a dog, and directed them in a play that involved the,'Raccoon" knocking over a trash can and the,'Dog" chasing it, and that was all well and good until Spencer, our real dog, got freaked out and decided to get involved in the chasing and offered to bite the,'Raccoon" on the butt.Spencer went to puppy time-out and the play was revised.
The eldest came home long enough to eat 6 slightly burned waffles coated in half a bottle of syrup, shower, drop off his dirty clothes, collect his guitar, argue with me and leave again. I cant say I blame him, I kind of wish I could trade places with him. Especially after daughter comes up to me and said,"Remember that chili ed made me eat yesterday?" yeah...I did after she giggled and walked away. Girls are every bit as gross as boys. As I write this, she is out burping her brothers in a root beer burp contest.She tells me that she wants to spend the next couple of weeks,'Being feral." I asked her, "What if we have company?" She scoffed at me, "Nobody ever comes over to our house. Im not worried. We dont have any family around and the boys are always trying to make me smell their arm pits, so I think I should try to go stinky as payback." Seriously...can I trade places with the older one?

Dear Roger: Things I Cant Give Her

Christmas approaches and while it promises to be better this year, its also a bit stranger. I have struggled with what to get my kids, not just because money is a bit of an issue, hell...Im used to that, but because they seem to not really need anything. I work really hard to provide for them, and they have pretty much what they need in the way of things. We keep our lives pretty simple and they aren't the type of kids to really demand the latest shiny electronic toy or geegaw,(well, the eldest is, but then again, he has most of that, that he is allowed to bring into the house),and the other things, like video games and fancy flat screened tv's, he knows are just things that aren't really that important.
I have debated and tried to figure out what would be special to each child, and while daughter is the easiest,(art, music, monkeys and Rathbone related), she is also the most difficult because I want to get her something she will love because she is also the only kid who hasn't hit me with a list on a daily basis. She did mention a hula hoop, once, but she hasn't begged or nagged or pointed at everything in every store or ad.Its like she has faith that she will be taken care of and she just keeps on keeping on. She was tickled to death to bring home the present she had made for ME from school to put under the tree and she wanted to make sure that Spencer and the cats all had something to put under it as well. She enjoys doing for others and she wants to be involved in either making or getting stuff for her brothers and shes been making up and singing Christmas songs all week.
Her brothers are kinda the opposite, they are on overload and its like Christmas was soo sparse for them last year that they just want anything this year so they are asking for everything in the hopes they will get something. Apparently he got them each a coloring book each and then they got some clothes that didn't fit from a charity. The money I sent them was spent on candy and food, so apparently it was a pretty crappy Christmas for them. I have already made sure it wont be like that for them this year, but I can tell that they are worried. They got given critter head beanies already and Stubby has not taken his raccoon one off yet. I dont know if its because hes happy to have such a cool present, or he just loves it, but when he got a fishing pole from another friend yesterday, he slept with it next to him last night.
Stevie has faith. I think that is the difference. She knows that no matter what it will all work out and what is meant to be will be. She is very happy with very little, because she knows that there are others who have had to make do with a lot less than she has gotten, she has seen them in her own family and she wants them to realize that this year things will be different, even if they dont get the whole world, they got a new one and it is getting better.
Im going to get her a keyboard of some sort or another, it may not be the best, it may not be brand new, but it will be new to her and I know she will love it because that is just how she is, and she will use it to make music that will make me laugh and that will be my present. Talk about a gift that keeps on giving.

Dear Roger:Cast That First Stone, I DARE You.

