One Year.

One year ago today my husband and I started that faithful journey known as marriage. And what a year it has been indeed. We went skydiving and then discovered I was pregnant with baby #2. Rudy started college and I started work and then we suddenly decided it was time for a change, again. So we packed up everything and moved from Minnesota to Arizona where we now live today, with two daughters, two cats, and hopefully no scorpions.

I get jealous when I read about my friends going on expensive, special trips for their anniversaries because we can't even afford to go buy more butter so I could bake a cake. No cake for us. I sit here in my pajamas at nearly two in the afternoon and wonder how this annoying pink spot showed up on the duvet cover, while simultaneously telling my daughter to stop shrieking at the top of her lungs. Happy Anniversary indeed!

Rudy is in the clubhouse studying, and while I'll consider finally throwing myself under some hot water, I may first put Afton to bed and look for some music to inspire me into doing something other than nothing.

It is my anniversary, after all.

Confusing the Story.

I get annoyed sometimes. Especially when times are tough. Mostly, I get annoyed at people who try to tell me stories of how someone else survived and I can do it too! For example, my recruiter told me that another consultant lost her job in January, her husband's in February, AND they have 5 kids ranging in age from 15 to 1. But she stepped up her game and was able to support the family on her sales alone. Wow. If she can do it, I can too, right?

What she fails to see, or understand, is that we are not the same. They have older kids, and had older jobs. I am fairly certain they grossed more than 19,000 a year, combined. I don't even think Rudy and I make that much combined. They are people with houses and savings accounts, stocks, bonds, CDs and IRAs. They are people who have something to fall back on because they had the means to save in the first place. When you make as little as we do, there is no saving because there isn't anything to save. Every penny goes to rent and bills and food and diapers. If there is anything leftover, which rarely happens, we usually get something for Afton, like a toy, or a book. Or we go buy some lightbulbs, because everybody needs lightbulbs.

What I'm saying is, just because someone else had no job and had kids, doesn't mean we're the same story. We're not. We have nothing. Any little mishap could break us. Our windshield could break us. Because we are not the same story. And no one even bothers to consider what a story truly is. My story isn't done, but it feels like it, certainly.

If it wasn't for bad luck, we'd have no luck at all.

I am not afraid/I am afraid.

We collect books that tell us what to do because we don't know what to do. We ask our mothers, our grandmothers and our friends what to do because we don't know what to do. And every single source says something different, so what are we supposed to do?

I am not afraid. As infants, my children slept on their stomachs, in my bed, under the covers. I know SIDS exists and is a reality for some, but I am not afraid. I don't strip the crib bare, I don't use humidifiers, de-humidifiers or vaporizers because someone else thinks it may decrease the chance of my children dying of SIDS by 1%. They sleep on their stomachs because that is what's comfortable to them. For me, that is love.

I am not afraid. I feed my children early because they have hearty appetites that aren't quenched simply by milk. I fed Afton peanuts and eggs and seafood before she was even one years old, because I believe if someone is going to be allergic, they will be allergic regardless of when you introduce the food. I also believe that early introduction of different foods has expanded Afton's palette and allows her to not be as picky as other children. She eats everything. Even spicy foods. I feed them because I am not afraid, and because I was fed early and the only things I'm allergic to are pollen and dander. For me, that is love.

I am not afraid. I let my children pick toys up from the ground and put them in their mouths. Same with food. I don't rub every surface with antibacterial products, and I don't slather myself and my children with it either because I am not afraid. I do wash my hands and their hands in regular soap, and I bathe them when they are dirty, but I let them get dirty because to me, it's what they should do. For me, that is love.

I am afraid. I am afraid that if I yell at my children too loudly, or even at all in public, someone may report me as a child abuser. I don't tell people that I stopped breastfeeding at six weeks because I don't want to see the eyes that say I didn't try hard enough as a mother and I don't talk about using whiskey on my teething children because I don't want someone thinking I'm an alcoholic child abuser. I keep everything to myself because people are uptight and afraid of everything, because they want to protect their children from everything and I want to expose them to everything. I keep it all to myself because I am afraid of everyone else.

But, for me, that is love. I make no apologies for who I am and how I raise my children, because I am not afraid.

Bake me Baked.

When I worked on the Riverwalk in San Antonio, I would often have customers who partook in various drugs such as cocaine and marijuana. One of my more...gypsy-like customers would peddle his weed brownies and cookies. They were delicious, soft and chewy, and they left you with an unbelievable high. Well, not for me, it was too much and I would sleep for like...16 hours straight.

There is a point to this, somewhere.

Rudy and I started watching Weeds the other day and Rudy became so inspired he now wants to start his own bakery filled with deliciously psychedelic goodies. The key to all of it would be the butter, of course, which is quite an endeavor to make properly. Then I would do all the baking, since I am a master baker and can make almost anything imaginable. After that the samples would be passed out, to get people hooked on the goods, and next thing you know, we're millionaire drug lords!

That's why it only happens on TV. It's a nice thought though, and would be even better if it was legal!

Born on the 4th of July

Meet the newest additions to our expanding family! We rescued these two little guys from a wiener shack on the very southern edge of Gilbert off Williams Field Road, approaching cattle country. In reality, we were lost trying to locate an apartment complex and ended up at a gas station where we noticed a sign for free kittens. In jest, Rudy asked if I wanted to go see the kitties, which I of course replied "Duh" and off we went.

The next thing I knew, Rudy had three kittens in his hands which landed on the passenger seat of the car. I looked them over and Rudy decided he didn't want a certain kitten while I clutched the other two to keep them from crawling under the seats. He came back out from behind the wiener shack and to my surprise he said we would take the other two! So we started for home and giggled about such a silly adventure. Saving strays from a wiener shack. How odd it sounds. Even odder was our quest for names.

I'm the kind of person who enjoys randomly weird names. I wanted to name my cat Chuck, regardless of whether or not it was a girl. Then I relayed the story of how Salem got his name, which gave birth to the names Stiffy and Cooter. After that we thought of patriotic names, since we saved them on the 4th of July, after all. I was still stuck on Chuck at that point. It really is an awesome name for a cat. Once home we started browsing online for interesting cat names such as Lolcat (how do you even say that?), Fluffling, and Dammit. I really liked Dammit. After that I told Rudy he should name his cat Fizz, and he said to name myself Fizz (no you!), and finally I giggled and said he should stop being such a Fizzle. We both broke out in laughter at the Family Guy reference, and Rudy told me there was no way I could name my cat Fizzle.

Guess what? I named her Fizzle. Oh, at this point I should let you know that both cats are female. Poor Rudy, he can't even rescue a male cat. He's doomed to be surrounded by females.

Rudy hasn't yet named his kitty, and we've had very many politically incorrect conversations about what to call her. In the meantime, the kitties are getting acquainted with being strangled by Afton and where it is appropriate to poop. They are fun to watch play, and I cannot wait for them to start really warming up to us!