The Needs Merry Go Round

Can you tell I'm still pissed? I tried to have a conversation with his majesty the king. Psssh. It's like talking to a brick wall. Humans have needs. I get that. It would be nice if he'd share them with me. He likes to act like I'm not meeting his needs. I might not be for all I know. How can I know? He won't say. Maybe that's a control thing. Maybe he needs to be miserable, he wouldn't be the first person on the planet like that.

Here's the thing. I have needs to. Where I ask him what they are, only to be met with a refusal to say, he doesn't even ask me. He just doesn't care. All he thinks about is himself. It's like he needs to be a martyr, poor him, with his horrible wife. He doesn't like me to meet his friends, they will get to know me and realize that I'm not the harpy he says I am. True, I am probably nastier to him than I am to anyone else, but I'm not horrible.

He's so stupid! I have this urge to repeatedly punch him in the head, right in the nose. He's not happy, I'm not happy, yet he doesn't want to have any kind of meaningful conversation. Stupid ass.

Yet what can I do? In the end, I still love him. I do want to work on things. I don't want to be unhappy and I don't want him to be unhappy. You hear of or know these great couples, but are they really that great? Are they living lives of quiet desperation or are they truly a happy team? Are great marriages something that Hollywood sells us or is it a possibility? Are we all so damaged that what we take for happiness is really just some nasty form of co-dependence? Maybe. Who knows.

We are a nation of adults that were raised by single parents. (not across the board, I'm just making a point) So what do we even know of relationships? Promiscuous male celebrities are praised but when the celebrity is a female, she's a whore. What is right?

Where do we go from here?

Tired

I am so tired of double standards. My husband has certain expectations of me, but god forbid if I have expectations from him. Sure, I could keep the house cleaner. Sure, I could workout more. What he wants isn't exactly out in left field. Except that he doesn't feel that I have a right to put any demands on him. I am so pissed off right now.

His majesty the fucking king wants me to loose weight. He's right, I weigh an unhealthy amount. However, he couldn't be bothered to be supportive. Support isn't nitpicking, criticizing, or basically harassment. Who the hell is he that he can act like this, but have a damn heart attack if I ask him to do something for me. Like pick up his fucking socks???

That brings up another thing. He expects me to keep the house perfectly clean. Not such a bad demand on the surface, but he's a slob. Too lazy to go to the damn bathroom, the man pees in jugs, milk gallons, and bowls. It's foul and I refuse to dump them. No, they don't sit around in the living room, he usually sleeps in the attic. To sleep, he needs a movie and food. I can't sleep like that, so he has his "man room". The cat peed on the futon cover and he never washed it. I'm not welcome in that room, so I don't clean it. The cat peed on it years ago, and continues to pee on it. Add the cat pee to rotting bowls of food and bowls and jugs of pee. Yeah, who the hell is he to bitch about a small mess?

Can you tell he got home from work tonight in a mood? We went through a really rough patch over the summer. I owned up to my mistakes in the marriage but he's not man enough to do the same thing. The ass can't take responsibility for his own mistakes, everything must be my fault.

He's bitching that he's stuck home tonight. Not my fault that he never kept in contact with his friends and the only one who still talks to him is too tired to go out. Not my fault, nor my problem. While my social life isn't as active as I'd like it, for the time being there's nothing I can do about it. So why complain about something that in the immediate time I can't change? I swear, the man's middle name is whiner. I've never met anyone who complains as much as he does. Quite frankly, I'm tired of it.

If you aren't living in the solution, you are living in the problem. That's a little gem I picked up from Alanon. It's a glorious bit of wisdom. He'd never listen to it, everyone else is the cause of his issues. Strike that, I am the cause of his issues. I ruined his life. I caused his misery. Whatever.

Raindrops Keep Falling On My Head

Ah, what is that sound? Could it be a plumbing leak? Or did my home come with a waterfall. Oh, no waterfall feature, just a waterfall from the bathroom.

Damn.

I finished my bathroom floor a bit ago and then the entire sewer line decided that after 117 years of faithful service, it was time to retire. Why couldn't it have done that BEFORE settlement?

I took a billion pics, here are the highlights:

Cast iron sewer line.

The mess they made while cutting the ceiling out to get at the leak.

Oh, yeah, the bathtub drain was leaking, too, and there was a floor joist in the way, so this was their solution. Honestly, these guys were very professional and this was truly the only option that didn't involve cutting the joist. It reminds me of that old windows screen saver with the moving pipes.

The final picture of the damage. We have to let the ceiling dry out before we replace it. That's fine, we just spent a bazillion dollars on plumbing work!

It's Been A Busy Month

Oops, it's October already. How did that happen? School started, boxes were unpacked, and life went on. I really meant to update this thing with some sort of regularity. Ah, such is life.

Two weeks ago I was finally able to get an evaluation for my oldest son, Xavier. He's a delightful child who is hyper as all hell, defiant, and at times, obnoxious. There are two sides to him, the sweet side and the devil side. He is eight, and I've struggled parenting him since day one. He's always needed more, more of my time and energy. He was diagnosed ADHD and ODD, which is oppositional defiant disorder. No one who knows him well was surprised. NO ONE. I did a happy dance in the parking lot of the mental health office. I finally have answers, and with answers, comes help.

