When I Was Happy (and how I've been ruining my life)

"there is no greater sorrow than to remember in misery the time when we were happy." - Dante

In truth, I find that the worst periods of my life have been those in which I was not just sad, but spending all my time trying to get back something from the past. An event, a feeling, a person... maybe even just an idea. A fleeting moment that was so perfect that it haunts me now... 
And by allowing myself to go there, to wish for it, to refuse anything else because it could never be so good.... and to bemoan the fact that what my life is NOW is not exactly what my life was then? I'm turning the beautiful moments into something ugly. I'm destroying my life.


Most recently, I found myself beating not only mySELF but other people up about the lack of continuation of the feeling of ecstasy I experienced on my New Years trip to Vegas. First of all, I expected waaaay too much out of it, but surprisingly, it met expectations. In a way. I had fun. I was happy. I wasn't upset that I ... wasn't somewhere else, living out a past experience over again.
It was all new and all amazing and beautiful and fun and I ruined it the very next day.


And I ruined it every day after that, analyzing why the fun couldn't continue every day. Why the feeling couldn't remain.


Tonight (I say for my sake... but this morning), driving home from work, I was hit by the very sudden thought of how beautiful and funny my children are. I was struck by gratitude for the mere ability to drive a vehicle alone again, to sing along to the radio and think about things and look at the stars.
I thought for a minute about how much I have missed this year, being wrapped up in my own misery, not only ruining my life but that of many people around me. Ruining relationships and potentially damaging those that I love the most with my self-pity. With my... constant insistence on getting something back from the past.
I can't fucking HAVE THE PAST, I can't hold it. If moments didn't pass, why would they be precious? If we knew we could experience our children's babyhood over and over again, what reason would we have to cherish it? 


My daughter is this beautiful, mature soul who can draw amazing pictures and concentrate on a project for hours at a time. She makes up songs every day and writes them down and plans to use them in future musicals she will write. She dances for no reason but to dance. She still believes in.. everything beautiful in life. Despite me.


My son is this crazy, enigmatic ball of light that I can't keep up with, but just when I think I'm going to collapse from exhaustion, he stops for a moment and puts his arms around my neck and says "snuggle mommy!" and lends me some of that light.


Sometimes I feel a little sad, when I look at their baby pictures, that they are growing up so fast. That I miss so much when I'm at work. That I've missed so much, being so self-absorbed. But even now I am wasting time, thinking about what I've missed. 
I know that I can't be perfect every day, but I made myself a promise tonight to enjoy my moments with them more. To embrace the amazing ones and then let go and be excited for the next one. To accept the hard times because they bind us, and the darkness contrasts with the bright light of their joyful laughter, our perfect moments, and that is why they shine. 

Beyond that... I'm going to put it out into the universe now that it's my intention to let go of some other things from the past. To stop trying to recreate them, and instead, just allow new moments to take place. Maybe if stop pushing so hard for something that doesn't exist, I can have something that does. I can have new perfect moments, but there's no room if I don't let go of the old ones. I can look at them like those baby pictures and think how wonderful they were, and then put them away and look at what's in front of me now, and make the best of that, because it's new, and it changes every day, and I can't have expectations. Only open my heart to hope.
Besides, hell, what am I going to do? Keep having babies until my ovaries shut down? NO FREAKING WAY. I'm going to enjoy watching my kids grow up instead of taking the focus off of them by trying to get back THEIR childhoods by having.. more babies..... cause that would be a different experience anyway (nothing wrong with having a lot of babies.. unless you're me... just a metaphor.)


I was going to blog tonight about why I'm awake and why I've always been an insomniac and how crappy it is to be going through xanax withdrawals and not be able to go to sleep even though my body is exhausted, but this is way better.

I'll just say, don't ever let yourself become dependent on a chemical to make you go to sleep or to be calm. 
Drugs are bad, mmmkay?


Letting go is good. :)

Scars, or Open Wounds?

On January 12th, a man that I once loved deeply had a baby with his fiance. A beautiful baby girl. He and this fiance have had an incredible relationship, from what I have observed from afar..... this man learned how to love someone besides himself, somehow.

This man ruined me.

He was the first real life-threatening, knife-to-the-heart wound that I ever really received. It made Sophia's sperm donor bailing on us pale in comparison.

Somehow, even after all the ways he tore me apart, I put myself back together, taped and glued and patchworked into someone I only sort-of recognized, and I even put he and I back together, as friends. I forgave. 

