More color please ..

I am a dark brown/black/gray person. Have always been even though I sort of hate it. I guess it's easier to speak as much about disappointment with the world as I do when you wear dark colors. But then I see myself in the mirror and get instantly pissed. Then decide I need more colorful clothes, go to the store, happilyreturn, open the bag and realize I have once again purchased something black, gray or dark brown. Fuck me!!

So today I saw on Fab this bracelet which totally captivated me. Captivated me enough to overlook it was going to cost close to $30 including shipping. But then of course I decided it was way too bold. What would I wear it with? Black? I'm not willing to stand out that much. Plus, don't you have to be in your 20s (somebody's gonna slap me) to wear bright colors? Probably not but I feel like an old old lady nowadays what with the energy vampire toddler and the lack of sleep and whatnot. Plus colorful stuff just looks fake on me .. kind of like if I were trying to pull off a frilly dress or really anything too girly. I want to feel comfortable in stuff like that but

just can't feel myself pulling it off. I usually end those visits to the dressing room with tears in my eyes from laughing my ass off.

So I didn't get the red which I sort of regret now. Instead I got this one (partly) made from cork which is really not that bland (yay me!).

Ok so I lied .. now that I'm glancing at my closet I do have more colors but they're all earth-toned and dark. Same difference.

This is all stuff from The Brooklyn Bakery jewelry store btw but for the life of me I can't find either their location or their store or a website.

I bore myself

Each time I am faced with the empty textarea of the blog I draw a blank or worse, the thoughts I try to express seem petty and uninspired. And they probably are. So here we go ..

I feel like an amorphous blob of ever changing emotions of which I don't seem to be in charge of. I know it's a matter of learning how to deal with them but so far mentally I'm a step behind catching up with my emotions. Does that make any sense? Probably not.

I've always been like that but not to this extent. After dealing with debilitating panic attacks for years I finally got put on paxil and things started to be a little more mellow. The panic attacks went away but I was also no longer reacting to things impulsively (good?), life became something to drudge through (bad). I had very little passion or drive (although friends would not recognize that as being the case) but I had very few highs and lows. I'm going to stop with the psych-speak now cose I am pretty much tired of all of it. This is hopefully my last bit about it. I'm stopping paxil and three things are happening:

1. I feel alive (for the lack of a better word) - it's almost like I've been sensory deprived on and off for the past 7 years

2. Some anxiety is coming back

3. I feel (do not laugh) like my mind is a wild horse I am trying not to tame but to learn how to tame

So far I have found buddhist ideas to be most helpful, especially the idea of mindfulness. I much prefer buddhism to paxil which has been a bitch to get off of. Withdrawal some say resembles that from heroin and the amount of nausea, dizziness, perceptual shittiness (can't come up with a better word) where the image your eyes see moves slower than your head, etc, in the past 2 months has been debilitating at times. But I can't really complain .. this drug has saved my life not by making it easier but by alleviating conditions which in the past have rendered me unable to function. I'm just hoping that I might be able to stop using it as it feels like I am cheating myself out of life.

It's interesting .. last time I stopped the paxil I had found out I was pregnant so shortly there after I went from a generally high dose to 0 which prompted a lot of nausea, etc, which we all attributed to the pregnancy. I did not however have any of these other symptoms. Turns out pregnancy in the 2nd and 3rd trimester acts the same way on the level of serotonin circulated in my brain as paxil. In the case of pregnancy, more serotonin gets created and in the case of the paxil the small amount of serotonin I have gets recycled (due to the pill's reuptake inhibitor 'feature') so it's the same as having more. That explains why while I was pregnant and off of paxil I really very few anxiety related issues but as soon as I stopped breastfeeding it came back with a vengeance.

But this is not a negative post. In fact I feel very liberated .. freaked out, but liberated nonetheless. Last drop down to an 1/8 of the medication happened 2 days ago and again the barrage of withdrawal symptoms are starting (takes about a month and 1/2 to really feel the effects of this change). In two weeks I pretty much have to stop taking it all together so we'll have to see what I can do to really enjoy our trip to Italy which happens at about the same time.

Just keep swimming, just keep swimming ..

