Obsequious and oily I look down at the floor and then through my eye lashes ahead of me, through the crowd wondering if I should say out loud what I am thinking. I think not and I don’t. It smells like wet rubber, crushed leaves and stale smoke mingled with cheap perfume and I am bumping up against too many people I don’t want to touch. Moderately toothless gals wearing skinny jeans, oversized sweatshirts and frizzy unnaturally colored hair scowl like me looking for their progeny in the milieu. Its loud and there are too many forced smiles catching my gaze and my cheeks are starting to ache smiling back politely. Suppressing the urge to YELL get the fuck out of my way, offspring in hand literally we drag ourselves like cows to slaughter out the back door and into the rain. The back of my neck is cold and damp and I contemplate if I had some sort of accident with the car would the children be injured, how long could I be off work and how much pain would I be in? It seems like a bad plan and its dismissed as quickly as it appears in my brain and I sigh, opening the door, admonishments and warnings of where not to put your god damn muddy feet issued I put the key in and u turn towards home.

Fall feels like that person you see sitting on the opposite end of the sofa at a party that looks charming and interesting but as they edge closer you notice they have bad teeth and breathe, touch you when they talk and their hands are all clammy and their clothes are dirty and mismatched. You feel cheated because you missed out on talking to that hot tan person because really, isn’t that kind of thing over with? Warm, tan, easy going? You thought some edge would be cool. Yes, cold. Cold and damp. Fall is like the lover you thought you wanted and when you have them they break dates, stand you up, give you the cold shoulder and are hard to snuggle up to. You find yourself pining away for wearing less clothes even though the colder weather has softened your skin-making it doughy when naked and pale like milk. Longing to bear your shoulders in the sun, that lover you wished for -Fall-blows cold wind down your neck forcing you to steele yourself for something harsher like snow. An inevitable ice that hardens your heart and turns your toes black.

The car hums along, away from where I was before and the radio refuses to cooperate and play anything I can sing along to that matches the blank and vacuous mood I seem to be in so early this morning. Yakyakyak. Jocks spew on about gossip, sports-hockey strangely enough. No one ever talks about hockey. Just like nobody says porpoise. Random random random. Houses fly by, plastic bags swim like fish into the trees behind the exhaust of a city bus. Petulant children slowly walk to school like the Baton Death March because its a weekday.

Frustrated by the lack of sufficient tuneage on my radio and unwilling to be disappointed by the selection in the cd player I turn it off and listen to the street. For no good god damned reason it occurs to me that one day, I will die. Like really die. Leave my children and the lives they create. Die and never have sex again. Die and never cook my famously delicious Pig on Pig thing. Die and will probably still wonder if I made a mistake. Die and wonder if I missed every chance. Die and still be bummed about my flabby stomach.

You know, just die. Like dead. Der. Yes,yes, yes. I know, I know, I know. We all die. But wait a second. I’LL DIE. Me. I will, cease to exist eventually. Probably sooner than later considering I am almost 40. I am sure I am at least half way done. Maybe less.

Driving seemed pointless at that point but the person behind me honking pulled me back into now. I drove home a new route, cause I had never driven that way before. I had pie for breakfast which does nothing to thwart my loathing of my flabby stomach but pie tastes good. Pie was right now. Pie seemed like a good idea and on that roll of good ideas I sat down to think of some more.

Being a creature of habit and repetition I tend to read the same books over and over again, listen to the same song over and over again in the car, watch the same movies over and over again, well you get it right? I am tedious.

That being said I think I am at a cross roads having come to the end of something I can not just revisit. I finished school and am now a practicing RN. I say practicing because that is the correct term and the appropriate term. I feel like an amateur in the sense that I have to work at it, am not an artist. You know, that definition of a hobby and a profession? You have to be in the mood for a hobby….blahblahblah. I can’t seem to turn the page on this career thing. Things seemed like in a groove of working it out, making my way, figuring shit out and now, all of a sudden I am forgetting things I totally know, not remembering to do stuff, feeling so overwhelmed I am crying about it and I AM NOT A CRIER. I am more of a shouter and stomper and fit thrower. Crying makes me all squishy and I abhor squishy. Squishy is disgusting.

