Swiping

It has been weeks since I did anything remotely resembling housework around our home. One plague-like infection after another rendered me useless for most of the past month. While the teens kept the house from falling into a state of slovenly disrepair, there were things they couldn't do.

Like grocery shop, file this year's taxes or sort through and file the mountain of paperwork I've ignored for the better part of the year all the while hoping it would just spontaneously catch fire so as I wouldn't have to deal with it. 

So I spent this past weekend doing all the things I've put off for far too long.

I went grocery shopping. In the city. On a Saturday afternoon. Because I am a masochist who enjoys fighting angry coupon clippers for the last pack of discounted toilet paper and spending hours standing in unmoving grocery lines.

My kids about wept with gratitude as they hauled in grocery bag after grocery bag of food supplies. 

"Ketchup! You bought us ketchup! I thought only rich people had over-processed tomato condiments! It's a miracle!"

"Bananas! We have BANANAS. I forgot bananas even existed!"

"THERE IS TOILET PAPER AND IT IS NOT THE SCRATCHY KIND!!"

Don't even ask me how they reacted when they realized I bought ice cream. Let's just say, my place as the world's greatest mother hall of fame is guaranteed for as long as the frozen treats and fresh produce last.

But I didn't just grocery shop this weekend. No. I cleaned a bathroom, attended a dance recital, folded laundry, helped Nash with his creative writing assignment, taught my daughter how to write her first cover letter so she could apply for a fancy internship thingamajig AND filed a year's worth of paperwork that had been sitting on my kitchen table, mocking me, for weeks now.

I know, I'm totally bragging. You are all awed and inspired by both my exciting life and unparalleled work ethic.

If only I had known just how truly fascinating my life would one day become. Sigh.

This weekend wasn't a complete wash, however.

While I was filing old tax returns and bank statements and medical reports, my kids wandered into my office (and by office I mean my itsy bitsy teeny tiny bedroom closet where I keep our filing cabinet, hidden beneath dusty dresses and a shiny burgundy suit my husband refuses to let me throw out) to ask me a question.

"Holy cow Mom. Enough papers!" Ken exclaimed as she saw the mess I had scattered about me as I ripped apart the filing cabinet.

"Thanks Tips. I hadn't noticed," I huffed as I tossed another stack of old receipts into the pile headed for the paper shredder.

"Wait, what is this?" Ken asked as she bent down to pick up a small rectangular piece of faded paper.

"What? Oh, that? That's an old credit card receipt."

"But why is it so odd looking?" She held it like it was contaminated and examined it as though it contained the answer to cold fusion.

"It's a swiper receipt. It's how they used to do credit cards."

"A SWIPER?" 

That's when I realized she had zero idea of what I was talking about.

"Ya, back in the day retailers had to make carbon copies of receipts, and there was no such thing as automatic approvals. If you were spending over a certain amount on your credit card the cashier had to pick up a phone, dial the bank and make sure you were authorized to spend that much. Lines were long and shoppers were grumpy. It was about as much fun as getting your teeth cleaned."

"Woah. How did everyone survive like that? It's so inconvenient," she asked EARNESTLY. Like the spoiled, technologically advanced 16-year old she is.

"It's a mystery, kid."

Ken dropped the old credit card receipt and it floated to the ground, another flake of history ready to be shredded with my past. 

I picked up the credit card receipt and looked at the date. 2002. 

I marveled at how much and how little the world has changed in eleven short years. Sure our technology has advanced by leaps and bounds. I can only marvel at what our world will look like in another eleven years.

But as much as that has changed, there will always be parent sitting in his or her closet, trying to organize a mountain of papers while their kid reminds them how obsolete and old they've become.

Thank God she never noticed my very first cell phone I had in the trash pile, buried underneath all the papers. If she saw that old brick, she'd never stop pestering me with questions about what life was like before the wheel was invented.

Bad Touch

I remember the afternoon I first told my parents I had a boyfriend. A real boyfriend, not just some celebrity boyfriend who lived in my imagination, inspired by the pictures I tore out of the latest copy of Teen Beat and tacked to my bedroom walls.

Here's looking at you River Phoenix, may you rest in peace.

I was fifteen years old and swoony over a big blue-eyed blonde boy named Bruce. (I always did have a weakness for alliteration.) I was spending the week with my best friend, who just so happened to be Bruce's cousin and I was excited to tell my folks all about my new beau.

