....gotta love it. It's tough to find a template that speaks to you but also about you. Too much generic stuff floating around out there.

Boy, how often have I felt like the poor shlupp above? Ha!

Ran across the photo today and it reminded me of the ongoing discussion at home about death and dying. My son seems to agree with the road sign "Dead End", to him we simply cease to exist when we go. No heaven, no hell, no reincarnation - just utter, bleak blackness.

Living is hard enough already - do I really want to look forward to being wiped off the face of the earth and being nothing more than wormfood? It creeps me out.

I wonder if his attitude stems from the onslaught of death and the dying on a daily basis. We see it in games, movies, cover of newspapers, the daily news - it's just everywhere! I don't recall seeing that much of it when I was 14, then again I was outside playing with my friends. He on the other hand engages in battle via the Internet to murder, plunder and pillage. And that's fun to him. It concerns me on the other hand.

Kids should not be so desensitized toward violence that it becomes the norm. I really want him to have a reaction when he sees someone dead or dying and not pass it over as though it were nothing. Maybe he just can't believe that those people would go toward a better afterlife - I mean, if it were true why wouldn't we all just off ourselves and leave this nutty planet? Because nobody has the answer. I'm not going to leave any sooner than I have to but in the mean time I will keep the faith that "Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus."

Enjoy :)

I seem to have sparked some sort of blog debate with my previous post, "The great man shortage". While I can agree with Dennis to a certain extend that yes, the pool of eligible bachelors does shrink as we get older, I cannot agree that I should lower my standards and settle. What's up with that? Why am I not entitled to want a partner that complements me? I'm certainly not desperate or whining as this Finnish gent seems to think.

I've been married. So the stats being quoted really refer to women over the age of 35 previously UN-married. I am way ahead of the game. Ha!

I get propositioned by the 20somethings on up all the time. Am I interested in a quick fling? Hell no. I want a "quality" guy (as my oldest puts it), that doesn't have the unbearable urge to sow his oats, impress the female population with his car/job/money..whatever. But I digress again.

I'm not going to apologize and stand by my statement: There is a man shortage. Ha!

I was roused from my sleep rather rudely at 8 am this Sunday morning. It was my neighbor looking for his wayward dog again. His German Sheppard is kept in the back yard, restrained by a 4 foot fence. This never made much sense to me since the dog is clearly capable of digging under or jumping over with ease. Yet, week after week his owner puts him back out there all day and most nights - by himself. Without human interaction or other dogs to play with. I know for a fact that my own dog is a bit of an escape artist as well. Yet, knowing this, I would never put her in the backyard unattended. Well, that and the fact that I had to pay $100 to get her back from animal control the one time she did get out. Lesson learned. I digress.

Dexter is a great dog; well behaved and lovable, he adores it when I catch him and take pity on him bringing him in my house until his owner returns home. He is too large to sit on my lap but he will try every time anyway. Which leads me to believe the poor pup is just starved for attention - hence the repeated attempts at freedom.

I experienced similar feelings in my marriage. Being couped up all the time and missing the basic warmth of loving interaction led me to run away a few times too. Why should Dexter be any different? I'm willing to bet he'd ask for a divorce from his owner and go off to find a better match. I feel for you boy.

On my way to an appointment yesterday I fiddled with my radio waiting at a red light. Glancing in the rearview mirror there was a young couple in the car behind me. Both were on the cell phone. I couldn't quite make out if the person in the back seat was also on the phone. It's a sign of the times I suppose. Yet to me, it feels too disconnected - which is an oxymoron since the technology is supposed to keep us more connected. And here they are sitting in the close confines of a car and nobody is talking to each other!

While I own a cell phone as well, I held out for as long as I could actually getting one. As my sons got older and began roaming around the neighborhood though, I felt it imperative that I was reachable when not home baking cookies (ok, I made that one up, I'm a horrible baker). I crumbled and finally purchased one. I don't like using it. I have the least amount of minutes possible on my plan and 9 months out of 10 I don't even use one quarter of my "allowance". I do not use it for business ever as I am adament not to be married to work 24/7. If I don't answer, it means I don't want to talk to you.

My stepfather had a cellphone in the early 80's. This thing was as big as a desktop PC and required it's own suitcase to lug around. A big, gray ugly box. But wow, we thought it was way cool. Ha! It truly was a cool thing to have but very uncomfortable, not very sleek and stylish (certainly didn't play music or show videos), yet what nobody knew was that this little invention would forever enslave us. We would be within reach of anyone with our number 24/7 around the globe. It scares me to tell you the truth. We have all this technology at our hands to communicate yet we seem to be doing less and less of it. The disjointed garbled conversations on text messaging in crazy letter combinations don't count and email is becoming a lost art since we are inundated with spam, spam and more spam (I had over 2000 of them in my junk folder last week!).