And somewhere in there, hope crept in. The sneaky little bastard.

You see, he and I were the best of friends. SO close that I moved in with him for a short while at one point (as friends). I spent a lot of evenings laying on the floor in his condo, listening to Wilco or Brandon Flowers or whatever his music choice was for the night. It was always his choice.

Drinking expensive wine his ex girlfriend gave him, or Sam Adams beer.

Basking in the presence of a human being who I thought truly understood me... and his children, who are the most pure, beautiful expression of happiness and love i've ever seen. Despite everything.... they have turned out amazing.

And the one day he told me... because I couldn't be happy for him, finding happiness after he had broken me beyond repair, that we could not be friends.

And we haven't been.

But I am friends with his oldest daughter.

And I just looked at 12 pictures of a beautiful baby, and a loving father staring at her like she was a miracle.

And all I can think about.... is the day I told him I was pregnant with his child, and he turned into a demon I had never seen before. Anywhere.

He told me, "I won't let my kids see me 'do this wrong'".... he told me, if I insisted on not aborting, I had to move away and stay away.

He was threatening and scary.. I was more afraid that day than any other day in my entire life (except when Eli got dropped on his face from 6+ feet in the air.... long story).

He told me.. nobody would want to be with me unless they were drunk.

He wouldn't mind having another baby, but not with me. Nobody would want that with me.

I remember his cold stare, and feeling like I had to leave or my heart would simply stop beating.

I remember forgetting to strap my daughter into her booster seat, and driving 3 blocks before the intense, body-wracking sobs took over and I could no longer drive, and then I sat contemplating driivng my car off the nearest cliff.

I remember that look.

The look.... that will be burned into me for the rest of my life. Because it wasn't only him that gave it to me. It's been so many others.

The look that says, if you dare to screw up my perfect PICTURE of a life by making good of the mistake that we BOTH made.... then I swear to god, I will ruin your life, if not take it from you completely.

The look that says, how could you "allow" this to happen to me?  (like I raped you?)

The look that says, "I can't do this right now.."

Oh, you can't?

What about the woman, who has to deal with the emotion and physical repercussions of an abortion?

Or a 40+ week pregnancy that ends with handing a beautiful baby that you grew to know and love over to a stranger "for a better life"?

or.... all that pregnancy, the pain, the discomfort, the loneliness, the excruciatingly long days at work.. and the long nights alone.... and then having that baby

alone.

And raising that baby alone.

Men..... you.... fucking don't ever say "I can't do this right now". Because us women, we don't HAVE A CHOICE.

I dont' care about pro-choice, pro-life, pro anything. I don't care. Once your irresponsible semen fertilizes one of our (more or less) irresponsible eggs, it's on US. It's on the woman. It's our whole lives that change.

For you, it's a paycheck...

An inconvenience.

for me...

it's the broken record in my head, reminding me that I will never share that moment of joy with anyone.

Reminding me that not one man has ever been in love with me.

Reminding me that my children, no matter how much love me and my parents give them, it will never be the same as a real father's love...

And.. reminding me that.. it's my fault.

Because if they had wanted me... they would have stuck around for those kids.

It is my fault. All my fault.

I don't know how to fix me.

2012

2012... man, where do I start? :)

The year obviously started off with great potential, considering that I started it with someone totally amazing who helped me remember how to just smile and have fun. Someone who reminded me what it feels like to have good friends who care about you.. and who care enough to be honest, too.

That set the tone for the rest of the year, though I still had some major hurdles to overcome just to get back to living like a "normal person".

I got my license back and got a car that worked for me and my kids. We got our independence back and I was able to get a job that kept me on my feet and that I enjoyed most of the time.

I finally was able to reach past my fear of failure and disappointment and set some major goals for myself, and did what it took to make those things happen. I got my GED. I got my passport. I went to Thailand and ate gross food (haha).

I became a better, more patient mother to my children.. more emotionally "present" for them and much stronger.

I made some major steps toward securing an emotionally fulfilling AND financially independent future for me and my children and am now feeling confident in my ability to take care of my family.

I let go of some things that were very hard to let go of, but that were weighing me down in many ways. This opened up room in my life for new, better things. Although I was scared that nothing would fill the empty spaces, they were filled with love and happiness and emotional growth that I couldn't have attained any other way.

