things that make me feel good.

This isn't one of those out-on-a-limb lists you might find somewhere else. It's just a reminder to myself. List is not exhaustive.

• Reading people's blogs and then following the web they might create so I can know more. Looking at their flickr, reading other blogs they read.
• cooking a warm meal on a cold day
• reading when people write about gluttonous things. this might be about hot summer days and cold beers and the way music makes someone feel or food or sex or just any sort of guilty pleasure a person has. i love that. i love love love it. i think i got a lot of that really heady stuff from reading sarah cash's livejournal here. She could describe a summer day in Arkansas and have my head swimming. amazing. I love her.
• when my roommate touches me. today we were out and about with his mom and brother and Beebs and I started to trail behind and he reached his arm out and my heart swelled.
• really soft lineny type clothing after a shower.
• having lunch at whole foods with K.
• making coffee. this was such an ingrained ritual in my house. my mom made coffee every morning. she and my dad were always up while it was still dark outside. they'd sit at the kitchen table and smoke and drink coffee in their robes. they rarely ate breakfast. they alllllways had coffee.
• music. music. music.
• organization. however, this is not a skill i possess. i love when others are organized around me. i love the lists people make in notebooks.

I have to stop my own list-making now as the baby just woke up.

Today we sat in the car in the driveway and ate lunch together because neither of us wanted to wake Beebs, asleep in the back seat. We had the windows rolled down and the sun was streaming in. I've been looking online for a few birthday gifts for her. I can't believe the wee Hybrid is going to be a year old next month! Insanity. I just read this. I'm so longing for the community she talks about here. It's so hard though because I simultaneously feel this constant, nagging, "Leave me alone!" sentiment that sorta gets in the way of community. We're moving at the end of May/beginning of June. And wow, that's just over 2 months away. Our landlord is going to start showing the house April 15. I'm sad but I think I'm excited too. Like Andrea mentions in her superhero journal, we're pruning here. I think a good portion of our belongings (those things we want to keep) are going to be stored out at my mom's house. I'm excited about this necessary step and being "forced" to purge. I rarely buy new clothes and that's fine as I generally hate purchasing clothes when I've got so much self-loathing for my body going on but most of my clothes are leftover from high school and college with a few loungewear items thrown in. It needs updating but that's not pressing. More pressing is this need to get rid of so much stuff we're just not using and don't need. Any cool ideas for this purge process? I need motivation to get started but I know it will feel so good. So many of my belongings have no home and just reside in varying piles around the house. Any good cause I could donate items to? Maybe I'll take some things to Once Upon a Child or something? We are getting back $300 more than we thought on our income taxes and I'm desperate to spend it on a little trip or something. See how my brain works? Must save money! Must prune and purge our belongings and save money! Ooh, look, over here, a snail! Let's take a trip! I should note for those with the "if you haven't used it in the last 12 months get rid of it" philosophy that a lot of those things we're keeping are baby things to be used with future children! (more babies!!!) One year ago.

Spring!

Happy First Day Of. I am joyous today. I spent 15 1/2 hours at work yesterday. Yes, I'm including that 1/2. Shift started at 0645 and I left work at 2220. When I sat down to give report I just started crying. I'm absurd. A co-worker informed me I am "too soft" and I better "stop caring so much" or I will "never make it." So that all I'm going to say about work right now. It looks gorgeous outside. I am drinking coffee while my family sleeps. It's almost 9 am. We are a tired family. This week has drained us. I'm looking for a lunch partner today. Mom & I were going to go to Masalas for Indian food and I'm drooling thinking about it but she is working today. Totally in love with this Etsy shop. Seriously great stuff there and those really fun plantable cards!! Part of the proceeds go to charities. I love the colors and the artwork and the plantableness. I emailed her to ask if I could buy plantable birthday party invites for Beebs' first birthday! That'd be really cool. The day we brought her home from the hospital the lilacs were just insane here. It was all warm outside and when we got out of the car it was completely surreal. Sun shining, the scent of lilacs seriously swirling around us and holy shit here we are with our new daughter (!!!??!!). 100% Surreal. My mom had the thought of digging up some shoots of the lilac bushes so that we can keep them after we move. She took 2 to plant and my mother-in-law took 2 to plant. I love that. It's Friday, dudes!! I hope you have made it through this week in 1 whole piece. If you're preparing for a weekend of work, I'm thinkin' about you. Thanks for reading this! xoxo

Bummed. (still?! again?!)