When I was 16 I had to actually get of off my behind and walk down the street to talk to my friends. We connected in real-time. Maybe those kids in the car behind me could put down the phones every once in a while and talk; try it, you might like it!

I've received a few emails lately commenting on some of my posts; most are quite poignant and led me think even further on my random musings on life. It occurs to me that I have spend a good number of years aimlessly wandering through life. Whenever I got where I thought I wanted to go, I felt that this was not the place. And I moved on. This is not metaphorical either. I have packed my bags on a whim quite a few times and just up and left town. Some folks will do a fair amount of relocation throughout their lifetime, I would venture to state that most of these relocations are within the general geographical area though. Me? I had a tendency to move across entire oceans and continents! Once, I did not even bother to give notice to my landlord terminating my lease. I woke up one day and decided to move to England; hence, I did just that. My house key was mailed to a friend asking her to please clear out my apartment and give the stuff to charity, keep it or toss it. She wasn't too happy about that and was convinced that I had lost my ever-lovin' mind. Maybe I had. The England stint didn't last too long and before I knew it I was back in Germany - starting all over. I did within six months though move to California. Ha!

I have become quite adept at starting over; years of experience will do that sort of thing. Yet, no matter where I start or end, it never seems to be the fulfilling spot I had invisioned it to be. A heartfelt yearning still permeates my every fiber and I still fight the urge to up and move somewhere else. By now I have come to realize however that it will do me no good. I cannot for the life of me figure out what it is that is tugging at me so that I become so fiercely restless. This is not only true for geography but relationships as well. My wanderlust is often misunderstood by my significant other and I simply cannot see myself being stuck in one place for the rest of my life. Perhaps this is why I am still single. My internal compass is stuck on searching for my True North.

We tried so hard to make things better for our kids that we made them worse. For my grandchildren, I'd like better. I'd really like for them to know about hand me down clothes and homemade ice cream and leftover meat loaf sandwiches. I really would.

I hope you learn humility by being humiliated, and that you learn honesty by being cheated. I hope you learn to make your own bed and mow the lawn and wash the car. And I really hope nobody gives you a brand new car when you are sixteen.

It will be good if at least one time you can see puppies born and your old dog put to sleep.

I hope you get a black eye fighting for something you believe in.

I hope you have to share a bedroom with your younger brother/sister. And it's all right if you have to draw a line down the middle of the room,but when he wants to crawl under the covers with you because he's scared, I hope you let him.

When you want to see a movie and your little brother/sister wants to tag along, I hope you'll let him/her. I hope you have to walk uphill to school with your friends and that you live in a town where you can do it safely.

On rainy days when you have to catch a ride, I hope you don't ask your driver to drop you two blocks away so you won't be seen riding with someone as uncool as your Mom.

If you want a slingshot, I hope your Dad teaches you how to make one instead of buying one. I hope you learn to dig in the dirt and read books.

When you learn to use computers, I hope you also learn to add and subtract in your head.

I hope you get teased by your friends when you have your first crush on a boy\girl, and when you talk back to your mother that you learn what ivory soap tastes like.

May you skin your knee climbing a mountain, burn your hand on a stove and stick your tongue on a frozen flagpole.

I don't care if you try a beer once, but I hope you don't like it. And if a friend offers you dope or a joint, I hope you realize he is not your friend.

I sure hope you make time to sit on a porch with your Grandma/Grandpa and go fishing with your Uncle.

May you feel sorrow at a funeral and joy during the holidays.

I hope your mother punishes you when you throw a baseball through your neighbor's window and that she hugs you and kisses you at Hannukah/Christmas time when you give her a plaster mold of your hand.

These things I wish for you - tough times and disappointment, hard work and happiness. To me, it's the only way to appreciate life.

Written with a pen. Sealed with a kiss. I'm here for you. And if I die before you do, I'll go to heaven and wait for you.

I was going to title this "Boys will be Boys" but I think the problem is fairly universal and not gender specific. Ha! I had an impromptu visit from my son's best friend's father today. Did I know that they were out of town for 4 days and that the boys had a party with booze and smoking and everything at the house? Of course I didn't. As far as I knew, they were spending the night at some other friend's house. Paint me gullible. They were damn good liars, all four of them had me convinced of it too. Crap.