I slowly but surely began loving myself, more every day, and am sure this will be a continuous lesson throughout my life. Because of that, I was/am able to love other people more openly and fully and opened myself up to a great relationship with a guy who loves me completely for who I am and also sees my full potential and encourages me to live it.

2012 has been the best year of my life so far, but I plan to make 2013 give it a run for its money. :)

(phew... that was difficult)

(thanks SDL for the idea)

The inevitable unknown

I haven't been posting much lately. I've posted some poetry on my facebook notes... most of it pretty depressing. But 95% of the time, the only time I write good poetry is when I'm heartbroken, so, there ya go.

I feel like I'm in limbo lately, but today I realized that even in limbo, the universe and I are somehow working together to make things happen.

I can't even describe where I am at right now as "Depression" although I do cry, frequently. I get frustrated, I want to scream, I want to tear my hair out... I think I won't survive another day without transportation and choices and my own space.
There are many things I am frustrated about. SO many.

But time goes by very reliably, no matter how slowly or quickly we think it's going to. And we find ourselves looking back at the time when we said "I can't make it that long, I just can't."

As of today, I have exactly 1 month until I can get my driver's license back.
I only have to make it one more month before I can do the things I like to do again.

And while i've been sitting mourning the loss of my entire life, my life has actually been going on, and even growing, right in front of my blind eyes.

I got a job, practically overnight, at a place that I felt was very beneath me. As far as skill level? It is. I can do so much more. But does that mean it's beneath me? Is it so wrong for anyone to learn what it's like to do hard but mundane manual labor for a not-so-great wage... to REALLY work for a living? To be exhausted and overwhelmed, but get a paycheck at the end of the week and be able to feed your kids.....
I have learned to be grateful. Because there are people who wish they had my job, even as I'm wishing I didn't.

And now, I have two jobs. One that I feel completely UNDER qualified for. Life is funny. I mean, it's really funny. The universe, if it has some kind of personality (which it must) is probably laughing it's ass off at me right now.
I'm going to be an accountant for a trucking company. I started training today, and the guy that has been doing it stared at me blankly like I was a f***ing idiot when I couldn't pull  the solution for 6% of $1800 out of my ass in 0.5 seconds. I'm a smart girl, and I aced every math class I ever took. But I'm not good with percentages unless they're .. you know, 10, 20, 50.. 100... LOL.
That's what calculators are for.
Well, this guy looks down on me cause I have to use a calculator. Oh well.

The thing is.. I'm learning to be humble. In two very different ways. And I'm learning to be grateful. Because one job has taught me that I am not superior to any other human being who works in a factory just because I have musical talents or a high IQ or a pretty face (well, pretty when I paint it).
And the other job is teaching me that I have a lot to learn... but I can do it. I can get to a place in life... I have a doorway... to a place where I will be able to get a good-paying job that will support my family. Without having to go through years of school, I will have this on my resume. I don't even "Deserve" this job, but it's being handed to me on a silver platter.
Sometimes, the universe DOES do me favors. Sometimes.
Maybe, if I'm being honest... it's constantly in the process of doing me a big freaking favor.

If I forget that again, someone please direct me back to this post.
If I hadn't gotten in that car accident, if I hadn't gotten the DUI, if I hadn't lost EVERYTHING and had to move back in with my parents and even become a bad mom for a while.... I may never have even met the people giving me this awesome job.
I got to spend a lot of time getting to know my kids again, finding out what it's like to be a stay at home mom again, learning to jump on the bed with my 2 yr old and read stories to my 6 yr old.
I found out that your parents never stop being your parents, even when you're almost 30 yrs old. That good parents like mine are there for you even when you act like you hate them for it.
That my mom will never stop holding me when I cry, even if she doesn't have any answers... Nothing's better than a hug from your mom when you feel hopeless.
And THAT reminded me that if I, at 27 yrs old, still need my mom, even if i've been pushing my parents away for 10+ years.... my babies will need me many years from now, too.
I needed to learn that, somehow.

While I've been mourning my past life and freedom, someone or something or some energy has NEVER stopped planning for me, opening doors for me, paving paths for me to become someone better and stronger... to have a better life.
Why? I don't know.
But I'm glad.

I have no idea where I'm going to be a year from now, but for once, even though this year was terrible, horrible, scary, emotional, lonely, and full of loss.... I am grateful because every piece has formed a picture that is starting to make a little bit of sense.

