I have green eyes, just like you....

Apparently I once told my green eyed mother, "I have green eyes, just like you." Well, if you know me or have seen any photos of me, you know my eyes are as brown as brown can be. My eyes may not be the color green of my mother's, but they are green today for other reasons.

It's not easy for me to admit, but they are green like the green-eyed monster of jealousy. It's not pretty, but unfortunately it's true. I figure, the first step is admitting it.

I am jealous of people who don't have to constantly use pictures to communicate (or attempt to) with their child.

I am jealous of people that don't have to lock their cabinets and refrigerators because of more than the normal kid-getting-into-cabinet-and-spilling-entire-packages-0f-cereal/gatorade/rice/milk/soda/bread/mother's sanity that other people have to deal with daily.

I am jealous of people who don't have to battle to keep their children into carseats. And by battle, I mean BATTLE. As in I have wounds. Bruises, scratches, bite marks, pinches. I have yet to have a broken bone although my nose begs to differ. (And, yes, I know that my nose is cartilage. But broken cartilage can't feel much better, especially when it's on the front of your face. Oh, I forgot that my elbow, which had been fractured about 20+ years ago has swelling and brusing and could be micro-fractured again. Yep. Just because someone's sister got out of the car without him.

I am jealous of people that don't lie partially awake every night worrying that their child will again figure out how to get windows open and climb out just because the outside is so damned tempting.

I am jealous of people that get naps.

I am jealous of people who have outside assistance so that there is respite.

I am jealous of people that don't have to wipe poop off their 5 year olds on top of all of the other shit.

I am jealous of people who are stronger than I and have created a world for themselves where they provide help to others, can ask for help from others, can accept help from others and then get a home built especially for them to make their struggles easier. (yay for the family that has a home and land and are financially secure and were lucky enough to have ABC come build them an extreme home and get a Hawaiian vacation out of it.)

I am jealous of people that can pee in peace.

I am jealous of people that don't have shredded toilet paper carpeting their floors.

I am jealous of people that don't have to interrupt their selfish blogging time to clean up spilled mountain dew because I forgot to put it in the locked refrigerator.

I am jealous.

A dream is a wish your heart makes. Until your Mom breaks it.

"I want to hold Mickey's hand and watch the stars!" There is just no way to convey how compelling those words were when uttered by Maggie when she was about 3 years old and Disney was running ads about dreams coming true for the millennium and a child is holding Mickey Mouse's hand and watching the fireworks. Maybe if you'd seen her wide brown eyes begging from under bangs that had needed trimming for about two months as she clasped one hand into the other in illustration of holding Mickey's you'd get it. But you weren't there and it wasn't your heart being squeezed in between those hands. I actually burst into tears and promised I would someday take her.

I looked into it, was going to take out a 401k loan to take her, but decided to use the money to move to Albuquerque that year instead. Sorry Maggie.

About a year and a half later, though......Spring Break Kindergarten for Maggie, my BFF Melissa and her son Dakota, (7 months older than Maggie) flew into Albuquerque for the 13 hour drive to LA--destination DisneyLand. It was truly a magical kingdom and fun. I had the most fun, followed by the 5 and 6 year olds, followed by the only adult in the group, Melissa. Yeah, I admit it. I acted like a giddy child. I'd never been, Melissa had been countless times, and, well, youth is wasted on the young...so I had the most fun. (I remember it all. Maggie has vague memories augmented by the 20+ rolls of film I acquired of our experiences over 5 days. 3 days in the park, 1 cold rainy-ish day at the ocean, 1 afternoon at the top of the precipice of the Grand Canyon, and then two or three days of travel, which barely count.)

At the time of the trip of a lifetime, Maggie was obsessed with Little Mermaid. I say obsessed only because it's true and she got it from me. I went to it when it first came out in theaters about 9 times. First on our agenda was to go to see Ariel. (If you've never been to Disney theme parks, the characters are live, life size (or larger) and all over! You can stand in line and see them and get photos and autographs and I'm getting excited all over again just TYPING about it!) *Deep breath--inhale slowly, exhale slowly.....* Ok, I can continue. Maggie had been working on coloring pictures to give to her idol. The photos I have from that experience are priceless. She was so excited about the experience that before falling asleep in her bed that night, she colored about 10 more pictures for Ariel. Day 2 was an opening repeat of Day 1. Ariel first. Maggie was giddy.