In my teenaged exuberance, I hadn't stopped to take into account how my parents, most specifically my father, would feel about their daughter entering the dating world. I ignorantly thought they'd be as excited as I was. Because! Hearts! Flowers! True Love! Forever!

Since the boy who held my affection happened to be my father's best friend's youngest son, a boy my family had known his entire life, I naturally assumed there would be much praise and congratulations bestowed when I told my parents my wonderful news.

I stood, holding the telephone to my ear, grinning from ear to ear, staring out upon the same fields my father had stared at when he was my age, and waited for one of my parents to answer the ringing phone.

My dad picked up.

I launched into my excited tale, words shot like rapid-fire bullets into his ear, as tiny invisible hearts swirled above my head. 

My dad? He made about as much noise as a rock does as it sits in a driveway. I barely noticed as I chattered on. Innocent and so, so stupid. 

When I finally managed to stop long enough to inhale, my dad asked a question I had not expected:

"Why him? What's so special about him?"

You could say familiarity had bred contempt. You could say my father had maybe hoped I'd date a city slicker instead of the son of his oldest friend. You could even say I had probably shocked him into not really knowing what else to say. Any of this could be true. Perhaps all of it was. 

All I knew was it wasn't the reaction I was expecting. I didn't know how to answer; so shocked and stunned was I by his question.

I muttered something completely inelegant and trite, as were most of the things that came out of my mouth at that age tended to be and I staggered under the weight of my dad's obvious disapproval.

My love bubble had burst. Thanks Dad.

I had forgotten that conversation with my father, and the words he said. I had forgotten his reaction and how, for one second, it made me question everything I had been feeling towards the boy I later ended up marrying.

That conversation, that memory, had long been relegated to the dustiest corners of my brain, eroding a little further with each day that passed. 

And then my daughter started dating a boy she has known for most of her life, the son of a man my husband has known for much of his life. Suddenly, memories I didn't remember I had have all come flooding back to center stage. 

Nostalgia has washed over me, bathing me in the past, reminding me that the innocence I see upon my daughter's face was once mirrored on my own.

Is it wrong that I covet the boyfriend's truck? Complete with haybale for traction?

I never fully realized how soothing nostalgia is as a parental balm. It's probably the only thing that is keeping me from walking around screaming "Bad touch! Bad touch!" every time I see my daughter's boyfriend so much as look at my daughter.

(Okay, so I may have already yelled 'bad touch!' once or twice at them, but it was all in good fun. Maybe.)

But what I've come to realize as my daughter starts to explore her dating world, is that nostalgia isn't such a soothing balm for Bruce. It is more like Tiger's balm. The nostalgia and memories, they burn. Or maybe it is just that daddies are predisposed to growling about their daughter's boyfriends, regardless of how awesome those boyfriends may be.

I am fully enjoying watching my husband navigate this minefield my daughter has so thoughtfully lured him into. It's given me insight into my own father's reactions all those years ago. Because yes, I really did marry my father.

My husband hasn't stopped twitching in weeks. And these two kids haven't even been on a real, un-chaperoned date as of yet. 

If and when that finally happens? Well, I can't guarantee I won't be twitching right along with Bruce. Probably while reminding him that it was all our "bad touches" that lead us to this moment to begin with.

Heaven help us all.

Get Bent

Since I'm one whisker away from official middle age, I've decided it's time to get serious about my health. Since I will never quit chocolate or french fries, this means I need to get serious about exercise. Knox isn't getting any lighter and I can't afford to get any weaker. It's time to shake it like my arse is on fire. I need to get strong.

Like most things in life, though, the saying is easier than the doing. And it's the doing that is tripping me up.

For those of you who haven't been following along over the years, in order to get fit I need to overcome the obstacles of anxiety, depression, an impressively damaged spine, bad hips, weak knees, lungs that are still black from the five years I sucked back as many cigarettes as I could get my hands on, a sausage casing of fat around my middle and arse dimples so deep you could lose a finger if you poked at them.

I am a sexy beastie.

Last year I started running. And by running, I mean cursing loudly when I had enough oxygen in my lungs to do so and trying to wipe away my sweat before I was blinded by the volume of it. I was as graceful as a three-legged elephant trying to do hopscotch, but with persistence and stubbornness it got better.