My feet hit the floor with the best of intentions and usually about 2 hours in I feel like I am running a race I didn’t pay to enter, have no business being in, can’t keep up and it might kill me or someone else. I feel like I walk around with a huge sign on my back saying “LOOK HOW FUCKING STUPID I AM, AREN’T YOU GLAD YOU AREN’T MY PATIENT?” as people walk by and nod their heads in agreement.

Now stop. This is not some pity inducing WOO is me bullcrap. No. Just stop it. Don’t post comments like OH it will get better and I’m sure its not that bad OR WORST OF ALL….HANG IN THERE.

I am in there. Hanging. I think thats the problem. I am walking around on my tiptoes playing beat the clock. There is not enough time in my day to do all the stuff I have to do. Just when I get settled and think I have a moment to collect my thoughts I remember I forgot something else. I take my job seriously and would prefer to have the respect of my peers and not their fear of taking over my patients because of the mess they have to clean up.

I am not use to such a steep learning curve and its freaking me out. School seems like a good preparation. Then orientation is a whole new ball of wax and then poof! they allow you to practice with your own license. With people. That are sick.

I can’t figure out how to stop feeling behind before I even begin. Partly its the new computer things we have to do. I had just sort of learned to balance my day with the old way and then wham! Something new. But that is just like every job now a days. Technology changes and nuances of your job shift around, Maybe I am just not use to having to use my brain so much. All my jobs before were very physical with a sideline of mental organization.

I have spent a lot of time talking to myself lately. In the car, while cleaning up the house, trying to fall asleep to the sounds of harsh accusations inside my head. So, sadly, dear stumbler of the interwebs or misguided friend-rant is over.

Since the battle in my head isn’t getting me anywhere close to the land of milk and honey where things are easy as a summer breeze and I could do all this shit in my sleep I may resort to more physical measures to keep myself in line. That monk in the DaVinci Code may have had a good idea how not to push things over to the side of your mind where they can be ignored and neglected.

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….but really sad you are gone. Happy Birthday Mommie Dearest, her nickname for herself, not mine. I love the picture you let me take of you doing your Cousin It imitation, I love that you knew all the names of the flowers, I love that when I asked you how old I had to be to curse you told me 14 and I could only say shit damn and hell and not at you or Grammy, I love that you were a fab cook who hated to cook, I loved your hair so shiny and pretty, I envied your tiny body and did not realize until late in life it was the result of just never eating, I loved how you doodled when you were on the phone, I loved how you wrote my present lists and left them out in the open cause you could write in shorthand, I loved your sailor foul mouth, I was so proud of how you worked your way up through those corporate steps with only a high school diploma when you were just a secretary, I loved your laugh, You were always fun to shop with as long as it wasn’t vintage stuff, I loved that you thought I was wild and crazy, I loved that you loved me-Best of Everyone.

I am reckless and impatient. I am demanding and obstinate. I am quick-tempered and sensitive. I am shy and loud. Mostly I feel undeserving of such love and devotion from these tiny small people I made out of thin air and sex inside my stomach. I abhor a cliche and yet I am one. I adore my children. I adore them recklessly and with abandon. I loathe them at times because its all too much or too tedious or too tiring or too busy or too noisy. They rarely let me sleep but somehow give me peace. They often are ungrateful but kiss me anyway.

I see lots of people around with kids, breeders-we are everywhere. Is it the same for everyone?

Do you remember being a child and wondering at the limits of your parents power? Power over how you feel, what you do and what you don’t do? I think its natural to desire approval and acceptance from your parents and it still feels weird to not have it even be an option. Or rather it can be whatever I want it to be. If there is no yard stick of a job well done, how do you know you are doing it correctly?

Parenting is impossible but solid. Immovable once you are in it.

Because there aren’t words to talk about it. Because it sounds stupid and predictable to talk about it. Because I hate all that crap. Because I think its useless. Because it doesn’t help anything. Because nothing actually helps it. Because I said so. Because I don’t have to. Because it’s a choice. Because it doesn’t really matter anyway. Because longing is pointless and painful. Because I hate pointless and painful. Because it still makes me mad. Because I still can’t find one single person who actually knows what I mean. Because it doesn’t really mean anything.

Everyone dies and until that happens we are all just living our lives. Everyone exactly the same. We are all the same. Strangely enough there is a small degree of comfort in that.

Epic fail, (snort), blarrggh. sniffle.

