Help Wanted

After much consideration, self-debate, crying, and eating of Rold Gold Tiny Twists, I have decided to return to work full-time. Allow me to clarify, because that makes it sound as though I actually have a career to which I can return. Sadly this is not the case, as I am remarkably unsuccessful. If by remarkably you mean just as I expected.

Anyway, it was not a decision I made lightly. Mostly because I am great at arguing with myself. Seriously, I can talk myself into and out of anything 100 times before the dust settles. On the one hand, my current existence as a couch ornament is pretty depressing. I would like my life to have a purpose, and I would like that purpose NOT to be occasional sweeping. And I'd like to contribute to family in ways that involve money rather than neuroses. Thanks to me, our household has LOADS of the latter, but "will not go to the dollar store without full makeup" and "runs away and hides in the bathroom when someone knocks on the front door" aren't gonna pay for a nice vacation or any major surgeries we might someday require. But on the other hand, the couch IS pretty comfortable.

Really, though, I know I sound lazy, but the prospect of returning to work full-time and all the craziness that that entails (Who will watch the kids on half days, days off, and holidays? Summers? Whose going to keep them when they're sick? There are three of them, so chances are good that at least one is gonna be infectious on any given day. What the fuck is for dinner? Is my boss going to hate me for being late for the third time this week because the school bus broke down AGAIN?) really puts a damper on the more rewarding aspects. (Money. Just money.)

It also doesn't help that my prospects just aren't good. That dumb Bachelor's degree that I was going to supplement with further education? Well, thanks to life and inability to make proper decisions, that didn't happen. Since it isn't in 'Nursing' or 'Education' or some other field with a direct career path, I've had to take those dull, low-paying entry-level jobs that the government invented for dumbassess like me. Trust me when I say that, when your resume consists solely of that type of work, you are actually NOT going to be as attractive a candidate as you had probably imagined.

Although I'm clearly a genius that any prospective employer would be lucky to have, job searching just has not gone very well. 95% of the job openings I come across are for specialized workers with advanced degrees and 45 years of experience who are willing to work nights, weekends, and all holidays for minimum wage. Seriously, folks, if you haven't job searched in awhile, go check out the Help Wanteds. You'll leave totally fucking disillusioned and will probably become a communist hermit. I know I have, Comrade.

So far, I have found precisely three jobs that I meet the minimum qualifications for, and at least two of them made liberal use of the words strip search. I applied for the third, because if I'm going to be placing and/or receiving gloved body parts in any orifices, I'm going to expect more than $11.24/hr. I have standards, you know.

I'm cautiously optimistic that this particular opportunity will work out. Mostly because I've done this type of work before, and also because I've got a solid interviewing strategy on account of my experience as a career counselor.

My Infallible Steps to Guaranteeing A Successful Job Interview:

1. Get all gussied up in a way that is attractive to male interviewers but not intimidating to female interviewers. It's hard to mask all this hotness, but no woman is going to hire you if she thinks your tits are perkier than hers.

2. Wear a shirt that reads Team Player on the front and Rule Follower on the back. Not only are these traits that all prospective employers are looking for, but they'll appreciate your craftiness and will see you as a "creative type."

3. Address the interviewer as Supreme Ruler of the Universe and All That Inhabits It. The interviewer will either appreciate your superb brown-nosing abilities or will be just frightened enough to see your potential as a stalker that will almost certainly be fully realized if she doesn't give you the position.

4. Blowjobs. Nothing says dedication and willingness to accept a challenge like giving blowjobs to complete strangers. For the ladies, I recommend gift bags comprised of Coach purses, nonfat lattes, pink wine, and Sephora samples. Shouting out, "YOU get a Coach bag, and YOU get a Coach bag, and YOU get a Coach bag," as you hand them out will clench the victory.

So as you can see, I'm practically a shoe-in.

Well, I suppose it's time to wrap this up. Since my days as a professional layabout are numbered, it's time for me to work on my bon-bon eating quota. I'm super behind since I don't even know where to GET bon-bons outside of 1985.

One of Those Friends

First things first--I cannot STAND a showboater.

Like what you like, buy what you want to buy, be as imfuckingpressed with yourself as you want to be, but don't sit there and rub it under my nose and expect praise. I may be forthcoming with the compliments you so desperately demand to your face, but rest assured that I am absolutely talking shit about you in vague Facebook posts . (I'm such a hardass.) So consider yourself forewarned.

More than the talks of diamonds and how much taxes you owed this year because omigod you are just so damn rich, what I REALLY hate is intellectual snobbery and showboating in regards to one's own personal tastes.

Iiiiiiiiiiii would never listen to a Top 40 song. Iiiiiiiiiiii only listen to small local bands or bands from Scandinavian countries that haven't been signed to a label. They're not even indie--they don't have EPs, LPs, or singles. They mostly just chant and tune their instruments.

Fuck you.

Of course Iiiiiiiiiiii didn't read that book--Oprah picked it for her book club, so it MUST be awful.