Which leads me to this... why is it that teenagers always think they invented the wheel? There is nothing they could do, say or pull that I myself haven't been through at 14. I mean really. ::rolling eyes::

Yet here we are. Me having to ground him - again - and him thinking, "Crap! Caught again!". And it happens every time too; without fail. It's almost comical. He expends a lot of energy trying to pull the wool over my eyes and getting away with murder but it never works. Do they learn? Heck no - they will try a different route and get caught again.

Ah, the joys of the teenage years. How I miss them.

I felt something coming on yesterday with a gritty, irritating feel in my right eye. Mind you, this occurred almost immediately after my excursion into Flickr a few hours before. I rubbed at it furiously as the itch became almost unbearable. Nothing helped. My solution? Let's go to bed at 9 pm and sleep it away. It did not help. I awoke this morning with a nice shiner. If someone had clubbed me across the eye ball it could not have been more swollen, red and angry looking. Now, you might say that it's just an eye infection, go see the optometrist and get some medicine.


I see divine intervention in everything. The searing image of the dead Lebanese baby may have burned my retina; I know it damaged my soul to a degree. I cannot see this picture without being deeply disturbed by it, without feeling it tug at my heart strings and fighting to urge to immediately hug my children. I cry when I see images of abused children in the news and often wonder, "What makes a person hurt their children?" I've often wondered the same about my dysfunctional upbringing and although I've come to terms with the fact that some folks may just be hard-wired to feel no remorse..well.. I have been cursed with an extraordinary dose of empathy because of it. I feel the pain of the children, I feel the pain of anyone suffering and feel it with them. For that reason, I cannot watch any Lifetime movies that have anything to do with damaging fragile children's bodies and psyche's. I've felt the pain of losing a child firsthand and while it dulls with time and you learn to live with it, it always lingers somewhere in the dark corners of your broken heart and surfaces at the least appropriate moments.

I am not politically inclined in any radical way whatsoever. My choosing to include the Lebanese baby in yesterday's post was perhaps a way to release the anguish I felt at seeing it. Yet, today I wonder - should my eyes have seen it at all? Divine intervention gave me a black eye.

Last nights cruise into the world of Flickr was born of curiosity but turned into a sleepless night fairly quickly. All these goings on in the Middle East has me deeply worried. I'm torn if I should be taking sides (is this my fight?), reminded of my own mortality and painfully aware how much the world has changed since 9/11. Or perhaps the mayhem was always there and I chose to not see it? Before the fight was brought to us, it always seemed to be "somewhere else" and I watched the bloodshed on TV but from afar and with almost clinical detachment.

I am 42 and still remember the Cold War era, air raid sirens and bomb drills; I still remember the many jumping the Berlin Wall in their bid for freedom and being shot in their fruitless quest; I remember the Iran hostage crisis, genocide of Cambodia, Dawson's Field hijackings, murder of Marines in Mogadishu; and naturally, the mother of all - September 11, 2001.

But, last nights excursion into Flickr had me stumbling across raw pictures from the Israel-Lebanon conflict and here I am. It is barely 4 am, the rain is mercilessly pounding my roof and the image of the dead baby will not leave my mind's eye. Try as I might to erase it, it is forever burned into my memory and pictures such as these (that the popular media will not show) remind me how precious each day of life on this planet truly is. My son is spending the night at a friend's house tonight, blissfully ignorant of all the pain in the world as I was at his age - tomorrow I will hug him and tell him I love him.

Photo published by the Arabist, Flickr, July 21, 2006

Now I'm just irritated. I read the latest and greatest on the education debate by the Republicans and I am aghast! School vouchers for poor students in underperforming schools to go to private schools or get a tutor. Huh.

This is by far the most infuriating thing I have read all day. As a single mother I have had two boys going through the public school system and none of the schools were really up to par. Yet, I am not poor, so tough ..... for me on getting my sons the education they deserve, right? The rich can afford private schools, the middle class (some, not all) have to work two or three jobs to be able to do this and the poor, well, if the government has their way.... you get the drift.

Where is the equality in all this? What I am seeing is that I worked my behind off all this years to keep the bills paid, food no the table and so on ... but I wasn't poor enough to be helped nor rich enough to help myself. Oooh, that's a good one.

While I was incredibly excited to have the chance to chat with my son via MSN messenger all the way across the "grossen Teich", it has proven to be more of a hindrance. We chatted daily for about a week until I received an email from him requesting to take a "time out". It appears he felt strange about the whole thing. Needless to mention, I was distraught for a moment. Here I was, 21 years in agony over a child I could not see with a new chance of reconnecting and I felt that I had blown it.

