So it's May of 2013 and Cory's 26th birthday has passed and Emma's 19th is upon us in a few days. May is our busy month I am glad Marisa picked February. I know that it's such a common dialogue, especially for parents but I can't even comprehend how fast the time has gone. My maternal Grandmother used to talk about it a lot and I was never the Grandchild that ignored her stories so I would listen to her but I couldn't understand it from my perspective then, pre-Mom years. Now that I completely get it, I can't tell her how right she was but she certainly was. I think our concept of time is just that, a concept, something that was a good idea but maybe didn't come fully to fruition. It's great to have a reference, days, weeks, months, years, a way to understand what needs done and when it needs done, a way to keep track of all things coming and going but it's certainly flawed in the large scheme of things. I think it would be fixed somehow, it wouldn't ebb and flow like it does (now pardon my physics this is just me thinking way to far into the matter and let's not even start talking about matter) it would be more constant and uniform. If I were floating in the universe as a single being with no "life on earth" experience I believe I would have no concept of time it would probably only be a sensation of now. I would be in the center of it, the looking back would be the same "length" as the looking forward, equal time past and future with no concept of them being different at all, they would be the same and I would just be in the center of it. BUT! I am a single being having a "life on earth" experience and relying on the time/space laws as I have learned them so I find myself looking back and finding the whole thing happened in a fraction of the time that my looking forward self is experiencing. SEE? The future still seems longish, like there is plenty of time to get to this and get to that, not rushed, even at my age. HOWEVER the past seems like it's actually trying to catch up to where I am in the current scheme of things. So I see my children and I remember going to parks, playing on swings, learning to ride bikes, watching Barney, then high school dances, first dates, first jobs, moving away and all of that kind of just happened recently in my perception. Then I think about them marrying someday, having families of there own, working at a career they have planned for, college, whatever and it seems way off but I know that in an instant it will be behind me but I can't conceive of that until it's past, then I will realize how lightning fast it actually was. SO TIME.......I don't get it, I think it's a flawed system and with that I realize I am rambling and off topic (somewhat) so here is what got my mind in a tizzy about time...
My children are grown, I need to face and accept that, embrace the new stuff without mourning the old stuff so how do we do that? As Mother's how do we just step back into the life we had before we were one hundred and fifty percent, hands on care takers? It's an odd sensation because all of the sudden you realize your OWN life and your OWN needs can be addressed again but you don't remember how to do it. Sometimes it is so great, I used to cry because I was so overwhelmed with things I was happy just to have a bath and I didn't care that they banged at the door to get in I was so glad just to have a few minutes to relax and not move my physical self from one spot to another. I remember Emma and Marisa would actually get books and sit on towels in the bathroom floor because they wanted to be where I was. If I locked the door they would sit outside the door and whine to get in so I just set them up beside me and they were so excited they thought it was fun and I knew they were OK because I was still supervising but our bathroom was like a big playpen and I could unwind without worrying, and of course we would sing and that was just so cute. The other night I decided to take a bath, I got a nice glass of wine, lit some candles and while I was laying there I remembered that and I was so overwhelmed with everything I was so happy that I could have a glass of wine and enjoy the feeling and not worry that someone would get out of bed in the night or get sick in the night and I would have to be in Mom mode in a second (I never drank when my children were young in case something would go amiss in the middle of the night and I would have to drive or whatever) so it was really nice knowing that was OK now but then I started sobbing because put in a different light, that just meant no one needed me now and I felt so lonely it was overwhelming. I am not sure why all of my life's positives came with a negative attached, it has always been that way and I am sure a lot of my quirks and ticks are a result of it all but therapy is a bullshit concept to me so I may never know and most of the time I don't care it is what it is. I see so many people who's children leave the nest and they are out and doing things, filling time with long awaited dreams to conquer, embracing every second with new adventures and I want to be that person. MONEY, money is an issue most definitely. We were hit with the PLAN B scenario in 2009, unfortunately we didn't have a PLAN B. That year our business began to fail (but not entirely because my husband refused to let that go so he's still hanging on and good for him) at one point it was costing us money to keep that store open but it was Scott's life's work and you don't take that lightly. We lost our cars, our house was on the chopping block for 2 years, kids college money gone, vacations we used to take 2 times a year, gone, the only thing we could do was try to keep chins up and food in the cupboards and we did both of those things, not always and not always to this day and it's 2013 but things are getting better, we just found out we are able to keep our house but it's not going to be easy that's for damn sure, but we are doing it. If I had not experienced losing my financial security I would not be the person I am today, it was a blessing looking back because I am more humble, I understand people that I once did not understand, I am thankful for things I should have been WAY more thankful for but took for granted. So it's not all bad but my ability to do the things that I had planned to do once my children were grown has been completely obliterated. Scott and I were going to travel, we thought about a houseboat in the Carolina's for a summer home, we talked about fine dining with couple friends that we would most certainly make once we could get out and meet more people, we had dreams and goals and we did not see the crash coming but it's not as bad as it sounds, we just kind of got through it a bit at a time, so a negative with a positive attached this time. Our marriage was really rocky for a while and I don't talk about that often but if I'm going to be honest to a fault in this blog I have to mention that. Scott become sole proprietor, he works 7 days a week then comes