So ashamed of my url

Ok... so just because it's true, it doesn't mean that I'm ok with it. In a moment of clarity I chose that URL .. amblingintoit .. and went ahead with making it public. But ever since then I've been ashamed of it, like trying to escape it by proving that "see? I'm in complete control"

Well, I'm not. A year+ into it and I'm nowhere close to in control. If my child kept repeating the same month over and over [thank goodness he doesn't] I might be .. I might have learned enough to deal with every mood and the stress and everything else. But that's not the way it goes. These kids .. they change every month, week, day .. sometimes every friggin' hour. They do!!! And by now I would want to be able to say "I've got the hang of this" but there is no 'this'. Nope. Not at all. So fuck you all nay-sayers. I don't care about you anymore because .. you know what?! I have no fucking idea what i'm doing most of the time.
1. I try to make it in to work on time but I fail most every day
2. I try to remember all of the preschool due dates and what not but fail 25% of the time [two boxes of baby shoes due this friday??! seriously?! I recycle those the next day after i buy the damn shoes!!]
3. I try to have home-made organic dinners 3 times a week but we usually end up eating take-out
4. I try to take a shower every day but guess what?! I don't
5. I try to give Mr. G a bath every night but it usually happens every other night
6. I try to show my hubby lovings every week but it doesn't usually happen that way .. usually I find a week when there are no molars coming in or sickness in the house and make it up for 1/2 of the month
7. worst of all, I try to be consistent with Mr. G. but sometimes it's easier to give in, and the hubby hates it .. yet I still disagree .. he will be raised well, the leeway he gets while 2 doesn't affect his LIFE .. I will totally be a hard ass on the 10 year old version of him
8. i will now definitely have to keep this domain because as much of a mess i am we've decided - mostly cose of my arguments - to have another child .. this year .. despite my best judgement.

So there we go. We're raising a good kid .. he's so compassionate and loving, giving hugs to classmates who are crying and loving babies, but being a hardass when it comes to sharing things with the parents - not with anyone else btw. Our place is rarely clean and the carpet has more stains than I've had sexual encounters. BUT there is hope. He loves to help: putting dishes in the dishwasher, cleaning his table, attempting to dress himself. And the hubby too is helping by modifying his behavior to use less manliness on Mr. G. and more cuddliness. He was raised in a very strict environment so it's hard to be judging.

The conclusion is [and yes, I am a closeted horoscope freak] that we want a Sagitarius baby because that would provide the best match of Mr. G. as a sibling and, secretly from hubby, that he himself being a sag. would change his parenting style to be more maneable. If the 2nd is a girl it's even better.

Deciding on this "should we have a 2nd" business is hard, so I'll speak more to it in next post.

Still ambling into it ..

The impossibility of it all just smacked me when I got depressed and overwhelmed to the point where I didn't even want to spend time with my little boy. Then I got a nasty cold and got set back at work and tempers flared at home and I just gave up. I need sanity and adding another X hours of work a day just won't do it. So I had to tell myself that the responsible and smart thing to do is just pick the necessary stuff and remove the rest. So I did, although that speech was mostly parenting advice from movies and I didn't believe one iota of it. Guess it was what I needed to hear.

Christmas went by fast. The little one got some awesome presents which means I get a little break from the little someone pulling at my pants constantly when I'm in the kitchen. And we, the parents, are doing ok. We've had some conversations which led pretty much nowhere further than "ok, so we have different parenting styles and at least one of us cannot stand the other for it". But we're ignoring it for now I guess. I don't know what the plan is. I never move on without a plan but here we are .. keeping on keeping on. Smiles, kisses, cuddles and hopes that the situations that make me sometimes want to move out simply won't happen again which is impossible.

I got out of work early today and stopped by Bed Bath & Beyond to get some small freezer-safe glass containers - to store the super duper sneaky veggie purees that go into little man's food without him knowing - and a pepper grinder/salt shaker thing. I found myself not wanting to leave. Where would I go other than home? And at home what? laundry and dishes. I felt like - and had to do some - cooking - but would have to do dishes first and clean the counters. Blah.

Sometimes I feel so separated from everything else in this world. Motherhood is such an alienating experience. Even mothers of children of similar age can't always relate to each other at a deep enough level to really elevate the conversation to something more meaningful than insignificant chatter. Some days I want to die, more so than ever. Some days I am so frustrated and angry that it makes me feel violent even though I never act on it. Some days I don't want to be married, as much as I love my husband, and just want to be alone. Some days I just don't want to leave work, the best escape I have.

