Katrina's Nonsoapy Journal

June 3, 2003

Amazing.  What a life I have.  I can't believe what happened to me today. 

I was walking Dylan to the school after parking a couple of blocks way from the school (see previous rant on how people drive around schools - grr).  As we were walking toward the school, we walked past a lady who was watching her child walk up to the school.  That's normally what I do with Dylan, walk him part way and let him run up the rest of the way.  She had her eyes shielded against the sun with one hand and held a toddler on her hip with the other, which was the side nearest me.  As I walked past the lady with the baby, she said, "Uh oh," and I didn't think anything about it until a few steps later when I said to Dylan, "I smell poop."  In fact, I smelled human poop and when I looked down, I saw that her child had shat upon my foot!  I mean, how often does that happen?  Here I am with a foot covered with golden goo, seeping between my toes and into the seams of my open toed sandals!  I looked back and she was scurrying into her car like mad, then burned away.  >:<  I don't know the exact temperature in Sacramento at that time, but I'm guessing it was about 98.6.  I started wiping my flippers around on the grass, trying to clean it off so it at least wasn't squishing between my toes.  Back at the car, I found Eric had a bottle of water with about a half inch left in it and a grease rag in the trunk, so I got most of it cleaned up with that.  When you are walking around and a bird shits on your head, you pretty well figure that them's the breaks, but how do you go about expecting that somebody else's kid is going to projectile poop on your foot as you walk by?

* * *

I am a Virgo and therefore, it is mandatory that I have major control issues.  I have worked hard to diffuse them a bit, but still, they hang around.

This thing with "the business" [that my husband, Eric, is starting] is killing me.  The lady who was interested in investing has given an enthusiastic affirmative and says she is pulling all of her investment out of a staffing company she co-owns and will be putting it into the company Eric, Mike and Dan are starting.  They have several people wanting to contract them into jobs starting immediately and they can't really give any info on when they can start work until they hear from her.  They have enough inventory to do small jobs (they have a couple of those as well), but they can't do any major projects until their financial backing comes in.  They haven't heard from the lady in a couple of days and I've tried hard to not say anything.  For me, I'd be on the phone to her telling her that there are a number of people waiting for them to start working and they need a TIME FRAME of when she projects her investment to be made.  Not a specific hour, but an idea of days or weeks or whatever.  His theory is "we don't want to pressure her," which I understand, but MY theory is, "this is business" and "time waits for no man." 

Every day, they get new info, always good and I'm exhilarated by how well things are moving.  I just wish they'd find out about the important stuff.  >:<  I told my friend, Georgia, today that trying to speak "man" is like trying to speak "dog."  So today, he finally agreed that they might need a timeline to consider and that she was the one holding the calendar, so hopefully, they'll know something in the next few days. 

* * *

Dylan's fake birthday party is Saturday.  His real birthday is July 5, but he wanted to have his party during the school year, so we're going to move it up.  I'm having it at a local park to limit the clean up and make directions easier.

* * *

I don't like being a sensitive person, but it really makes my spine hurt when someone calls me, "Kat."  My best friend in high school, Sandy, called me Kat and still does, but she's the only human allowed to do so.  Two of my prior significant others absolutely insisted on it, despite my narrowed eyes and piercing stares.  I'm a different and stronger person now, so I don't think I'd be as generous about it as I was then.  Back then, I was still concerned about people liking me and not offending, to the exclusion of what I felt, thought or needed.  Screw that.  My ex-husband still insists on calling me, "Kathy," which was what my family used to call me.  I've told him that I now go by "Katrina" (my actual name), but he figures he doesn't have to honor that.  I don't know if it's arrogance or laziness on his part or if he is trying to remind me of who I was when I was with him or what.  Fortunately, I don't have to speak with him often (ever). When I went back to Kentucky when my mother died, of course everyone there called me "Kathy" because that's who I always was. I don't even know if many of my relatives in my extended family even know I have a given name that's not "Kathy."  Back there, it fits for me, so I don't worry about it.  Now, if people persist in calling me "Kat" after I've asked them not to, I return the favor by calling them some abbreviation of their name that they likely do not appreciate.

