Our Angels

September 30, 2013 1758

            The light shines at the end of the tunnel!  Yesterday was my 42 birthday and as most in adulthood went virtually unnoticed.  I was told “Happy Birthday” a lot, but no more big parties or gifts.  I guess they resume those things at 100 years old. 

            But I did get one very big gift from my God yesterday.  I received an answered prayer.  The angel bringing this answered prayer was my friend Kat.  She has opened her home to us and she has been over accommodating.  Each morning as her family start their day The Goat Man and I sleep on her couch and loveseat.  They get ready in the dark and whisper to each other just so we are not disturbed.  Her generosity and consideration has no limit.

            Last week at the beach with The Goat Man’s sister I was taking pictures of my French manicured toes in the sand just as giddy as a schoolgirl.  It was the one thing that made me feel among the humans all summer.  Homelessness (poverty) takes away a person’s humanity.

            The option of buying sanitary products of my choice that I find comfortable went out the window with my money.  The only thing that matters is cheap.  Always in the back of your mind is the knowledge that “that time of the month” will show up when there is no money to buy products.  The products given to you or bought at the dollar store leave you feeling…well…just icky.

            The several showers a day, if needed, to feel acceptable company (especially to a man) is not available.  The simple hair removal taken for granted, deodorant, shampoos, conditioners, perfumes, lotions, and all of those things we pamper ourselves with slowly back away leaving an in human icky hairy unappealing woman.

            I cannot wait to have my first haircut in over a year.  Everyone thought I was growing it out for a new look, but the truth is when your losing everything financially haircuts become frivolous.  I actually miss my make-up.  I admit I am not an everyday wearer, but in a year I don’t think The Goat Man has seen me in make-up three times.  I am not sure he has ever smelled my favorite perfume.

            Now that I write all of this I wonder why he has even stuck around.  I have felt horribly unappealing, less than human, and well, just icky for what seems like forever.  The things we take for granted are the things we miss the most when they are gone.

            Megan, Mike (and his family), Kat (and her family), and Michelle have all been very instrumental in our survival this summer and I want to thank them one more time.  We have met several people along the way and many strangers have helped us also.  Without Crystal and Dave we would have starved in the Crews Lake Forest and been eaten by the bugs. 

            All of them have been our angels.  The Rope Center and The Good Samaritan Clinic have helped us and treated us like humans.  The churches that have given us food, and anyone else I may have forgotten.  Every smile given when we were finding it hard to cope. 

            However, yesterday Kat was our angel.  She is the connection that lead us to a job that pays room, board, and a salary.  We move in and start next Monday.  We have made to the next step.  We made it without stopping my writing or my school.  We now have medications and a doctor that is addressing all of our needs, including The Goat Man’s teeth.  He has been diagnosed with a gum condition that are requiring all of his teeth to be pulled.

            It is a very painful process for him and I am only allowed a minimal amount of kisses (which I don’t really like, but do understand).  However, he has already said his every day pain and pressure behind his eyes became instantly relieved when the first set of teeth were removed.  He has been suffering with “bad” teeth for a couple years.  We are both very happy The Good Samaritan clinic is able to help him.

            We are counting our blessings and we are not taking anything for granted.  We are gladly moving to the next step and cannot wait to conquer that one as well.  It is not how many times you fall that matters, but how many times you get back up.  The Goat Man and I made it through the first year of a long relationship, the summer of homelessness, and we are more in love every day.  He is my “big sexy man.” I say that with a smile.

The Lilacs

September 28, 2013 1646

My grandparents with me at Faros.

            I remember the lilac bushes around her front porch.  They were purple and white, but mostly purple.  I have always loved the smell of lilacs.  Here in Florida lilacs do not grow.  There is a nice smelling impostor, but to those of us who have experience of the lure of a lilac know it smells just a smidgen differently.

            My cousins and me would play every Sunday while the entire family gathered in the garage and ate all the good cooking.  The one thing my family does well is eat.  The porch was surrounded almost completely with bushes, trees, and lilacs like a secret garden.  I have countless hours of play on that porch.  I think of the lilacs every time I drive by the old house.  When my grandpa died my grandma moved out of the house.

            I have had thirty years of wonderful memories since that house with my grandma, but that house holds lilacs, family, food, and memories like very few places in my past.  I remember writing mystery stories with my cousin.  I remember picking rhubarb and making rhubarb pie with my grandma.  All of us sat on her counter and ate bowls of graham crackers and milk.  I remember playing hide and seek in her boiler room and putting on plays for all of the adults in the basement.  I remember my grandma fondly.