So because of her love of Ariel, and she was going to need a new backpack ANYHOW, I found one with Ariel on it when I was Christmas shopping. And since I had already spoiled her rotten with items from me, I thought it would be cute to give her the backpack and sign the card "Ariel". (And if anyone gets their underpants in a wad about it, there better be nothing under YOUR tree from Santa Claus.) Oh, the look of joy on her face that her friend Ariel remembered her! It was the best face ever. Too bad nobody but me got to see it. Eh, stinks to be you guys. Sorry, I was actually IN the moment rather than viewing it from behind the camera. You'll get over it. Of course, you'll never see that face again because of what happened a few years later.

She found out the truth. It took a couple of years. I don't remember when exactly she realized it. But she yells at me constantly about it. "YOU RUINED MY LIFE!" Yes, sometimes she means this because I "lied" to her about Ariel giving her that backpack. She was more upset about THIS than when she figured out Santa=me in our house too. (I wonder if she would rather think she'd been on the naughty list all of those years.)

So, in one year, I made her dreams come true and shattered them. (The shattering actually came a few years after, but hey, it doesn't sound as cool.) And I'm sure that since she just turned 15, she will utter those words again for various reasons. But I would do it again given the chance.

The Wheels on the Bus Go Round & Round....like my brain!

I don't know why Colby decided at the beginning of ESY classes that he couldn't handle riding on the bus. He did just fine for two years before that, minus the week or so that he was on the bus too long and his behavior changed and then we changed everything about the bus pick up time. At that point, he adapted and was again just fine on the bus. Mr. Mark and the assistants were great. I had no reason to believe that his ONE trip to school on the bus with the new driver would be any different. But he absolutely would not get on the bus after class that day. And thus began our ritual of going to and from school with Mom (me).

Beginning of school year this year and Mr. Ed and Ms. Carolyn came by to start the ritual of bus riding to school again. He got on and I could hear his screaming through the closed doors. I've learned to sometimes close my ears to the sound. Tatiana and I were in the yard playing around and once again it crossed my mind that I wished I could get on the bus and help them get him in his seat. I was sure he was scared and scaring the other children on the bus. But given all of the press about parents on buses that have abounded as of late (yelling at other kids, trying to help their child in the middle of a seizure, etc--all parents facing criminal charges...even the one assisting her child in the middle of a seizure...what is WRONG with THAT picture people. If she hadn't assisted that child NOT on the bus, she'd be facing neglect/abuse charges...maybe that ought to be another blog post.) I was almost ready to go back into the house. At this point, Mr. Ed (not a horse at all, a nice man) came off the bus and asked for my assistance. A couple of very sweaty, muscle cramping moments later, I told him we should just try again tomorrow and that I would take Colby to school. After taking him to school, I copied the instructions for the $115+ harness I purchased since APS department of transportation had not yet seen fit to get one as requested (and required) and gave them to Mr. Ed when I went to pick Colby up.

Next morning, tried to get his harness on Colby. He got out. Seriously started thinking that perhaps somewhere in my child's ancestry is someone named HOUDINI. We tried ONCE to get Colby in the seat without the harness. Yeah, shorter version of the day before. Ed then said his bus company had a harness and we'd try it. Yeah, that didn't work either. Ed then came up with the idea that perhaps I could ride with Colby and he would just bus me home afterwards. Yeah, that one didn't fly with his bus company bosses. At this point, Colby has just been being "bussed" to school via our personal vehicles. It's worked out ok. (Since now I'm unemployed, I have PLENTY of time to take him to and fro school.)

So, imagine my delight when his class was going to go to the pool at the University--by bus. I was happier hearing they were going to go on the city bus. I was still going to go just to help out...but then plans changed and OH JOY we were going to go on a big yellow bus. As predicted, as soon as Colby figured out that we were headed for the bus, he went berserk. Mr. Jay and I managed to manhandle him to the point where Ms. Michelle could assist. We got him kicking and screaming on the bus. As soon as I sat in the seat next to him, he stopped screaming. He did wrap his little arm around my arm and clung on for dear life. I leaned away from him to assist another student with his seatbelt and Colby started thinking I was leaving and his grip started cutting off circulation. He held onto me all the way to the pool. He wasn't very talkative and loooked pensively out the window.

An hour or so at the pool having a delightful time later we started towards the bus for the ride home. Colby held my hand and just walked right on the bus as if it were his private limousine. Maybe after a few trips he will be ready to do it without Mom. Maybe. And maybe Mom will be ready.

The next day,

I got nothin'

I may have to resort to a little writing prompts game a friend of mine and I used to do when we were in college....pulling a word from the dictionary and writing about it. If I don't get the creative juices flowing again--)a YEAR since my last posting!?!?!), I might just explode.

It's lame and embarrassing. And I may need to do it and quickly so I don't just write about how difficult things are right now.