So of course there had to be some drama for my sons birthday,we are no longer allowed to enjoy a simple day to ourselves as a family, with family related things going on, no, for the past two birthdays we have had to deal with the black cloud of a pseudo girlfriend and her family of dysfunction.
I really don't have too much of a problem with girlfriend, she is a product of how she was raised, but she is a manipulative little thing that seems to be able to make my son dance like a trained monkey on a leash like no one else. The couple of weeks he had broken up with her were like the good ole days, he was a happy guy again and a joy to be around, and we all knew the minute she pulled the,"I cant live without you" bullshit she used to get him back because he looked like the weight of the world was back around his neck. The only bright side? I am pretty sure he is starting to break away from her by hanging out with another girl from his school is a dancer,(no, not a titty dancer though even that would be an improvement, a Ballerina), so that's an interesting wrinkle in the situation.
On sons birthday, I was informed that girlfriend was going to bring him a cake and that she was going to be joining us for dinner.I learned after last year to not put much weight into such declarations and I went on about my business of preparing for dinner, keeping my comments to myself, though I made it quite clear, I was NOT going to drive him to Vancouver so he could see her. He assured me that she was coming to our house and I should be ready for an extra at dinner, suuuuure.
I went running around with a friend of mine for a little while and did some shopping for some things and then I arrived home to find son in a particularly foul mood. He informed me that his girlfriend was NOT going to be coming for dinner,(no, really? Wow, I'm shocked), she had texted him and told him that her father was not going to bring her because I am a,"Damned Sinner" and he doesn't trust me around her.
Whoa...say what? Does he think I am going to sacrifice her for a virgin or something because considering he has 2 other kids who both had kids out of wedlock before they were even 17, I'm willing to bet that ship has probably already sailed. (Catty, I know, but let me give you some backstory on this crew), and then we will talk some more.
This guy...he considers me a,'Damned Sinner" because I support gay rights. I don't go to church and I have issues with my faith. I am very open and honest about that.I have been though a lot and I have my doubts about a lot of things, but I don't force my issues on my kids and I send them to church. One of his relatives found out about what I write,(that was a really fun day), and they confronted my SON about it IN CHURCH. My kids didn't know about what I wrote until then, thanks to them, everybody knows now. Nothing like being outed as a writer of Gay erotica and other things to your teen son in front of his friends in church. I wasn't even there and that's probably a good thing because I would have gone to jail. These are the same people who told my little girl that I was going to go to hell along with her favorite boy and his band,(have no idea what the hell they did to set them off), and most of the things and people she holds dear. The only thing that kept me from going over to this guys house and kicking him in the dick is the fact I don't have a car and he lives in Vancouver with the kids of his that haven't attempted suicide recently or who aren't currently locked up.
Last night, I actually saw my son finally reach his limit with the crazy. He made other plans with other people after they stood him up,(again at the last minute because I am a sinner), and right as he was getting ready to walk out the door, his girlfriend texted and asked if he was able to leave to go with them and his response back was,"NO, Im busy being a sinner too."
Can you tell I am a bit pissed off? I didn't choose the church my kids go to. I never intended them to continue at this church for a long time, I wanted them to maybe for a year, get a good feel for the doctrine and then move to another church and see how it was different, but then son got tangled up with the crazycrew and its been all downhill from there. Another good thing about the move for me and my daughter will be the fact that she will have to change churches. Shes a child of faith, and she can flat throw down a prayer like no ones business, but I really don't like the social makeup of the church she is attending. They are all about the financials and a lot less about service to others and compassion. She is a compassionate child and my son used to be. We don't have the same social beliefs as the church they are attending now, and we damn sure don't have the hypocritical attitude.
He didn't go hang out with her today either, and I have my hopes that he has finally seen the light, but I am not going to hold my breath, this "Damned Sinner" has learned that the boy doesn't seem to think too clearly when it comes to women, though I am really rooting for the dancer, shes the one who made him the snow globe and asked him to the Winter Formal and who has told him to, "get over himself" more than once. Gotta respect a little chick that and shes a local so I would at east be able to keep an eye on things.

Dear Roger:Werewolf Birthdays

My son turn 16 today. I think this is the saddest I have been on one of my kids birthdays ever. Raising a boy has to be one of the most maddening, frustrating, heart breaking and difficult undertakings you can attempt.

I tried hard to be a good mom. I talked, listened, stayed involved, gave lots of hugs, supported, and made sure he had the things he needed to fit in or to be himself, whichever he was wanting to do at the moment. I always made sure than when he went to school, no one knew he was a poor kid. I indulged his weird haircuts, his odd tastes in music and when I could I took him to see his black cloud of a psuedo girlfriend. I cleaned up after him and over-indulged him as any Texas mother is prone to do her first born son. He has constantly been told how,"Smart, talented, handsome" and what not he is, and hes got a bit of an ego. Ive heard from his best buddy he can be a bit of an ass at times to be around, and honestly, ive seen it. Hes got a snarky, sarcastic temper and hes a perfectionist who expects everyone around him to be up to his standards.

I love my son with all my heart. For his whole life hes done without the key thing that helps a boy turn into a civilized male, a civilized male role model. He has no father. His biological is a sociopathic bastard who offered to kill us both many times over if we ever bothered him, convincingly enough that the state investigators determined that he was a credible threat and that we should probably stay far away from him.( I really know how to pick men)But now that my son is of age and wanting to go into acting and such, he wants to meet his father and ask him,"Why?" partly to find that out, and partly because his father was a small time actor amongst other things who still has family out in Santa Monica and I guess he thinks he might get in their good graces.