* * *

I miss Iyanla.  :(  Iyanla Vanzant is someone that I discovered on Oprah Winfrey a few years ago and I was instantly in love.  She is the author of books like "Yesterday, I Cried" (her autobiography), "Faith in the Valley" (about having grace through crisis) and "One Day My Soul Just Opened Up" (a FABULOUS book).  I had the books on audiotape and used to listen to them when I would walk aerobically, back in the olden days.  (roll your eyes here)  This means that when I think of the books, I hear her wonderful voice.  She used to do this thing where she'd put one palm onto her forehead and the other at the base of her head and say, "Breathe... breathe..." and it was all just so lovely.  I taught Lamaze childbirth classes for seventeen years and breathing through the pain is something I identify with in a profound way.  After seeing the effects on literally thousands of laboring women over the years (seeing with my own eyes for many, many) and feeling it for myself five of six births, I can vouch for it enthusiastically and so why should I think its benefits would be limited to childbirth?  I certainly use it at the dentist office and in other stressful situations, so why not emotionally and spiritually painful circumstances?  Our pain is seldom limited to the physical. (just breathe!)  Oxygen in a marvelous drug, as anyone who has ever hooked up to a mask can attest and breathing deeply is one of the finest ways to regain or maintain self-control and composure.  Just breathe.  We tell hysterical people to take deep breaths for that very reason (after we slap the shit out of them to get their attention).  When we meditate, we slow our breaths considerably to rest our minds and help us to move into those precious delta brainwaves.  On that level, wisdom is more accessible and thoughts are much clearer.  Breathing = good.  So that's how she got my attention.

She is such a positive and infectiously spiritual person that I felt drawn to her in a way I've seldom felt with anyone else.  I was elated to find the books she'd written easily available.  I was even more excited when I heard she was getting her own talk show.  I thought it would be wonderful and it was.  The thing was, she was interviewing ordinary people doing extraordinary things and in a Jerry Springer world, it just doesn't fly, so she was moved to 2am after just a few months and then she was just *gone*.  She has a group she has founded called "Inner Visions" and it looks wonderful. 

The only snag I've ever felt with anything she's said is that the majority of her books are geared specifically to "women of color" and her wisdom is peppered with comments of "as women of color..." and "the problems facing women of color..."  It's a little jarring, because her wisdom is so easily applicable to ANY person, not just "women of color."  I was able to smooth through it by reminding myself (and possible Iyanla), that I, myself, am not clear or even opaque.  I have a color as well and because my ethnicity is Caucasian does not mean that I am without challenges and sorrows.  That let me include myself in her clique, which eased the jolt.  I wish we were at a place as viewers where enough people could have appreciated what she was doing to allow her show to continue.  It was lovely.  I miss her.

* * *

I need a giant dumpster and a lot of medication or liquor.  I'm not talking about a little metal dumpster like is in the back of stores, I'm talking about a dumpster that is one of those size of a truck trailer dumpsters.  I need my kids to go do something really engrossing, safe and fun for about 4-5 days.  During that time, I want to take the drugs or drink the drinks that will fuzz me out enough that I don't get all emotional and teary so that I can ruthlessly go through my house and divest myself of the crap that is backed up in my house and my life.  I am such a packrat and I keep way too much stuff that ought not be kept.  Four or five days of pitching and tossing should about do it.  That would make my house easier to organize and keep clean and might even let me walk through my garage without risking life or limb.  I also need for things to disappear as soon as they hit the dumpster so that I have no hope of screaming and throwing myself into said dumpster to retrieve some precious piece of shit that I regret throwing out at the last minute.  Hmm.  I guess if the crap is going to disappear as soon as it goes in, I can have a smaller dumpster.