home and watches television and goes to sleep which is all he has had the energy for and I understand that. He drinks way to much and I don't blame him, his life is all about work, keeping the store going and not about the nice casino's and nice vacations with his wife that were planned at this stage of the game, he was so financially set we had no worries...until we did and that is hard for a man, they are so "provider" minded and I know Scott took it as his failure and he never quite saw that it was circumstance and not anything he did, we certainly understood that and would never blame any of it on him personally, this family LOVES THAT MAN and respects him so much and he earned every bit of the love and respect he has gotten from us, he is a great father though admittedly not a great husband (but he's mine) because he is married to his store and I have long since gotten over coming in 2nd (well 3rd if you count his dog Boones and she really is way cooler than me so fair is fair). I have wanted to medicate too, just to find that one thing that didn't make you feel shitty all the time. Scott picked beer and I picked cooking everything for everybody all the time and then eating to much of it. It's fun and we all need something right? Somehow we managed to make some couple friends, we don't need a babysitter anymore and that's another "time" thing, I remember Scott saying "it's ok because before you know it they will be old enough to stay home alone for a while and we can sneak out for a little bit and they will be fine", it felt like forever away and now it's past and I am still reeling from the fact that I can go wherever I want and no one needs to come stay at my house for a couple of hours. I didn't do babysitters I was to over protective, it was my Mom or Sister or Scott's Sister or our niece and that was it. I still worry like that but everyone just laughs at me. Emma was visiting last night with her boyfriend and when she left I said "make sure you wear your seatbelt" and everyone thought I was ridiculous, I am but for good reason I live in the middle of nowhere and there are deer everywhere so good advice right?? Never to old for good advice. So these days Scott and I still don't see a lot of each other but we have grown accustomed to it all, we have very separate lives so we really appreciate our time together. We have made great friends in Tom and Marcia Kelly the past few years, we do a lot of fun things together and Scott and Tom are hilarious, they make us laugh all the time. We are now able to hang out with Scott's Sister Janelle and her husband Bob (Sponge Bob to my girls who have called him that since they could speak and Cory even calls him Sponge to this day). Scott's Mother and her husband are close to 90 now, June (Scott's Mom) has a wicked case of dementia and Bob and Janelle have moved them in to care for them and they can't get away a lot so we go there, sit on there beautiful front porch in lovely Akron Ohio, smoke cigarettes (Scott doesn't inhale) and drink wine, eat to much and talk about life and I am so grateful for porch nights. Our kids meet us there a lot, usually stop by on the way to somewhere else but they love porch nights too. Janelle's son Ryan usually comes on Sunday's when he's not being a rock star (he's the lead guitarist of Red Sun Rising) and somehow we always end up talking about when they were all little, how Ryan teased Cory to no end and how Cory tried to stab Ryan when he was 9 (ahhh memories). So the 6 of us have become our own little group of old people friends, I always wanted that because my parents had that and it looked so fun. I remember poker parties with my Mom's cousins and their husbands. So life is taking on a whole new vibe about now and I am not sure what to do with it, I am "Happy and Sad Together" to quote The Innocence Mission. It is very nice having Cory back home, I know it's just for a bit but I love it. Emma is out of the house, Marisa is moving to Vermont in a matter of weeks now actually and that doesn't compute yet. So that positive with a negative thing can be looked at many different ways, lucky to have positive AT ALL, negative keeps you humble, balance is the key, all positive would make you write stupid songs anyway right? So off they all go, and I spend many hours alone at home now, but HEY...I have a home to spend those hours in and I am forever grateful, I love my house with it's leaky roof and ugly basement but I LOVE IT. I may not have loved the city of Hudson for a while, being an Akron gal but I actually have fallen back in love with it, just like my husband, it's where I belong. The people hurt me here, not all of them, not most of them but some of them. We were talked about, especially my daughter, by people who don't know us, wouldn't understand us if they did so water, bridge, who cares. But I have many friends here, and I am grateful that I can drive 5 min and have coffee in my pj's on my friends porch if I want to, meet for lunch at Aladdins, walk downtown with my dogs and I feel at home again. I have re-embraced my old friends too, whom I have missed and whom I misunderstood and was misunderstood by. So here I am 53, kids grown, money scarce, still working my butt off for chump change as they say, still singing because I don't know how not to, still socially smoking though every single day I quit, still eating Ben and Jerry's at midnight when someone hurts my feelings, still laying in bed watching re-runs of Downton Abbey, Merlin and Sherlock with my dogs, bleaching my kitchen, burning to many candles, and cooking to much food in the home where I raised children, took care of my dying Mother (at the same time) who eventually left the world through one of my upstairs bedrooms, and it's all fine and as it should be. I am so thankful for lessons learned, experiences had, friends made and while I can't jet off to Scotland as planned I can sit in my backyard surrounded by nothing but trees and animals and friends and family when they stop by, and they always do. I may not be driving a new car with heated seats and On Star with DVDS for the kids but it's OK (I LOVED THAT DAMN VAN) I can still drive and while it's a borrowed van from Scott's Sister with over 200,000 miles, it works and it has a radio and though I would not have believed it 4 years ago, it suits me just fine these days. So some of the things I have always wanted to do I am doing, and some of the things I always thought I would do, I am not and so what really. I have taken to antiquing and thrift storing and I have gone from Office Manager of a Theater and Professional Musician (which is my hobby now not my livelihood) to cleaning lady and piece worker so if you put it in Downton Abbey terms, I have moved from upstairs to down and I have found that downstairs is WAY more fun.....until next time when I talk about getting my DNA ancestry chart and finding out I am not related to the man I knew as my Father........Tracey
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