Seriously, all that cutesy shit people write make me nuts. Don’t even get me started on emoticons. Its freezing and drafty and boring in my house and while attempting to assemble our wintery electric blankets for a cozy nights sleep the extension cord zapped me twice. And my nose itches and I keep sneezing and the goddamned kitten won’t get the fuck off me and what I would really like is to go shopping but the site of my doughy ass would make me want to hang myself with the latest cute low slung belt at anthropologie OR slap the dressing room clerk as she refuses to take my items to count instructing me with an adorable smile to just hang um there.

Oh ferchrissakes.

I was enjoying my no drinking thing but if I am to live through the next two days, yes I am taking it two at a time cause I am a hero damnit- I think a cocktail might be in order.

As its only 2pm I am going to drink some hot tea, kick the fucking cat into the basement, cry on the couch for a while and then maybe try to enjoy the last few minutes before the children return from school.

Yes. Its okay to want to smother me with a pillow. Option two is to whisk me away on a tropical vacation. Option three is to give me lots of money. Option 4 is to tell me how thin and pretty I am. Option four is to smother me with two pillows.

I wear bad looking clothes,a uniform, of which on prinicpal I have never been fond of. I basically wear pajamas to work and while the constant exaltation of “wow, that is so comfortable…I wish I could wear that instead…” as they turn and walk away in a pair of fab high heeled boots, fancy dress, jewelery and makeup makes me want to stab them in the eye.

Its a race everyday as I sit down and make my list of patients on the computer, looking up their medications, orders and lab results trying to plot out how exactly I need to care for them that day. Its a fresh start each day in my ugly clothes, clunky stethoscope and pocket full of pens, labels, scissors, tape, alcohol pads and most importantly-”MY BRAIN”.

My “brain”is a couple of pieces of paper that has my patients history and medications and other various important information related to what I have to do that day for them in the course of their hospital stay. Its a horror filled moment when you misplace your brain and you frantically search for it, panicked not knowing where you left it last.

Wearing my ugly clothes, lugging my bits around, worrying over where I left my brain last I meet my patients. Some are lovely, humble, appreciative and sick. Some are sick, stoic and quiet. Some are loud, cursing, stupid mother fuckers. I am guessing you can imagine which are the hardest to deal with.

Some of these motherfuckers are like children in that you feel empathy for them because they are helpless, feeling poorly and are sick and seem to not be able to be reasoned with, talked to rationally or just not lose your shit over.

Such as was the fate of the lollipop man. For reasons of legality I can’t divulge any real details BUT our days were continually filled with demands of “MY FUCKING LOLLIPOPS.” and accusations of being the “FUCKING POLICE.” and idle threats of leaving “AMA CAUSE YOU ARE BEING THE FUCKING POLICE.”

I don’t know why irrational crazy patients get me so wound up. I find myself tempted to count to three as I do with my children and if they don’t cooperate to just stamp away telling them to stay on their bed until they can speak more pleasantly to me.

Its stupid. Really. I have be more like a duck and let it roll off my back but I can’t yet. I am too attached to the ugly clothes, weapons of nursing, my badge I get to swipe, notes I have to write and seconds I wish went by quicker so I can just be at home with my family. It all seems to cling to me like a sock stuck to you pants that you don’t notice until someone embarrassingly tells you in the elevator that you might have your pants on inside out.

That actually happened one morning.

For those of you not my friend on facebook… I will share with you a bit of conversation I had with my son over the weekend. Friday was a Professional Development Day for public schools in our city and the day spent at home was a joy for all to behold.

After a million exhalations of “WHATAREWEDOING???I’MBORRRREEEDDD.” and one of my personal favorites,”CAN’TWEWATCHSOMETHING????ITCANBEWHATYOUWANTTTTTTT…..” I was puttering around and trying to clean up the joint. Housewifey shit I live for.

Spawn, for reasons not entirely clear, must sit on the couch reading surrounded by a menagerie of doodads,toys, treasures and junk. Or as I like to call it, “ALL YOUR SHIT.”

So I ask him for the hundredth time to pick up his stuff and he ignores me so I say loudly (der), “PICK UP YOUR SHIT!” Spawn responds, “Don’t call it shit.” Mama says, “Hey don’t say shit!” Spawn replies, “Well, then don’t call it shit.” Mama says, “STOP saying shit!” Spawn squints at me and says, “Its legos, not shit.” and walks away in a huff.

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Kid 1