When my ex showed up out here, he greeted him with open arms and they have developed a camaraderie. I dont really know what to think about that. I know that they have talked, in depth, several times about what happened, and I know that my ex has apologized to him but I dont know, I guess I just cant forgive as easy and my ex knows that. We actually talked about that last night when my son left for a little while. It cleared the air about a lot of things. My ex said that boys reach a point where they just become creatures that are really unpleasant to be around,(like werewolves)and that without focus or direction and strict regimentation like a military school, they often get into trouble. He told me that the next two years are going to be the toughest. I remember my 16-17 year old years and I still don't really know how I survived them and I wasn't in a big city filled with all kinds of trouble to get into. My son has been pushing me away lately, not wanting to talk to me, looking at me scornfully and accusing me of favoritism towards my daughter. Thats not true. I love all my kids equally, but differently and i tried to explain that to him. With him, for years it was just me and him, struggling with only each other for company, he was my peanut and my world. I gave up everything for him and I stopped being selfish. I stopped living just for me. With Sticky, my protective love emerged. I watched him struggle to live and then struggle to achieve and I helped him every step of the way and I live for his smiles and his hugs. Stubby is my middle child, the one who thinks he is the extra, but he is the child who is most like me and that is both something I love about him and fear for him. I see every personality trait I have ever worried about in me, living in my son and I hug him daily in the hopes that he will realize that he is loved well beyond what he imagines. Stevie, my daughter? The one son accused me of favoring...we nearly died together. She was born sick, she struggled to live and nearly didn't. Her father never came to the hospital to see us in those entire 10 days she struggled to live. When I brought her home, I was told that she was my problem. I spent months sleeping with her in my arms. She is my smiley child. Even though all the horrors, she would try to make me smile. When I was soo sick with H1n1, she would bring me drinks and sit and sing to me and keep me company. She always greets me with a smile and a hug, and no matter how crappy my day has been, she knows how to make it better and she will harass me until she makes me laugh or smile. How can you not love that?

I'm not really explaining very well that I love all my kids equally, but I do. When Chance is late getting home I am uneasy and worried, not because I want to control his life , but because I want to know hes safe. he thinks its because im a control freak at this point. The ex tells me that I wont win. He said I could present the boy with a brand new truck for his birthday,(wouldn't do that even if I could because that's just ridiculous over indulgence), and he would still find a reason to be pissed at me. I was going to give him the electric guitar, but I don't think I will now. I'm going to wait for Christmas, maybe by then he will be talking to me? I don't know. Everyone says boys are supposed to be easier, but I don't believe it. They are like having a werewolf with rabies and and an eating disorder living in your house. The do dangerous and ridiculous things and wonder why they have road rash on their skull and ass, and scorch marks on their jeans. I've spent some time looking at military academies and wondering if i dart him like a rogue grizzly, would they accept him for shipping if he were duct taped to the seat?

Dear Roger:Love You Long Time

http://youtu.be/Mia9jYTDtFI

My daughter. Good Lord that child. I often say that she is the greater beings sense of humor at work because there is no way a train wreck of a woman like me should have such a girly girl as a child. She has butt length curly blonde hair that she expects me to help her style when my idea of style is a pony tail stuffed under a ball cap. We got into an argument last night because she wanted me to paint her finger nails and toe nails, and I told her I didn't want her to do that because she is too young and because I am terrible at doing that, I mean seriously, it looks like a blind man with the tremors got ahold of house paint when I attempt it, but she wore me down and I let her do it.

She loves young Jackson Rathbone. I think we've talked about that before quite a bit, and I don't really deter her. She needs a decent male role model and she could do worse than him.

She celebrates his birthday pretty much the entire month of December and draws him cards and such. Last year I had to hike my ass to the post office to mail his card in the rain after she found it laying on my desk where I had stashed it thinking it would just go to some mailing center and be discarded anyway. I wont make that mistake ever again. She wanted to sing a song for him this year and after she worked on it for over a week with much drama and stress, she finally got something she was happy with and we got it recorded and I sent it off into the internet ether a little early thinking it would bounce from place to place and maybe get seen someday. Yeah...im a dumbass. Not only did he see it, he tweeted it out and thanked her for it setting off an avalanche of emails and tweets and comments and HOLY COW ! in my life. She was tickled to death he had actually seen it and that he knew she was thinking of him.

Shes a good hearted kid, and that was her whole motivation, to let him know she was wishing him a happy birthday. She prays for him every night and defends him from teasing by her brothers and others.