The hubby, Bob, rode in a charity bike ride on Saturday. I'm so proud of him. I couldn't pedal 80 miles! Hell, I don't think I could go one.

In other news, I finished my bathroom floor. The ugly cream and green checker asbestos tiles are gone, replaced with shiny white ceramic tile. I have repaired the toilet about five times, including pulling the whole damn thing up three times. Gotta love home ownership!

Actually, I'm in love with this house. I still walk around and giggle to myself, we own a home! It's ours!

Today of the First Day of the Rest of the Year

Hear that sound? The whining and feet dragging? That would be my beloved children going back to school. New teachers. A new routine. This has been a crazy summer and I don't have enough words to say how relieved I am that school is back in session.

I am trying to come up with a decent routine for school. I am not a morning person, as my sister can attest to. Coming up with something that suits four people, only one of which is an early riser, is challenging.

Getting the baby to bed is the biggest challenge. I almost feel like nothing else will get done until he's asleep. For now, I sit next to his bed until he falls asleep. He rolls around. He asks to brush his teeth again. He lists every last person he knows and asks what they are doing. Sigh. He doesn't nap anymore, so getting a good night's sleep is really important.

In other news, I spent the better part of three days in the most god awful heat, digging holes. When we moved in, there was a single clothesline. I don't own a dryer, and I don't intend on ever owning one. The clothesline broke. Not the line part, the pole part. It just wasn't fixable. Hubby got a new one, and I put them in the old holes. There wasn't any concrete, so I thought it would be ok.

They fell over.

Ok, off to Home Depot. I got quick setting concrete, thinking, surely this will do the trick. I'm not Bob Vila, but I AM pretty handy. The kids and I had a good time digging the holes. I poured the concrete and thought that was a job well done.

They fell over.

Back to Home Depot I go. I talk with some random employee walking by, and at his suggestion, get two bags of concrete. I am to redig the holes, going down in a v shape for the old concrete ball, then wider, for the new concrete.

The heat index was 110. I ran out, dug a bit, and ran back in to sit in front of the fan. That kind of heat is just illegal, or should be, anyway.

Finally, Saturday evening, the clothesline was put back up. Sunday I really needed to do laundry. We were out of almost all of the clothes, except the ones that rarely get worn.

The load of laundry finished. I stood in the yard, eyeing the line warily. I was so afraid that it would fall down again, but we were about to totally run out of clothes. Tenatively, I began hanging up my laundry.

It held.

Huzzah!

ssssPAckle

Yes, say it outloud, just like that. ssssPAckle. It's kind of fun. Can you guess what I've been doing the last few days? The attic is my husband's "man" room, and it needs a lot of spackle. I like to spackle, it's kind of soothing in a way. Then again, I also like watching laundry in a washer.

We are really settling in. I began the process of tiling the bathroom floor. The old floor was cream and green checker board in ancient linoleum tile. It looked lovely. This house is odd, the previous owner kept everything in good repair except the bathroom and kitchen floors. It's all good, I'm beyond happy to be in my own space, that we own. That is ours. OURS.

Except that I irritated my shoulder spackling. A lot of the cracks and dings were over my head, so my arm was up in the air. Ten years ago or so I was wrestling with my younger brother. My younger brother who has been taller than me since I was 14. He tackled me into a wicker couch that was up against a wall. I didn't dislocate my shoulder, but it hasn't been right since. Right now it hurts.

I'm still glad to be in my own home, sore shoulder and all.

Captain, My Captain

I took a carbon output test to see how environmentally friendly we are. My family scored a 348. I couldn't seem to find whether that is average, high, or low. I know we could score better. For instance, we don't have all halogen bulbs, just some. They are expensive, so as bulbs burn out, we replace them with halogen. So that one will get better.

As we settle in, I'm thinking more green. Growing up, we had rotating chores. One of the chores was the light captain. This person was responsible for going around to rooms and making sure the lights were out. I am going to do that here. That would help our green rating, besides saving on electricity.

I wonder what the average family can do to be more green without spending a ton of money?

That Tricky Air

My sister called yesterday. She is an amazing person, one of the smartest people I know. I seemed to get all of the clumsiness in the family, she got the looks and the brains. However, I was reminded that, while I fall all of the time and she rarely does, she tends to get hurt in spectacular ways.

She got chicken pox first. I can barely stand on skis, she falls once and gets knocked out, complete with a ride down the mountain in an ambulance. I've only had stitches once, not counting the epesiotomy stitches, she's been sewed up twice. I've broken my arm and most of my fingers and toes, and as far as I know, she's never broken a bone, so she's one up on that.

On Sunday, she was leaving a friend's house and turned around while walking down the sidewalk to wave bye. There was a lumpy, bumpy pile of AIR in her way, and being turned around, she didn't see it. She tripped and fell, royally banging up her right knee and severely spraining her left ankle. My poor sister.

I'm sending her good healing vibes. She was supposed to start a new job today, but she can't drive. Her car is a stick shift.

Feel better soon, Sissy!