I sent him a brief but understanding email....and will wait for him to come back 'round. It occurred to me that the anonymity of Internet chat is not always a good thing. In this case, the exchanges were brief, somewhat disconnected and didn't lend themselves to forging a relationship between a lost child and mother. I should've thought of that before I happily agreed to exchange MSN handles. What we really needed was a "real-time" visit, good old fashioned snail mail letters and photo exchanges and the like. A much slower approach to forging a relationship. The instant exchanges of photos, meaningless banter and the like didn't help or apparently mean a whole lot in the scope of things.

I do understand his feelings.... and respect them. I think I will go and buy some funky stationary and write an old-fashioned letter with postage and everything.

In my insane youth I thought it to be a given to head to the local watering hole for happy hour after a long, ardeous day. Through time, marriages, children and other obligations I sort of gave all that up to a large extend. I still enjoy a few drinks occassionally but have found recently that the whole environment turns me off. Whereas I used to delight in engaging my bar neighbor into debates, I know sit with my Creative Loafing - sipping a beer, watching CNN, munching on some steak bites or otherwise ignoring folks around me.

I was a regular at a popular Irish pub and everyone, including the owner, knew me by name. They still do, mind you, but the visits have been sporadic to say the least. I get annoyed at loud patrons, crowded tables, golf on the TV when I want CNN.... in short, I have turned into a middle-aged bar fly. It's quite disturbing!

The scene used to be a means of meeting new people and socializing and I did it quite well. Up until a few years ago I had a large circle of aquaintences. This has shrunk considerably as one by one they all dropped out of view. I see them ocassionally but when I do, it's never the hearty "HEY! How have you been?" with the exuberant hug and obligatory peck on the cheek. It's just a half-hearted attempt at feigning friendship when clearly it always was restricted to sharing a few drinks, a few laughs and nothing more.

Unless I've had a few too many and want to engage you into a political debate, don't even try messing with me. I'm content just sitting there with my face buried in the local blotter or news of the weird. Although, there is plenty weird stuff going on around me at all times.

Take the older gentleman that everyone knows to be a chatter box, known to drink to oblivion and always dishing out helpful advice on anything from your personal lovelife to how the country should be run. The other day I made my brief visit to the pub and he was already there. Sufficiently soused and engaged in a heated debate with a scary biker type. I tried to ignore the whole thing but it was getting difficult as the decibles attained heights no doubt heard in every corner of the place. What happens? The gent gets excited, tries to turn on wobbly legs, steadies himself on a barstool (or so he thought) and promptly takes a nose dive to the floor. Did anyone help him up? Negative. Everyone rolled their eyes in an "man, what a loser" comment and continued to ignore him. I felt bad for him. I also felt a little put off and wondered, "Geez, do all of us older folks look like this when we had too many?" I have to tell you, my evening was ruined and I quickly made for the door.

I notice a lot of older men and women in said watering holes. Some chat, some sit, some stare, some look forlorn and lost other look like they just want to drink their sorrows into the bottoms of hell. When did we become such a community of sad sacks? I don't like to party anymore but still enjoy a few drinks and witty banter with complete strangers. But the whole scene largely leaves me cold now. When did this happen? And, more importantly, what does it mean??


It really was my camera and not my sight... :)

It has been an interesting week. Scratch that, interesting is not the word I should be choosing. I’ve had the fortune to chat with my son briefly online almost every day. The more I know about him, the more I am astounded at the similarities. Although he’s 22 he seems to be going through the normal teenager identity crisis – he’s just not sure what to do. The eternal savior that I am I had to give him advice; “don’t put so much pressure on yourself”, “take care of yourself first” and so on and so forth. All the while I’m thinking that I’m not really the best person to give him such advice since I hardly followed my own counsel at that age. I’m hoping that maybe it does help him a little, even though he really doesn’t know me. He’s been jumping through my dreams every single night. I haven’t had that much activity and restless nights since I first left England so many years ago. All of the suppressed garbage came right back up and I am struggling to squeeze it back into the safety box that kept me sane all that time.

To make matters worse, word from my ex-husband in Washington is that my middle son, now 20, has gotten himself into another pickle. I realize that the history of that relationship is not evident by that brief reference. For brevity’s sake, I’ll just say that he was released from jail in May of this year after serving six months for breaking and entering. Breaking and entering into MY home – twice successfully and the third time not. It appears that he was video taped in some store, a gun seems to have been involved and the FBI has something to do in this whole story. I am really not so sure what on earth transpired – maybe I don’t really want to know. He vehemently denies any wrong doing but then again, that is his modus operandi and I know him well enough to see right through the lies.