            Over the years I have travelled farther and farther away from those lilacs, but I think of her every time I smell lilacs.  I think about the way she would crinkle up her nose and smile from across the room.  That crinkle was the same as a kiss or a hug.  She passed that onto my father; He too crinkles his nose. (So does The Goat Man, but he doesn’t like it when I tell him how much he is like my daddy.)

            There are stories I could tell you about being left in a pumpkin patch and going to pick out the tigers.  I could talk about her brownies or the fact that she spent most of her life worrying.  But, I think she is explained best when I simply say she is my grandma.  She was “grandma” to my friends, my children, and everyone she met.

            My mother called me yesterday to give me an update since she went into the hospital almost a week ago.  She has been moved to the cardiac care unit and developed pneumonia.  She turned 92 years old on August 3^rd.  I have smelled lilacs since that phone call.

            I am an adult and I understand that sometimes life is down right rotten, but I still fight back the tears that come when I realize I don’t have the money to go home.  I don’t have the money to go tell her I love her.  I don’t have the money to go home for her funeral when they lay her next to my grandfather.

            I cannot hold her hand and tell her to quit worrying.  I can’t crinkle my nose for her…

Zooboo at Tampa's Lowry Park Zoo has returned.

Zooboo at Tampa's Lowry Park Zoo has returned.

Metallic green triceratops beetles and more

September 26, 2013 1742

            Sometimes the smallest things in this world are amusing and they take us from the big picture and fling us into the small moments of reality that make up this crazy chaotic world.  These are the moments I do not want to miss.  These are the moments I want to share with my grandchildren.  These are the moments The Goat Man and I call adventures.

            With the constant pull of the world against us we try to find small moments just watching the world go round.  It takes all kinds to make this world go round and that is what makes this the best world to live on.  Of course it’s ability to sustain human life helps the raking also.

            The front porch where The Goat Man promotes his own personal lung cancer by smoking cigarettes crazy things occurs.  Every once in a while, there is a duck parade down the sidewalk, a dead bloated cat that needs to be moved off the sidewalk, and a small statured that walks almost everyday in what The Goat Man calls the mad hatter hat. 

            Lately, a dark SUV with really dark tinting drives by and honks at The Goat Man.  Earlier today, the mysterious friend reached out the window with an exaggerated wave.  It looked like a happy wave, but no one can be sure.

            On our anniversary The Goat Man and I snuck away to the beach.  We are grown adults with no jobs, so we never ‘sneak’ away, but it sounds like more of an adventure when I use that word.  Therefore, we snuck away to Howard Park and we walked on the beach.  With our feet wet to our ankles we walked in the warm water watching small fish with long straw like noses swim around and scurry off as we splashed.

            At the end of the beach we climbed up on the rocks (never mind the sign) and sat enjoying each other in silence.  It is amazing how closely two hearts will beat when surrounded by the outdoors and serene peaceful bodies.  I don’t need to hear The Goat Man say the waves are beautiful because we both know they are.  We can feel the beauty in the world around us.

            On the rocks we sat watching a pod of dolphins swim around the point.  First they played jumping over each other splashing and gaining our notice.  Then they swam in a group around the bend and across in front of us.  They were not more than ten feet away.  We took a video, but we now regret not entering the water and joining them.

            We went back to that same beach two days ago with The Goat Man’s sister.  She drove from the other side of the state to spend the day with us.  Because I would have been a breathing shark call I did not swim when they went swimming.  I walked on the crushed shell and sand beach.

            I much preferred the time alone with my thoughts.  I cannot remember the last time I was alone.  I need time with myself to formulate my life plan and goal agenda.  It is the time alone that keeps me strong and focused.  I have been swirling around chaos so long I was forgetting my purpose.  I was starting to whine and I dislike whining!

            Standing in water half way up my calf with the occasional wave hitting that spot on my short leg that wasn’t wet, (The water is always colder in that spot.) I felt some thing swish between my legs and felt some thing smack against my outer right leg.  I spun with all the grace of a drunken ninja just in time to see a dark spot dash into the deeper waves.  My brain knows it was a fish and it was quick.  It had to have been at least as big as the feet of the lady at the blood mobile.

            With my newfound ninja skills I slowly stepped back one large step at a time nonchalantly looking around me in a panic without looking like I was looking.  I was using the “OMG did some one see” move that is very common among drunken ninjas.