And in just the next month I am facing my love moving literally across the world for an entire year. Without any promises made.
I'm scared, but for the first time, a little bit of me can trust that even if it's not necessarily the picture I had in mind (although it might BE)..... some kind of beautiful picture will come about. Again. From every experience.
I've no doubt that he and I will love each other for the rest of our lives. I don't know if we'll be together. Clearly, sometimes we will be apart.

But I'm taking the moments. The moments with the kids when I feel connected again. When I feel loved and needed. When I find myself doing "good mom" things that I didn't feel capable of.
The moments when I feel loved by the man I love, even if it's not my perfect picture right now.
the moments when I see people truly trying to help me and be there for me in my hour of need.

It's all kind of beautiful. You just have to wait and see.

Purely rambling...

I feel like I need to start doing those writing exercises where you just write/type everything that pops into your head for an allotted amount of time.

I've never felt so.. emptied of words, but full of SOMETHING that I have to get out.

Ha, ha, I know there are people out there with messed up minds like me that are going to laugh at that. But seriously.

I've been thinking a lot about the similarities and differences between ME... and between my life now, and my life a year ago.

A year ago, I probably weighed about 13 lbs less. Yup, that's right. And I kind of was enjoying it, even though it was extraordinarily unhealthy. I was unhappy, drinking heavily, and not eating. I had bleeding intestinal ulcers that I left untreated and that was when I started taking massive doses of my benzodiazapenes and narcotic painkillers .. you know, to kill the "pain" (mainly the emotional pain). Smart of me.

I planned out my own death, to be carried out on New Years Eve...
I also began a spiritual journey that has changed my life. It has been difficult, in many ways, and in the beginning, I thought that my first "epiphany" would fix everything. That I'd finally be happy and attract all the things I wanted into my life, magically...

Like most journeys, it's been a lot longer than I expected. With more speed-bumps.
And clearly, I didn't die on New Years Eve. I spent it with the man I loved, which is exactly what I wanted to do.
And probably a week later, we got in a fight and didn't speak again for several weeks (not that this is an anomaly in our relationship).

A year ago, many people walked out of my life. It was the beginning of something like a mass exodus.. people realizing that they couldn't fix me, they couldn't even make me feel better. I had made up my mind.
A select few stayed. Like those who sit at the bed of a hopelessly comatose patient, holding their hand, speaking words that may or may not be heard, and just waiting. Knowing the end could come, but staying anyway.

Those few people, I have developed such an immense love and respect for, I couldn't possibly put it into words.

The rest, I don't blame. Some have come back into my life. Others have shut and locked the door to revisiting friendship.

For a moment, during this period of time, I found a profound sense of childlike joy, in the discovery and acceptance of a spiritual path that has probably been calling to me for years.
From mid-November til shortly after New Years, I was quite happy, despite many losses in my life. I had hope for the year to come. Things weren't perfect, not by any means, but... I saw the man I love frequently, I had my own place for Christmas, I decorated it with the kids.. I found a new sense of direction and hope.

When Dan and I "split up" again, it hit me hard, as it always does, but I managed to get on with life, as I always do. I got my tax return and planned many things.. to re-do the floor in my living room, to take Sophia to disneyland for her birthday, finally... to take a vacation on my own.

Then, in March, my car got totalled. Cue me, slowly but surely falling into a pit of depression. I had no job, no transportation.. was stuck at home almost constantly with two children.. Eli was, as always, a huge challenge, and I was very lonely. Dan came back into my life, but in the enigmatic, flighty way that he does at times when he's even further from "sure" than normal.
In May, I lost it completely. Dan vacated, and for good reason, but not without leaving some scars that will always be .. present.

I waited, I made phone calls, I pushed for a settlement on my car. I needed a car, and then things would be ok. I overdosed a couple times. I found it hard to breathe, to move, to be awake or to be asleep. I just wanted it to be over. I was alone. I couldn't even perform the one job that meant anything to me in this world -- being my kids' mom.

When I finally got my settlement (in June), 2 weeks later, the 2nd week of July, I set off for California with Sophia, to take the trip I'd promised her for 3 long years. Disneyland, and a chance to get to know her "Dad" a little bit.

truth? It was hell for me. She had a great time, and I'm glad we did it.

And I came back to an email from Dan. a simple, one-sentence email that silently gave the invitation to revisit.. whatever we were. To be friends again. That said.. "I still care."