So while on one hand I am elated to be in touch with my oldest, one the other I am distraught that the middle son seems to be lost in the world of crime and drugs. How can children be so dramatically different? My youngest isn’t the poster child of awesomeness, but I’d like to think that the closeness of our relationship has made him more prone to make better choices. So far his occasional bouts with crazy choices have been disciplined and never repeated. I am aghast at the life that my second son has chosen for himself. Carelessly stomping over people, their property, their thoughts and feelings as though he is a mammoth about to be flash frozen and couldn’t give a rats you-know-what about anything but living every second.

I’m doing my best to maintain some resemblance of normalcy for the sake of my youngest; but he’s picking up on the worry-vibes. I need to watch that.

I have spent years wondering what it would feel like to have a long lost child make contact, how I would handle the fact that he had another mother that raised him, loved him and cared for him. Would I feel jealous? Would she feel threatened? How do you achieve such a delicate balance that no one is hurt or offended in the process of becoming reacquainted?

The very first email I sent my son was difficult; not because of what I had to say but because I was at a loss how to sign it. Gina? Mom? I struggled with that for a moment and decided to put the question to him - ultimately signing it both ways before clicking that send button. He replied that for the time being he would prefer to call me Gina, since the woman that raised him was his "Mum". It stung for a second but then I had to remind myself that I really had not been instrumental in making him the fine young man that he is today. So Gina it is. It will take time to earn the designation "Mom".

We've had some conversation on this via MSN messenger (what a wonderful tool this is across the Atlantic!) and the process of connecting, or re-connecting as it were, has been delightful and sometimes suprising. It brought on reminders of the old nature vs nurture debate as it was obvious that he shares a lot of personality traits and quirks with me and his two half-brothers. He was as stunned as I was. Somehow the conversation flowed easily from one topic to the next, with occassional dips and spikes - as was expected since we chatted most of the day.

I am so thrilled to be embarking on this journey but terrified at the same time that I will blunder and say something to scare him off. Will I say something that will offend him and his allegiance to his "Mum" or will his curiosity and our biological bond withstand my occasional faux pas? I have not been able to think of much anything else in the past few days. They say time heals all wounds but this one has been torn open and I'm not even licking them.

Considering everyone seems to be in a celebratory mood today (for obvious reasons) I am somewhat contemplative instead. And there is an obvious reason for that too, although the world at large wouldn’t know what that reason is.

Yesterday I received a phone call that I had been dreaming about, planning for, rehearsed for – you name it. I had a speech at the ready but when the call came, I was too stunned to say anything remotely intelligent, let alone impressive and too shocked to shed any tears. The call came from my oldest son, now 22, whom I had not seen since he was 10 months old. He grew up with his father in England, who remarried and seems to still be in a fairly stable situation. But what do I know? There is a fairly long story behind all of this but for brevity I will not go there. Not yet.

Over the years I have made various, unsuccessful attempts, at getting past the gatekeeper on the telephone – namely, Mrs. X. I got nowhere every time I did call and finally gave up. Until Easter of this year when once again I forgot about the time difference between the US and the UK and called at 4 a.m. their time. Being subjected to a barrage of expletives wasn’t my idea of fun, it was exceptionally painful to be honest, but for the sake of leaving my current address and phone number I endured it. I may have had nightmares for days after that but in light of recent developments I’m sucking it up and stuffing it into the drawer labeled “things I never have to do again”.

I always thought I would burst into tears when eventually my son made contact with me, as I always knew somehow that he would. None of that happened. We had a calm conversation as though we had always known each other, exchanging laughs and observations and the like and it felt comfortable. Nothing overtly emotional about it at all. I’m still trying to sort that out. Perhaps I’ve gotten so used to missing him that I was drained already and simply had nothing left to be emotional about? I don’t have a shrink on retainer, so I’ll have to ponder this on my own.

Oh say, can you see? Here we are, celebrating yet another Independence Day. Which leads me to ponder – what really is independence? In the case of the country we all know what it means, freedom from the Brits of course (no offense to the English, I love you guys). Yet the ties are as strong as ever. In the context of a 40something single woman, what is independence really?

We grow up, mostly, have raised our children, established careers, own our own homes and our mantra is “We don’t need to stinkin’ men!” All the while, we have this inexplicable yearning to belong. So we join book clubs, church communities, PTA’s and the like to fill the void by our “man-less” existence. So are we really independent then? If we are then we should be self-sustaining communities on our own without the need for outside validation. I have found this to be impossible. Yes, I value my freedom, whatever that may be. But somewhere, the void in me does echo and it gets loud on occasion.