I now look like a three-legged hippopotamus trying to hop but I get the job done. 

I've learned something about myself in my quest to become a runner. 

I've learned I hate running. I hate running on treadmills. I hate running on asphalt. I hate running on gravel. I hate hills, I hate straight stretches; I hate it all. There isn't much I like about running except for that sweet, sweet moment of when I stop.

And still, I run. Never fast and never really far because I start having visions of jumping in front of moving vehicles to end the dreariness, but still, I run. 

Yet I hate running. I would stop entirely, but since I started running, my back pain is under control. It's been the best pain management I have found. I'm never stopping. Even though I hate it.

But it occurred to me the other day, as I was cussing and huffing my way to the end of yet another run, that I am a grown-arse woman and I can totally find an exercise that I like to do. It doesn't have to be all pain and hardship and hate. 

Enter, yoga.

I've heard good things about yoga. Well, mostly. I once attended a church service where the pastor proselytized about the dangers of yoga, while shaking his fist and invoking the name of the Lord. I just figured he was bitter about not being able to do the crane pose or something. Everyone else I know, loves yoga.

I decided it was time to discover yoga and see what the fuss was all about. So I did what anyone who is serious about learning something new would do: I downloaded a bunch of apps.

What could go wrong?

With my iPhone in hand, I unfolded the yoga mat that had been collecting dust in my closet, opened up the app and pressed 'Start.'

At first, it was a total breeze. "This is so easy!" I thought to myself. "I'm not even breaking a sweat. How is this even considered a work out?"

A few minutes later, I conceded that it may be getting a bit harder, but that was only after I fell on my face after trying to get into a pose I had no business even attempting to get into. 

After stopping, brushing the dust off my nose, restarting the app, this time being sure to use the 'beginner' setting like I should have started with (whoops), I made it through an entire 60 minute workout.

I will be honest. I was feeling a little smug. I totally made that downward dog my bitch. 

I rolled my mat back up, stuffed it back into my closet and phoned my husband. 

"Ya, I don't think yoga is the work out I was looking for. It was way too easy."

"Um, okay. I've seen you try and tie up your shoes. You can't even touch your toes woman."

"Well sure, I had to make some modifications and I went with the easiest, gentlest level, but still Bruce. I think I need to find something more 'active.' Maybe zoomba. Or one of those boot camp type of classes."

"Or maybe you should join a yoga class and learn it properly. Millions of people swear by it. They can't be all wrong."

Nope. I was done. Yoga was way too easy. I got nothing out of it. I want an activity where I can feel the burn, I argued, proving that running really has ruined me and made me insane.

The next morning, I went to roll out of bed and let the dog out of his crate like I always do and that's when it happened.

The yoga train hit me. Apparently, all that yoga stretching and posing was actually doing something. Something like shredding every single muscle in my body into tiny bits and pieces. 

"What's the matter, Mom?" Nash asked as he watched me hobble into the kitchen for my morning coffee.

"Yoga is the matter. I hurt so much. Even my belly fat hurts," I grimaced.

"That's not your belly fat Mom. It's your abdominal muscles under your fat."

Which is really weird, because you know, I thought I got rid of any abdominal muscles I had years ago. Two pregnancies ago at least. 

It turns out yoga comes in like a lamb and roars out like a lion. Those yoga apps should all come with a giant flashing warning for amateurs (and stupid people like me.) PROCEED WITH CAUTION. IT LOOKS EASY BUT TOMORROW YOU WON'T BE ABLE TO WIPE YOUR OWN ARSE YOU WILL BE SO SORE.

So I'm going to keep up with the yoga, along with the running. Because I embrace pain and because there is a pose called happy baby that is both slightly obscene and really happy. This is my type of exercise.

But I'm going to find a class so that I can learn yoga safely and properly. 

I figure the humiliation of learning yoga in public will be counterbalanced by all the Yogi Bear jokes I'll make in my head as I learn.

Hannah-Barbera will be so proud.

***

It's been a tough week filled with a sick boy, a teething puppy and a lot of hospital food. I'm glad the week is over.

 Don't feed the Bear.

What Abbott does whenever I sing. I kid you not.

Boy sized delusions extend to the size of his wheels, apparently.

Pillow talk at nap time. Little sleeping was done.

Buddies.

Have a great weekend everyone. Here's to getting bendy. Without the pain that follows.