I used to have a very colorful life filled with dreams and books and travel and hopes and plans and ideas. All I can think now is that unfinished to do list at home: dishes, laundry, food .. and from time to time I remember we are potty training, trying to learn new words and trying to modify every day tasks to include this little person who just loves to help me with things like throwing dishes in the sink and pouring 1/2 gallon of juice in his small cup and picking forks and knives out of the dishwasher. I know this is who I am only temporarily and as he grows and develops his own dreams and plans I will be left with a void that can be again filled by my own. But until then I will miss my old self and I hardly find her in my own thoughts and actions. That makes me sad. I have lost my closest friend, confidant and cheerleader: myself.

Teeth & enterpreneurship

.. they are ruining my sleep. G.'s getting a couple more which means I don't sleep nearly enough and after 2 hours of screaming between getting home from school and going to bed the only energy I have left is the that necessary to grabbing a glass of wine .. then some fatty food, then more wine and of course, more food. Thus fatter ass. I ran .. a few days then I stopped. Something to do with the above routine.

Things are exciting around here though. A number of competitions involving coding, mobile apps, etc and potential contact with investors if your idea is hot enough. SO of course now I listen to 5 hours of tech podcasts a day, read a number of books and am completely involved in the whole coming up with ideas/learning new cool things. Which is great and would rock if I actually had some extra time. The only "extra" time I have is between 7ish and 10ish when I'm literally wrecked from making diner/serving dinner/keeping G happy/bathing G/etc G related.
Enough said about that.

So I've got a couple of months to get all my shit together for these competitions. The truth is, once I figure out what the hell I am doing, my chances of actually getting something out of these things are pretty damn good. But the problem is that I don't have nearly enough time and unless I start planning my days/nights better I won't get anything done which would be very very sad.

But I have a plan and some lists and that's a good place to start.

UPDATE .. 3 hours later: actually I'm freaking the hell out. I want to do this thing but it's almost impossible to achieve. AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!

How dare I let them?!?!

I am pissed off! Why? Because the world is fucking evil and it has no soul. And, most of all, because I let its commentary on my choices and my life affect me.

Got to daycare 15 minutes late yesterday .. fancy daycare ..local daycare in beautiful brick building .. great programs, healthy food .. flipping expensive at $1200/mo .. and was threatened that next time we're late if they can't reach us by phone - i did call back 5 minutes after they called and i didn't hear the phone - they will call child services to pick Mr. G. up. Child services??? If it wasn't for the wonderful teachers at this school and the fact that it would be impossible to find a spot at an equally good school mid-semester I would be withdrawing him immediately. How can I trust an institution who treats my child like inventory?

Anyway .. a number of executives will be receiving a very angry piece of mail in the next couple of days.

I'm gonna go run my anger away now.

Bastards!!

On procrastination

I used to be a horrible procrastinator until college when it started to catch up to me when I started working jobs where one needed to be quasi-responsible. Having realized what a negative impact this could have in the long run I decided to make swift and powerful changes that would ameliorate the problem. I put pen to paper and made a list of everything unfinished, whether in progress or abandoned and got to work. The process? Simple. Take the first step. If it was calling the bank about something I just picked up the phone and dialed without thinking about the 2nd step. That is the hardest part of the process: not thinking about the future, about the next minute, next 5 minutes, etc. So simple and it worked .. immediately.

The more of the list I tackled and the more action I was taking immediately on new instances where in the past I would have delayed acting on them the more satisfying the whole process become. Almost addicted to the satisfaction of what I called the "clean plate". No more little crumbs to remember and frustratedly think about, even if for a second.

And then the baby came and little by little I fell into the same old cycle of procrastination. Now I had a very valid reason: I am/was tired all the time. Whatever time I had I just wanted to sleep well into his 20th month. In fact I am procrastinating right now. Every morning I procrastinate when I decide not to work out although I have been telling myself every night that the next morning I will make the 15 minute investment of going to the FREE gym in our building which is just doors down, on the SAME FLOOR as our apartment. Yup, that bad. Then every night I procrastinate eating better which is something I vow to myself every morning. There's always tomorrow but the point is that it's not for tomorrow; it's for right now.

I wanted to write this to out myself as a lazy ass and psych myself up and actually make it to the gym before going to work but the truth is I would have to wake up a lot earlier to be able to accomplish that [another level of my horrible procrastinating as of late] and I have to get ready and be at work for a meeting in 30 minutes so in this case I will have to say confidently and with resolution that I will wake up early tomorrow to start the 8 week program in preparation for a 5k and that I will not regret the next day all the junk I've eaten in the previous one this whole week. I promise myself that and I am doing it for all the procrastinators out there.

Sometimes the first step is simply the decision to take the 2nd step in a specific time frame. I will write back tomorrow, after my first run in over 2 years.