Her father wasn't pleased by all the attention, but then his gripe was,'She never does that kind of stuff for my birthday." yeah...well...I wont go into the reasons why, they are all public record, but she doesn't even know when his birthday is and I don't think she cares.

She adores a decent enough boy and I am happy to let it be. I remember when I was just a little bit older than her, standing in front of a stage I was barely tall enough to see over, watching a young man sing and strut around, my heart racing as I screamed my tweeny lungs out. I adored him and I had all his records and posters and concert t-shirts. He was pretty obscure and I got teased pretty hard for liking him as well, but 30 years later, the opening chords of one of his songs still brings the biggest grin to my face and news of a revival tour of the states has me contemplating going to L.A. for the first time in over a decade, just to see him. I get it, I really, really do.

Dear Roger: As If Life Wasn't Interesting Enough

So yesterday I was telling you about daughters little video that I sent off to her favorite fella? yeeaah...I didn't think anything of it, he is busier than a one legged man in an ass kicking contest and he has soo many people vying for his attention that I didn't even dare to think that her little video was even going to cross his radar, so I was going about my business yesterday morning, sitting around being lazy, drinking my coffee and reading a, uh ahem...story? when my Iphone tells me a priority tweet hit. I picked it up off the coffee table thinking it was either my bestie Chels wanting to know if I wanted to go for coffee or the band boys talking about all the excitement over in England. Oh yeah, it was one of the band boys all right, THE band boy daughter thinks hung the moon and lit the stars. Not only did he see her video, what I was looking at was his tweet of the link to it with a description of it as the "Best Birthday Gift Ever" and thanking her for it. I dropped my damn Iphone in shock, thank God for good cases and soft carpet.

I may have shrieked...I dont know, but Spencer jumped, the cats fled the room and then things really got crazy. My twitter feed went nuts, my email started blowing up and I just was standing there with my teeth in my head for a few minutes before my Texan kicked in and I remembered my manners. I typed in a polite,'Thank you " to the young man and sent it off and then realized I had to tell someone in RL other than the dog how awesome this was because I just knew my daughter was going to lose her ever loving mind when she got home from school. I watched for a bit as the numbers on her video started climbing and I was dumbfounded, good Lord...My little girl has sand like none of us has ever had. I would have never had the guts to do that, I am still freaked out that I helped her with it, but she was very sure about what she wanted to do and how she wanted to do it, I was worried though that she would be freaked out that soo many people had seen it, so just a little bit of dread hit for a bit.

I called up my sis and talked to her and she was more reassuring and convinced that God had played a real joke on me by giving me Stevie as a daughter,(girly girl), when I flounder on the best of days to not shave my head in frustration and and am more prone to jump into a brawl than some men. Stevie makes me try harder to be civilized and that, I think, is good, but I hope I am not failing her.

I got all kinds of emails and tweets and facebook comments in support and love for her little video and I was busy all day saving them up for her, but the main one, the one from him, I marked that as a favorite and set it aside so she could see it when she got home first thing.

I watched for her bus and Shortround got home first. I told him and he was excited and happy for her. I swear, if his mom cant keep it together, I am going to adopt him. Hes a great kid and hes good for my son, making him spend less time texting his black cloud of a psuedo girlfriend, and more time actually going out and doing things. The way he invades my sons personal space and forces him to be more social, cracks me up, and well, he has done the same damn thing to me. The kid is a hugger and I've been hugged more in the past week than I have in the past couple of years. I've learned to deal. Hes needed them because things have been pretty rough in his life. Hes started calling me,"Mom #2" Weve spent a lot of time taking about his situation and things, and he knows it will get better, and that he has a place with us for as long as he needs, my main rule is that he has to actually eat some real food, check in with me regularly, go to school and be here at night. My son watches out for him at school and walks him home and to school, so I think we have it handled . He helped me get the computer set up so when she got it the tweet was right there for her to see. We both got hang dog expressions on our faces and pretended we had some bad news for her,(fucked up, yes, I know) and as she shed her jacket and backpack and sat at the computer, I got my camera ready. It took a minute for it to register and when It did I was glad I was standing back. The "OH MY GOD's" were deafening. She was soo happy he actually saw it she jumped up and hugged me, her brother Stubby, Shortround, Spencer, and then she raced through the kitchen half a dozen times shrieking, "Im soo happy! I love him soo much!" She was buzzing for HOURS. In fact, the voice of doom finally had to be broken out at 1130pm to get her to finally go to bed and go to sleep. She had gone on a painting jag and had painted half a dozen new ideas that were mostly hearts.