I had a month of ... happy. I went to American Idol auditions, and auditions for The Voice. Didn't get anywhere with either, which was depressing. And then ... other things transpired... bad luck after bad choice after bad luck ... I managed to get a DUI when I wasn't even drunk. I managed to get Dan in trouble at work while trying to keep things from blowing up. I managed to get EVERYTHING taken away from me. Everything except my children, and as it has been, I've barely been hanging onto them. Hanging on for dear life.. selfishly.. they are all I have had to hold onto.

And I look back on a year ago when I really had... the world in my hands. And I wasn't grateful. I wanted to end my life. I was impatient, petulant, childish.
And I think.. had I been more grateful, would things be different now?

and as I sit with my second drink of the night in hand... having been sleeping on my parents' floor for 3 months now... having taken my allotment of pills for the night... wishing that pure oblivion could BE an option, I wonder...

if I were more grateful NOW.... what could change? Could I avoid falling deeper into this pit?
What if I said... yes, tomorrow I start a job in a factory line, which sounds primitive to me. I'll be working 13 hr swing shifts.
Yes, I still have no car and no driver's license.
Yes, the man I love is now living 7 hours away, and soon will be living a world away.

But do I have the world in my hands?
Didn't I have the world in my hands earlier tonight, when I held my 2 yr old's hand and jumped on the bed? I don't remember the last time I jumped on the bed.... but his laughter is addictive. His happiness... contagious.
Didn't I have the world in my hands when my daughter hugged me for no reason and said she loved me? (which is a rarity in her "grown up" 6 yr old world.)

By being grateful, I can't get my license back. I can't get a better job, yet. I can't make someone decide to make a commitment to me that would ease the ache in my heart that never quite lets up.

Technically, all it would change is how I view things....
And perhaps that's all that really matters, in the end. Because if I could go back to a year ago, knowing what I know now, I'd be deliriously happy.
I didn't know anything then.
Perhaps I know nothing know.
I just don't want to look back in a year and say "god, I wish I had been grateful then, for what I had."

I Hate Loving, Dammit.

Seriously.

I know this is unhealthy and uninspiring, but I've got to get it out.

What is WRONG with me?

What girl in their right mind wouldn't fall at the feet of a man who offers her every FREAKIN THING she's ever asked for or wished for silently.. who accepts the baggage and even loves it.. who worships things I hate about myself?
What's wrong with me?
Why I am I so dead set on loving someone BACK, on worshiping them back?

I have to sadly admit that honestly.. loving someone is way better than being loved. And while I love being loved... the few times I have truly felt that way, for a moment.. I love loving even more. A lot more.

And It Is Necessary.
It is an absolute must.
I can't be with someone that I don't feel completely unreasonable adoration for. I can't be with someone that I love if I'm not head-over-heels-stupid-in-love with them.

As I'm sitting here contemplating how much easier my life could get if I could just get over this stupid obsession with loving someone, I'm really mad.
I was telling a friend the other night that THIS is one of the prime reasons I became atheist. And it's true. I CANNOT believe in a "god" that has any control over anything that would allow this bullshit.
Falling in love with people who don't give a crap about you... Other people falling in love with you and you loving them for it but not falling IN love with them... heartbreak, all over the fuckin place. It's not cool, man! IF YOU'RE UP THERE, DO YOU HEAR ME?

nah, you never have..
but really.

It's inane.
I've wasted 4 years of my life holding my heart out to a man... holding it out, dripping blood and guts and tears and willing to DIE for the chance to see him take it and appreciate all the times it's beat for him. All the times it's skipped a beat a two. All the times I've wished it'd stop altogether, and all the times I've listened to his heart and willed mine into beating exactly in time.

It's fucking inane.

That, "it is better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all" stuff? B.S.!!! I call B.S.
It is better not to know what that kind of love feels like..
and to just settle happily into something peaceful, easy, and ... without passion. Without angst. Without tears. Without sleepless nights where I look myself in the eye in the mirror at 5 am and don't recognize my own face from all the crying and begging and pleading with... air. Nothing. Empty space.

I deserve not to fucking know the kind of joy I've known because I deserve not to have to feel this pain.
I shouldn't have to inflict it on someone else either. Someone that I truly love. Deeply. Someone who feels a little more like "home" every day, because he takes care of me... Because he's amazing. I love him. He deserves for me to give him my all, and I CAN'T right now (nor do I know if I will ever)!!!! And it makes me crazy.