            I had to move away.  I was unable to see if the shadow fish was wearing a hoody or not.  I didn’t know if the school he came from was possibly a school like X-men attend.  With our pollution a X-fish school is not so far fetched.  In this day and age one cannot be too safe.

            After a few steps back I stood with only my toes getting wet and peered out into the waves.  The shadow fish had been gone now for quite some time, but I was still looking for the remains of the school.  I felt seaweed on my pinky toe.

            The seaweed brushed the side of my pinky toe like a tickle feather and I moved my foot just a little to the left.  I was still peering and searching into the continually cresting waves when I felt the seaweed again, so annoyed I moved my foot up, shook it, and placed it back down.  I must have placed it back into the seaweed.

            Not wanting to end my peering, but irritated by the seaweed I thrust my head so that I was looking directly at my foot.  It was not standing in seaweed.  I almost laughed out loud.  A small quarter size crab with one claw half the size of its body was attacking my pinky toe.  I moved my foot and it did a little side step and attacked again.  Now I was convinced the shadow fish was from the X-fish school.  One of those fish could talk telepathically.

            These are the moments where the world reminds us of what it is and how we fit into it.  That was the bravest crab ever.  I know this because I would have ran from a pinky toe three times my size and attached to a human three hundred times larger. (And not just because I hate feet.)  The hero crab was in the same category as the attack turtle.  They were both heroes.

            The X-fish are another category of being.  They are the “think smarter not harder” class of individual.  They are quiet, sneaky, and always thinking.  The black crow that came down and stole my granddaughter’s McDonald’s bags once long ago at the playground. 

            There are few heroes in this world and there are few thinkers in this world.  The masses generally fall into the workers.  They are just average creatures that get up and do what has to be done so they can enjoy the rewards of their labor.  They spend most of their time working along side of others and a small amount of their time playing.  They play like the dolphins as they swam by.

            At Starkey Park, The Goat Man and I walked along the “solar system trail” and saw some worker beetles.  I did not name the trail and I did not see any planets other than this wonderful one we are all riding on.  What I did see was the cutest little triceratops beetles.

            They looked like every beetle I have run from in the past, but they had metallic forest green (no pun intended) triceratops faces.  We saw four of them in total.  They all looked the same from above.  We did not get that close after all they are beetles and they were pushing a piece of animal poo.

            Yes, I said animal poo.  We first spotted beetle number one (I am going to call him Fred.) single handedly pushing a piece of poo across the black top.  It was a small piece in our perspective, but it was at least ten times the size of the beetle.

            Fred was pushing his poo energetically and he was doing a great job.  I could hear his thoughts.  I don’t know if it was because of my contact with the X-fish or not.  He was as happy as a gold miner or the Beverly hillbillies when they found that bubbling crude.

            A head of Fred just into the grass two other beetles started coming toward the rolling poo. (I am going to call them Tweedle D and Tweedle Dum.)  So, Fred is pushing and pushing and focused on his prize.  He was going to be the hero of the beetle town.  All of the beetle women were going to flock to his poo and love him.  Homeless beetle children were going to have full stomachs tonight.

            The poo rolled off the edge of the black top and made three complete rolls into the grass.  Fred turned around instantly, “oh crap! Where did my poo go?” (Still no pun intended)  The poo almost rolled over Tweedle D and Tweedle Dum, but they didn’t even see it.  They started to split zig sagging in a pattern of search.  Perhaps two or three smacks from the X-fish would have allowed me to tell them where the poo was.

            The Goat Man and I laughed because we could both see ourselves doing just what Fred had done if the roles were reversed.  I do silently thank my God that I am not a beetle and do not wish to ever be a beetle pushing poo.  We watched for several long minutes.

            A fourth beetle arrived (I did not name him) and began helping Fred with his newly found piece of poo.  The pushed it together away from the black top.  Tweedle D and Tweedle Dum were still zigging and sagging when we finally continued down the trail.

Alienation is a crime!

September 24, 2013 2316

            I apologize to my readers for the interruption. However, I am telling the story of my life via this blog, so I cannot leave out the ridicules.

“Parental alienation syndrome (PAS) affects some children of divorced parents. In cases of PAS, one parent works to turn the child against the other parent. This complicates issues of custody and visitation rights of the parents, which makes PAS an important consideration in divorce court. Important case law on the subject has been made in many U.S. states.”Read more: http://www.ehow.com/about_6525266_parental-alienation-case-law.html#ixzz2fuSH4mRO

             I received a message this morning at 0915 from Harold Sprague via Facebook.    