I’ve never been a joiner. I don’t belong to any nomination (although I was raised Roman-Catholic), never been a member of a PTA for any of my children, never been in a book club (does the mail order kind count?), never gotten involved in politics or volunteerism. This is not to say that I don’t care – I care deeply about a number of issues. I am simply reluctant to follow this whole group think mentality for the good of man kind. Look where it’s gotten us? There is strife all over the globe and as a country we are deep in the thick of it. But I digress again.

So we form lose alliances with like minded folks to establish a sense of belonging to something. Message boards, chat rooms – ah, the virtual community; such a vast resource of opposing minds, terabytes of information (and misinformation) at our fingertips. Take this blog for example. I have no idea if anyone will ever read this, or even care about a word I have to say. Yet, it does give me a sense of belonging and sharing, while letting me retain my autonomy and aforementioned independence. Do I really care what others think of my random ramblings? I’m not sure. I suppose somewhere I do or else what would be the point? We all want to make a mark on the world in some meaningful way. If I did not care, I could simply whip out trusted pen and paper and submit my musings to an old-fashioned diary and hide it away in my sock drawer.

My personal and professional accomplishments serve to validate my existence, yet I still look for outside input and ‘atta girl’s. This in a way retains my independence but also lets me belong. Funny how that works. What is your idea of independence?

This one deserves it's own post since it is just hilarious. Apparently I am not the only one at the moment to ponder my 40something status and what to do about it.

Thought provoking read!

The High Pressure Friend

In 1986 I was married, so I missed the article by Newsweek warning me of the great man shortage. Now that I am no longer married and getting older by the minute, I wonder if there is any truth to it. Are my chances of getting married dwindling away? The pool of eligible bachelors is shrinking in my opinion and I am not about to marry a 20-something. I actually cringed when Stella got her groove back since I would be screaming bloody murder if my love interest played video games all day. But that’s just me.

I am actually a subscriber to a couple of dating websites – match.com and eharmony.com. I have to admit that match is really boring and the quality of singles that I’ve met thus far leaves much to be desired. I am willing to bet that all the handsome strangers displayed on their pages are really just decoys. I’ve tried to make contact with a few (ok, so I like a good-looking guy – sue me) and not once did I get a response. The only men that contact me are older than me, balding, chubby and some other physical attributes I’d rather not get into. Am I being shallow? Judgemental? My son says, “Mom, you’re too picky!” So what!? I LIKE being picky. I’ve lived alone for so long now that I am pretty set in my ways and bringing in a completely different personality from my own just wouldn’t work. I wouldn’t last a day in a relationship like that.

So I look for similarities but also issues that matter to me the most. For instance, I am a horrible housewife I’ll be the first to admit it. I hate doing laundry, windows, floors – if it involves cleaning I hate it. Which is not to say that my house is just a nasty mess, it’s just not Cleaver clean. I have dust bunnies and dog hair in various locales across the house and I don’t even care. But I’m a hypocrite. When I know visitors are coming I’ll go into a frenzy and scrub everything. Why is that? I hate when people judge me on inconsequential stuff but then I turn around and feed right into the craziness. I’m digressing again. Crap.

Back to the man shortage. Both websites leave a lot to be desired although I will say that I’ve made contact with a very nice gentleman in Washington state. Nothing but emails back and forth so far; but I like what I read. So my head goes into overdrive, “What if we really hit it off and he asks me to marry him and then I have to move to Washington? It rains too much, that would make me nuts. Why can’t he move here?” and so on and so forth. It’s an entire scenario from start to finish and it never ends well. So I’m a little nervous if I am about to sabotage myself again. I do this every time I meet a man. Finding faults in them that I simply could never live with. Sometimes it’s warranted. Like the handsome police officer who ended up calling me at 3 am in the morning all the time because he worked the night shift and well, am I not supposed to be at his beck and call? This was the same handsome gent who could not believe that I wouldn’t sleep with him in a New York minute. Come to think of it he was from NYC so maybe that’s a normal thing there? I told him he was in the South now and he’d have to try to become like molasses – real slow and easy like. He didn’t like it. His entire conversations revolved around sex, having sex, getting sex from me and so on. It was irritating. Needless to say he is history.