"deserve".. what a stupid word. I know that.
But tonight I'm being stupid. And I deserve for the man that I've given my all, my best, and my everything to, to give me something big in return.
I can't say I'm not holding out for it, even as I'm giving up hope. I let him go a little more every day, but at the oddest and most inopportune moments, I find a stubborn strand of my heart hanging on for dear life.. or death.. whatever the case may be.
it's hanging on, and I can't cut it loose.

Lord have I tried. I have done my best. I have failed.

So this begs the question --
do I buckle down and accept the love from someone I can't love equally, because.. it would be so GOOD for my kids to have that stability (every kind of stability).. it would probably be good for me, to be treated well. To know what it's like to be seen as someone amazing, not just a piece of amazing .. uh.. something... (ha...) It would be good for me to not be stressed to the point of staying in bed, crying until 4 or 5 pm many days, only jumping out of bed to avert the worst disasters my 2 yr old can conjure up.

Or.... do I stop being such a fucking pussy, figure out a way (though I have tried, SO FUCKING GODDAMN HARD) to do this on my own, and just accept that I will never have that little piece of heaven? Or... hope that someday I'll get over it. forget it.. and find that heaven somewhere else? in the arms of someone who truly deserves ME?

I want to see life as beautiful, and many days, I do.
But tonight, it is uglified in all it's fucking glory. I want to punch it in the face.
it
isn't
fair.

there, I said it. I'm an immature 13 yr old in a 27 yr old's body with a mom haircut.
It's not fair.

I can do anything for...

It's hard to know what to write when you haven't written for so long.

You'd think I'd be busting at the seams with anecdotes or inspiration or.. something. But Life has left me feeling pretty empty, lately.

However, I was pretty determined to write a blog tonight. It's better than writing another stupid email, or a million facebook status updates.

I've been thinking about how I really wish I was one of those super-witty blog writers like EVERYONE ELSE I KNOW .. I probably could be... I AM the girl who joked her way through the most painful labor/childbirth in the known history of the world. seriously. I was asking for a gun to shoot myself and cracking jokes in between contractions.
But. I'm not feeling witty lately, not at all. And while I'm still cracking jokes in between disasters and nervous breakdowns, I don't have a lot to say that I feel anyone could benefit from. Laugh at. Cry with. Anything.

While I was sitting here thinking about what I could possibly write that would tie any of what's going on in my life into a blog post, the stuff about labor and childbirth and shooting myself and my life right now and yoga (yeah, yoga) all brought it together for me.

I can do anything 10 times. (Sit-ups in yoga). I can do anything for 5 minutes (horrifically intense contractions + pushing a watermelon sized item through a pea-sized hole). I can do anything for one day (put aside my own misery, drama, loathing of my situation, and desire to RUN AWAY FROM ALL OF THIS.. for my kids).

So.
I can do anything.
I don't really want to admit that because if life piles anything more on top of what I'm already doing, I'm ... not going to take it very well. I will cry and hit things and smoke a cigarette and protest and say "I WILL NOT, CANNOT do this. I'm done. I give up. I quit."
and then I'll fuckin do it, because I can do anything for 5 minutes, 10 times, a day, a week...

four months..?

I can miss my brother for 3 and a half years and will miss him every day until we get to meet on the same "plane" again.
I can be lonely for a whole day. Every day. For the rest of my life, if I have to. Even if it's until I'm 80. I did it today, so I can do it tomorrow.

I can live where I have to live even if I really don't like it, and give up control of my life, and sleep on the floor and listen to underhanded comments whispered about my parenting and my bad life skills and try to make ends meet and play with my kids when I'd rather be sleeping. I can do that until I find a way to fix it.

I can miss the man I love the most in this world for four months, not knowing what will happen after those four months, because I did it today, yesterday, and for the past month, and I will do it tomorrow too. And I might do it for the rest of my life.

But I can do anything.

I can pull my daughter out of the charter school that I pushed so hard to get her into and homeschool her because I'm being taught another lesson about never saying never. I never was going to homeschool my kids, especially not my social butterfly. But this is what she needs. And I can do anything.

And if I can do anything, I can eventually get back into my own place, be my kids' mom, get my license back, work 2 jobs. I can record a demo CD, I can make money off of playing for weddings and events, I can pound the pavement until someone notices me. I can do it forever. I can find a career that supports my family, and I can push aside my disabilities and make it work. One day at a time.
Cause I can do anything for a day.

I can do anything.
Fuck, that really sucks to admit. ;)