This is Harold:

(Picture is proudly displayed on FB) 

            Just to be clear, Harold is not anyone I know and from the looks of this picture would not probably ever care to know.  He clearly has no self-respect if he can behave this way on the Internet, but I don’t want to get on my soapbox about lost morals and values in this country.  It is obvious by the message I received that the woman who doesn’t know her place sent it to me, I guess to prove my point that she goes where she is unwanted, uninvited, and does not belong. 

“Alienated children often make accusations toward the targeted parent that utilize phrases and ideas adopted from the alienating parent. Indications that a scenario is borrowed include the use of words or ideas that the child does not appear to understand, speaking in a scripted or robotic fashion, as well as making accusations that cannot be supported with detail.” Read more: http://www.socialworktoday.com/archive/102708p26.shtml 

            I write only to say…. and I roll my eyes and make a silent prayer to my God because some things are just to benighted for my time….But, I write to say I have read the court papers.  I have been aware of all of The Goat Man’s six children since each of their births (including the youngest two).  It seems I have personally known The Goat Man since you were in diapers.  Please have more information that me before you try to “enlighten” me in anyway.  I know a lot about The Goat Man.  We grew up together.  Our families have been intertwined in the same small town since before any of us were born.  I will of course take your comments under advisement.

            The two of you did not make it and he is no longer your concern.  I am sure he is flattered you spend so much time thinking about him.  I assure you we (and yes I mean him as well) do not spend any time thinking about you.  Actually, as I write this letter I am irritated at myself for coming down here to this level to partake in drama of all things.  I firmly believe drama is for teenage girls and the puerile.

            I do not care to be apart of your personal drama.  There is a reason we are not friends and it has nothing to do with The Goat Man.  I generally do not like mothers of children who say this to me:

            “I am hungry.  I have not had anything to eat today.”   After asking why they had not eaten any breakfast they responded with, “Mom was high last night and wouldn’t get up this morning and cook me any and there was nothing in the house I knew how to cook.”  (Readers, please be mindful to the fact this wonderful mother’s children are currently nine and eleven years old.)

            That is not The Goat Man’s “lies” that is my personal experience.  This is MY blog and MY story and I write what I personally see.  I am not your friend.  I will never be your friend.  You are not welcome in my life.  Please be mindful of that.  I thought it was obvious by my complete lack of interest toward you, but I can see you have trouble focusing.

            I do find you facetious.  I find myself wondering why you felt the need to send me nonessential comments.  I am not sure if it is guilt, egocentric drama driven nature, or just a need to over-step your place?  Either way thanks for reading my blog, but a more focused individual would not have sent me her broken love story as a defense.   I simply answered your accusation of my interference and I couldn’t care less about your broken heart.

“Alienating parents, on the other hand, may seek emotional comfort from their children and attempt to validate their pain and anger against their ex-spouses by trying to get their children to align with them and them alone. They speak negatively of their exes and subtly communicate their anger in front of the children. Alienating parents often manipulate and use their children to hurt their exes on purpose -- and with a vengeance. They may tell their children that their other parent doesn't love them or doesn't want to see them. They may destroy or hide communication from the other parent. They may give in to their children's desire to avoid the parent, actually encouraging such behavior instead of encouraging their children to have a healthy relationship with their ex.  Signs of Parental Alienation·      Children perceive one parent as causing financial problems for the other parent.
·      Children have knowledge of the divorce details or legal procedures.
·      Children show a sudden hostile, negative change in attitude toward target parent.
·      Children are not delivered for court-ordered visitation and/or are not allowed to "choose" to visit the target parent.
·      False allegations of abuse are made against the target parent.
·      Children are asked to choose one parent over the other.
·      Anger and negativity toward target parent is reinforced.
·      Children are given the impression that if they have a good time with the target parent during a visit, it will hurt them.
·      Children are asked about the target parent's personal life.
·      Children are "rescued" from the target parent when there is no danger. 
 In regards to parental alienation, the judge in the New York decision stated, "... Interference with the non-custodial parent and child's relationship is an act so inconsistent with the best interests of a child, as to, per se, raise a strong probability that the offending party is unfit to act as a custodial parent." Read more: http://www.momlogic.com/2010/06/new_york_dad_and_parental_alienation.php#ixzz2fuTlYXI6

            I have wasted valuable time and brainpower on this post.  I will now return to my regularly scheduled topics…ME!  And to the woman who doesn’t know her place…. Please GO AWAY NOW!