Why are there so many single people signed up for dating websites but only a handful seem to be making connections? You don’t hear that thousands of folks have found their soulmate and marriage through those sites, just a few hundreds. So, if there are 3 million subscribers and 100 successes what does that say for their success ratio? It totally stinks. If I were to hire a roofer (which incidentally I am working on) and he told me that 3 out of 100 customers were completely satisfied with his services, I’d tell him to go take a hike. So why do we shell out mucho bucks for those dating websites? Optimism, dear Watson. Or maybe we are all delusional. Or optimistically delusional with Pollyanna tendencies. I for one, am about to cancel the subscriptions – for the third time. Yup, I’ve done it before and wasted my hard earned money on Chubby Checker and his buds and got absolutely nothing in return. Not even a date.

I’ll keep you posted on how Mr. eharmony works out, but I’m not packing yet.

I’m 42. My birth certificate says I’m 42, my license says I’m 42 – my body says I’m 42. And I don’t like it one bit. Because inside my head I’m still 22. I see a yummy guy with smoldering eyes and the physique of Adonis and it still turns my head. I might even flirt a little. As a matter of fact, when my brother came to visit from Germany, I took him out on a night of the town. Considering he had never been in the US before I thought it only appropriate to take him to a country and western bar/dance club and make him ride the mechanical bull. He thought I was nuts, I suppose it insulted his German sensibility to do something so foolish. But he humored me and did it anyway. I think he enjoyed it. Well, maybe not so much the fact he banged his head against the bull while being ejected. Still. I digress.

We took our seats as closely as possible to the dance floor and people-watched for a bit. It was almost comical to watch the Cowboys and girls two-stepping on the dance floor while my brother seemed to uncomfortably move around in his seat. He wasn’t too impressed with it. We sipped our beers and people-watched some more. Then I had the brilliant idea to see if we could muster up some hotties for ourselves. Keep in mind that I am 13 years old than my brother, so he’s only 28 and much more equipped for the hotties. But since I am still 22 in my head I thought nothing of it. I pointed to a younger guy standing around by the bar with his buddy and told my brother to go get him for me. Yup, I did that. I had no shame. Plus, I was a little tipsy by that time. Dutifully he walks over and chats with the guy, pointing to me while I unsuccessfully attempted to feign disinterest like I had no clue what was going on. He comes back and says, “He’s not interested.” What?? Not interested?? Impossible. How can that even be true? I looked at my brother incredulously since he had mysteriously grown a third eye and was obviously speaking in tongues. It floored me for a moment. In my twenties (the real twenties not the imaginary ones in my current state of mind) I was a man-magnet. Couldn’t keep them off of me. I tend to forget that this was before I had my three sons and before I added about 40 pounds to my once svelte bod. I also tend to forget that was 20 years ago. Hell, even in my thirties I was still a magnet and rather young looking. Got carded all the time.

I don’t know what happened in the last 10 years that suddenly catapulted me to the status of a 22 year old trapped in the body of a 40something. Maybe it’s the fact that I am more concerned with making it to work on time, finishing papers for my MBA (I took on grad school a year ago) or lecturing my 14 year old son on how NOT to talk/eat/behave. Or the fact that I spent way too much time watching movies, TV or reading on the Internet. My butt seems to be permanently planted somewhere and it’s obvious now that this might have something to do with my loss of babe-magnet factor. It’s really quite depressing.

Which reminds me, when I met my brother at the airport, I had not seen him since he was 10 or so. So it was tough for us to recognize each other at the airport at first. Then, I recognized my step-father’s gait in his and he walked up to me smiling and said, “You look like mom when she was your age.” I was stunned. Me? Look like my mother at my age? I remember her sort of pudgy, always bleary eyed and hungover (I will not expound on that right now) and really not all that attractive. It really hurt and even now, months after he left and went back home, that comment resonates in my head and every time I hear it, it hurts again. I most certainly do not want to be my mother, nor do I want to look like her – EVER. Perhaps genetics cannot be avoided but the rest should be avoidable. Come to think of it, my mother used to be a babe-magnet as well. Since she is only 17 years older than me (again, I will not expound on that right now) we spent many a night together bar and club hopping together. She delighted in the fact we were mistaken for sisters and often used me to help her pick up beau du jour. I recall sometimes feeling a bit put off by her obvious ways in which she tried to attract the younger guys. Sometimes she got lucky, sometimes not. Do I want to be like that? A middle aged woman pathetically trying to cling on to her youth? I think not. So what’s a girl to do?