Today's weather is amazing!!! What's the current temp? 78?! Happy St. Patrick's Day. Today Roommate wore these charcoal cargo pants with a gray t-shirt and his gray hoodie. What the hell. I wore: black flowy soft pants, white nursing tank, various-shades-of-green hoodie (for parts of the day), green butterfly barrette in my hair, green flower necklace and green ring. I got up early to get a jump on my day off. While my family slept I read online about Sid Vicious and Nancy Spungen and watched youtube videos of Amy Winehouse and old Erykah Badu. Erykah was carryin' her sexy drug dealer man's baby and looking like an African princess and her hair was 1997 Badu lovely. Her man was all takin' a steamy shower then putting on this white linen outfit that looked so airy and they were both throwin' open the curtains and they kept the mattress on the floor with blankets and throws and pillows strewn about in a love nest. She was slicing an orange in the kitchen. Beebs slept until after 8. I'd finished a bowl of raisin bran and put on a pot of coffee. So anyway, we had a little list of apartments to see today. We looked at a few and then went back to scope out the one we've liked all along. Then we left to look at some more and that pretty much sealed the deal, we were still loving that same apartment. As we pulled out of the parking lot of one I said I was ready to put down a deposit on the other apartment and Roommate said he was too and we drove there and I felt excited to have you know, made a decision. I went in to get paperwork and put down the deposit and she told me the apartment had been rented. It's my fault 'cause I thought that would happen all along. Now I feel like we're back to square 1 or we settle for something we're not happy with. The last one we looked at today had this tiny little galley kitchen with the washer and dryer across from the refrigerator. I said "Holy crap!" and then after gawking at the smallness I think I said "Holy small!" and the girl said, "Erm, I take it you're not loving the kitchen?" and then sort of said some ramble salesgirl bullshit to make me sound stupid for caring and I sort of felt bad for exclaiming my disapproval. Also, pet rent? Give me a break. You can start charging pet rent when my pet gets a job.

Is it Spring yet?

Sick of winter and our mental illness around here. Gah! We've spent the last couple days apartment hunting and man. So weird. We've found one we really like and it's cheaper than the house we live in now and it's all electric so even if that's high the utilities should be less. Utilities are insane here so how could an apartment not be cheaper? I have a hard time with this because it sort of feels like we're going backward but who's to say what moving forward means? I think for us right now, moving forward and onward and upward would mean getting a really good handle on a budget and our mental status. I'm serious. Our daughter is the thing that keeps us afloat amidst the depression we're both battling. I took Zoloft for a couple months after Beebs was born. when I went in for my six week post-partum check-up I told the midwife what an awful person I was being to my husband and she wrote the script and told me I needed to take it for at least a year. I really had a hard time taking it, mostly because I'm breastfeeding and I felt like I should be able to deal with it without medication. I'm not sure that's the case because it seems like I cry or fly into fits of rage about four out of seven days. The smallest, most insignificant thing can make me want to just throw things. Our kitchen table is always cluttered lately and I was clearing it for dinner one night and it was all I could do to not just sweep it all onto the floor in one giant motion. I was so angry at that mess and at myself for creating it. I feel like a failure at all that I do, at every role I play. Sucking at my job? Check! Shitty wife? Check! Not as energized/wholesome/active/etc. mom? Check! Zero social life? Check! Ungrateful daughter? Check! Getting fatter? Check! and this list goes on. Self-loathing is sooooooooooo last winter. Time to shed this shit, man. I'm pretty sure I've probably written some variation of this blog post 100 times over because still I struggle. One of my charge nurses at work suggested I use the free employee assistance thing and get some mental health help. I need some goals. I don't know where to start? Small. I've got to start small.

gash.

This was a day or two after she got her gash. I inadvertently used the flash [poet] and she looks so different!