Looking over at her now, she is snuggled up in her bed with her monkey under her arm, and a slight smile on her face, her day, her week, her month, her year, made again thanks to a kind young man taking a few moments from his hectic life to make a child's life so much more bright.

The video view count this morning was over 903....good Lord.

Dear Roger:The Wheel That Spins Us All

Yesterday was just a weird day. It was colder than frostbitten penguin balls, in fact I swear I saw a few snow flakes. The kids were restless and working on driving each other an myself nuts, so they went out grocery shopping with their father for a little bit and he came back looking like he had been through the gates of hell,(wussy), and my daughter...that child, let me tell you, she is going to be the death of me. Seriously, she is going to probably be the one with the pillow over my face in the wee hours. She was insistent that she HAD to get the song and birthday video done for her favorite fella yesterday. She had been walking around working on the lyrics for a few days and getting frustrated when her ever helpful,(heavy sarcasm) brother Stubby, kept interjecting his suggestions. I had to intervene when she chased him from the bedroom with a boot in hand, prepared to use it as a weapon. I had to say,"Boots are shoes, not tools of destruction." Three thrown pens later, two flounces and and a meltdown in tears, she finally got something she was happy with. If she is like this as a child,(super perfectionist), what the hell is she going to be like as an adult? Her older brother was trying to stay out of her line of fire and practice his guitar with Shortround, but she went up to him and said,"I need to know if you can play a simple rhythm?" She then hummed it out for him and he tried to copy it and she shook her head, "No, No NO! Thats all wrong! Listen to me!" Shortround at this point is clutching a pillow and trying to not fall off the couch laughing as my son looks a bit intimidated. She clapped the rhythm and then gave him an example of the sound she was looking for by singing it. He tried to copy it but he was putting his own funk on it and she got annoyed with him."Do you not get this is a BIRTHDAY song?" They began bickering and I am sitting there looking at them wondering if other families have kids that bicker over such things? She finally just threw her hands up in frustration and said, "Never mind! If I want background music or something I will have Cole beatbox for me." Shortround fell off the couch laughing. Fired from a gig by a 7year old. I left and went to work for a while. froze my ass off, got called a,'Bitch ' by a junkie, and just generally had a crappy afternoon when my shoes got wet and my toes froze, but when I got home, I was met at the door by my little girl who hugged me with her sopping wet hair flying all over and one of her best dresses hanging on her . I was put to work right away doing wardrobe and hair, combing out her hair and drying it while she played with my Iphone and took pictures of her Jackson sitting on her bedside table. Once I got her hair and dress ready, I asked if she was going to wear shoes and she said,"Why would I wear shoes? We aren't shooting this outside. You aren't going to focus on my feet are you? I don't need my shoes, focus on my face mom."

She was practicing her song and talking to her monkey while her minion, also known as her brother Stubby, ran around getting the lighting just right and trying to get Spencer to stop biting his butt and chasing the cat. Once that was all sorted, he bribed his underwear only clad brother Sticky to stay in his room for the duration and then she tells me,"Im ready, get your camera person hat on and get ready."

With Stubby sitting next to me on the couch, adjusting my hat til she thought it looked right, I used my Iphone and filmed her, trying to avoid filming all the boots and jackets hanging all over the dining room chairs, the dog water dishes, the backpacks, and all the other crap in the background. She messed up once and we all started laughing so I had to stop filming and erase it and start again, with her looking like a bundle of nerves the whole time. Shes a funny kid, all confidence and swagger on the surface, but she wants to make things perfect to the point of stress. I got her laughing and she finally relaxed and said,"Okay, Im ready. Camera, ready? Lets get this right, its important! Roll em!" And she sang her little song and for once there were no interruptions of the dog barking or her brother snorting or anything else. It came out pretty damn cute. I loaded it to youtube, and she watched me like a hawk as I sent it off in an email and posted it to my Facebook page. I got a lot of hugs yesterday for that, pretty decent pay for what I did I think, though it was a a couple of hours after I got home before I got my wet shoes off and my frozen toes thawed out. Shes worth it though, her and her brothers started filming some movie about the dog and her monkey...God only knows what that is going to be about .

Found another place down near that school for her. Its actually right across the street and if I can get it all pulled together, hopefully we will be there around mid January. I wanted to move for the start of the new term, but there is just too much up in the air financially so I have to sit tight until I am sure someone else is capable of pulling their weight. She is so eager to go, she has been working on her ,"Portfolio" and yesterday she painted a picture of a cat turd because the blue flecks from the litter make it interesting. Interesting does not begin to describe the child.