After a recent physical my doctor advised me that my cholesterol needs to come down. Again, I was shocked. I have always been healthy as a horse considering I smoke like a chimney and don’t mind a few drinks now and then (ok, a lot of drinks when the mood hits me). I never had any health problems and now I was faced with the dreaded cholesterol ominously threatening to clog my arteries and forcing me to succumb to an early grave from heart disease. It was depressing. Stepping on the scale, I almost fainted. I put on 30 pounds since my last physical! (Mind you, that was three years or so ago) How did that happen?? Come to think of it, see above mentioned planting of posterior on various office chairs, couches and the like.

That night I lay in my bed and replayed the club fiasco with my brother, the phone call from my doctor and the fact that I looked like my mother at her age. If it had not been for my son, I may have just offed myself right then and there. It was THAT depressing. A year or two goes by so quickly these days and before you know it, you end up a middle aged lady who gets a “can I help you ma’am?” at the store. Well, I refuse to go there. I’m just not ready yet!

So for the past month I’ve taken to watching what I eat and exercising at least 30 minutes a day (most days). I am so Capricornian anal about it, I even got a software program that lets me record everything going into my mouth in minute detail. Some days I forget, most I don’t. I’m increasing my fiber to the recommended 25 g a day but seem to have trouble with that. It just seems that you have to consume onGodly amounts of produce to get it. Mind you, I hardly got any before that – it’s a wonder I am still breathing! I never ate fruits anymore, hardly any veggies, certainly never breakfast. It was all very irratic.

I think the USA did it to me. Growing up in Germany did not lend itself to much weight gain or laziness. I never owned a car and walked everywhere. Hence, I was a lithe 140 pounds until I moved over here 20 years ago. Hey, I am 6'2 in heels so 140 is waif-like. My nicknames in high school included: "Beanpole", BMW (Brett mit Warzen) which is just a mean way of saying you are flat as a board and various other choice cuddly (NOT) names. Even after my third child, who is now 14, I was still fairly lean. Then I experienced 4 miscarriages and the whole pot went to hell. Can't think of a better analogy at the moment...will edit later. Jeez, digression....

It’s just not possible to walk everywhere over here; you have to have a car to get around. Especially in Charlotte where the public transportation system leaves much to be desired. I have no intention of getting up at 5 am to catch a bus that will get me to the office by 9 am. So I just don’t walk anymore. Haven’t for years. That’s what did me in in my opinion. I still don’t like to walk. Can you unlearn something that was so ingrained in you in childhood and early adulthood? I suppose I am living proof dear Watson, yes you can. Can I relearn all of that? I doubt it. I can certainly try though.

My recumbent bike was dusted off as was my 12 year old Tony Little stair stepper. Amazingly enough, the thing still works albeit a little squeaky. Replacement parts certainly won’t be found anywhere on this planet so once it dies, it’s dead for good. I digress again. Thus far I’ve lost a couple of inches but only five pounds in one month. My body is fiercely hanging on to every extra pound. I suppose it feels its life depends on it. I eat all day, little snacks here and there, weigh everything before it goes on my plate but still fall short and some days only consume about 1200 calories (after deducting the worked off calories from exercise). I should be melting away! Instead, my weight will not budge and I get frustrated and depressed and there I go, planting my behind on the couch commandeering the remote again. If I wasn’t such a loner, I’d be heading out to find me a workout buddy. Alas, I am a loner and I don’t like gyms with their meat market feel. I ordered a Pilates DVD, maybe that will help. I even went out and purchased the entire line of Olay Regenerist beauty products. The jury is still out on the results on using that but I am patient. Rome was not built in a day and recapturing my babe-magnet factor might take a few months. I am however determined to do so, since looking like my mother at her age is simply unacceptable. That and the fact that I am refusing to get rid of my size 8 wardrobe in favor of the more current size 12 I’ve had to wear.

Which leads me to another dismal thought. When, and more importantly WHY, did I accept my expanding waist line and simply go out and buy larger clothes? The L label in some of my shirts should have been a clue, as should the jeans I tried on the other week and could barely get above my knees – let alone anywhere near my waist. I took a picture of my unflattering self with a digital camera and have locked it away. I can’t say for sure why I did that, taking the photo that is. Perhaps to wallow in self-pity and confirm to myself that yes, I am bigger than I should be. But maybe if I look at it long enough, it will disappear again and I can go back to doing nothing and passing the produce section at Food Lion without another thought.

Then again, there is that comment from the hottie at the club, “Not interested.” I might be able to bear a few more pounds but I never want to hear that again. Hence, I will be working my butt off, figuratively and literally, to regain my status as the hottest mom on the block. Hey, maybe I’ll even get a part on Desperate Housewives. Nah. I’ll just be happy to have a 30 year old lusting after me.