* * *

Concerned about the amount of crap in my garage, I asked 3 people on our block why their damned garages were so clean when I knew they had kids.  What was all their junk?  Each had an out.  One had a storage unit, one had a storage shed out back and one had a huge attic.  *swish!*  I was beginning to think there was something seriously wrong with me.  I do know I've got more than I should have, so that is a project on my list for this year.

* * *

Is it just me or does it seem that school years are off any more?  My kids have done both year round and traditional school years over time (I prefer year round, in case you're wondering) and we are now on the traditional calendar with this school.  My kids get out of school the middle of June and start the end of August.  Didn't we used to get out in May and start in September?  Am I remembering fuzzy?  Also, I know we had to make up snow days and STILL we got out in May if I remember correctly. 

* * *

Why are weight loss supplement commercials so damned offensive?  A few weeks ago, I commented on a Jenny Craig commercial where Ms Pert says, "When you weigh 180, you DON'T want to be reminded!!"  Crazy psycho bitch.  Now I'm watching a Xenadrine commercial where a number of supposedly newly thin people sneer, "I can't BELIEVE I used to look THAT shitty" and "I'll NEVER look like THAT again."  Invariably, their fat weights are less than I weigh now.  Pfft.  I've been thin and I've been fat, but if and when I get thin again, I hope I'm not a total condescending asshole about it.  If I am, feel free to just knock the complete shit out of me.

* * *

Dr Phil is starting to scare me a bit.  You know I love the guy, but lately, he's been having these shows on fat people and overeating and such and to all appearances, everyone with a weight problem has some huge, soul wracking pain that they are eating over to "medicate themselves with food."  Invariably, Phil can get them reduced down to a sobbing mass of self-revelation, but no matter how much I have opened myself to the dark places in my psyche, I can't seem to hit on it.  OK, I have martyr issues.  OK, I miss having had a mom and needing to nurture the world in her stead.  OK, I hate that my first husband was not the most life affirming, ego-stroking person in the world.  Meanwhile, my impression is that I just like to eat.  Eating is fun.  Eating is easy.  Eating is... simple.  Eating is nurturing.  God, Dr Phil, don't make me cry. 

* * *

My poor husband has been fighting a battle with cigarettes since before I knew him.  I really feel his pain and it has helped him understand the the weight loss (or lack thereof) issue with me.  He's a fine man and a strong, willful, determined man, but this seems to be one vice he just can't kick yet.

The one thing I have to admit is that he's one of the very few men who really do look good smoking. There aren't very many.  Most guys just look like a junkie getting a fix, but there are some men who make it an art form.  I don't know for sure what it is, but seeing a man squint into a cigarette his has hidden in the cup of his hand while he takes a drag awakens some primal something in me.  Not all men, as I said, but some men.  Here are a few:

James Dean & Bo Hopkins

John Travolta and Harvey Keitel

Harvey Keitel, Jim Jarmusch and John Travolta
(Yes, Harvey and John look good enough to get mentioned twice)

Clint Eastwood & Michael Madsen

Yum.

Kissing a man who taste like he just licked an old ashtray isn't exactly stimulating to me, but there are a few drags from a cigarette that when you get a second hand taste, it's pretty nice.

Smoking = Bad

Smoking sometimes = Really a turn on

Or course, having the guy be really cool, tough and not redneck or trailer trash is a really big component in the whole "looking cool while smoking" crusade.  They also have to be a reasonable age because anything close to peach fuzz face makes me go into Mommy mode and want to slap that thing out of their baby face and smack their asses home to their moms to apologize and do a few loads of dishes for atonement.

And with that, I'm outta here for another day to *sigh* clean the dungeon.  Also, for all of the well-meaning and loving people who have referred me to Flylady, she and I just don't get along.  I tried her last year and just could not hang with the bitching.  Thanks anyway!

Hope you have a stellar night!!  All things here are clear!

Love,
Katrina

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