You know what? Yes. Yes. Some of the books Oprah selected for her (now defunct?) book club WERE awful, but helloooooo, East of Eden anyone? One Hundred Years of Solitude? These are solid, asshat.

Iiiiiiiiiiii spend my free time studying____________ you've never heard of, drinking ____________ you've never heard of, learning to play ______________ musical instrument you've never heard of, and jacking off to _________________ European porn mag you've never heard of.

Dude, seriously? I'm sure there's a word I've never heard of to describe you, but since I've never heard it, I'm sticking with twatwaffle.

Anyone else have one of those friends? It's exhausting, and, honestly, absolutely not worth my time in any way.

Yet here we are, with me telling invisible you all about it, because I keep getting sucked in.

I'll try to rationalize it. Twatwaffle doesn't know any better. Poor Twatwaffle just can't help it. Maybe Twatwaffle was dropped on her head as an infant/abducted by badgers/forced to watch clips of Ricki Lakes spliced with Barney over a Jethro Tull track on a loop, Clockwork Orange style.

And then I'll give in to this stupid, innate, desperate, sad NEED to be nice, and I'll write to Twatwaffle and excuse her showboating and pretend that maybe I'm giving her commentary some unintended stank.

But I'm not. That stank, much like that of the drugstore cologne on a fourteen-year-old boy at his first Sadie Hawkins, is always intended.

You can practice behavioral modification with the mentally ill. You can practice positive and negative reinforcement with an ill-mannered child. But you cannot fix an ass.

It'll always have a big, ugly crack in it.

Dance Drama Drama

Before about 30 minutes ago, I wasn't 100% sure that my daughters start dance class today. Stellar parenting, that is.

Trouble is, they send you the paperwork for this stuff two months early. For most people, this would be a good thing. Time to gather the essentials, mark the calendar, etc., etc. For me, this two months serves the express purpose of giving me more time to keep track of stuff that I'm not going to look at until the absolute last minute. Which means shit gonna get LOST.

Cue me hitting up all the Walmarts and Targets within a 60 mile radius looking for the correct sizes of leotards, skirts, and hot shorts. Because hot shorts, apparently, are THE thing that hot-to-trot fancy-Mommed tiny dancers must have. Which pretty much makes me hate them on principle, but Middle One is at the age where she notices when she doesn't have the thing that is THE thing that one must have to be deemed acceptable. And, though my favorite parenting mantra is, "Who gives a shit? Be YOU!" (so inspiring, I know), the little third grade nerd girl inside me says, "Stop projecting your issues onto your kid and buy her the damn hot shorts." Third-grade me was most definitely into psychoanalysis. Lots of cool shit in the P volume of the encyclopedia...

Also, 'member how in the REAL version of Cinderella, one of the stepsisters cuts her toes off to fit into the glass (fur) slipper? I think that's what we're gonna have to do to get Little One into her tap shoes.

Middle One also needs ballets and taps. I told her just to wear her jazz shoes the whole time until next payday, lol. No one will know she's not really tapping, dammit! I really hope they don't get blisters, but hot damn, dance tuition is expensive enough without having to buy the stupid shoes every time you turn around. And come on. A jazz shoe, a (non-pointe) ballet shoe, a shoe for hip hop--pretty sure we could accomplish the same damn thing with one pair of shoes. Can't somebody invent some detachable taps or something??!?

Assholes.

Oh, yeah--I also can't remember if Middle One's orthodontic appointment (the big important one during which she gets braces and headgear and a retainer and her ovaries removed and a programmable microchip implanted into her prefrontal cortex) is tomorrow or next Wednesday. Fun times.

When My Husband Comes Home

When my husband comes home from work today, I don’t know what I’m going to tell him. 

"How was your day, today, love?" He will say. Which I will take to mean, "Jesus Christ, what the Sam Hill did you do all day?" Because we are DEFINITELY the kind of people who would actually say, "Sam Hill."

Now, I could try to justify my existence, playing up the fact that I moved some laundry from the washer to the dryer, started it, and threw a few new things in the washer. I could point out the fact that I unloaded the dishwasher (a chore which took all of 45 seconds). I could say that I spent all day working on my resume but that I just can’t get it worked out and can you help me pleasepleaseplease?

I could say those things.

But if I wanted to be truthful, I could answer that I cried all day. Because that is basically the long and short of it. I cried all day, and then I wrote about it. I wrote about it to nonexistent strangers. I wrote about crying to people I don’t know who don’t even exist because no one is ever going to read the damned thing.

I’m sure that would go over well.

The poor thing—I’m not sure he knows quite what to do with me right now.

I’m not sure that he really understands how sitting around on your ass all day long can be hard.

And I’m not sure that I can really explain it to him. You got me, pal. You got me! You’re right! It isn’t hard. Sitting on one’s ass is physically actually very easy! It’s the default way to be! When you’re not doing any other damn thing, sitting on your ass is where you’d find yourself. And yet…

How to explain that it is hard because it is precisely the exact opposite of what I want to be doing? That I want to be doing something useful? That I want to have a purpose?

But, um…the house is a mess. And dinner isn’t cooked. And when is the last time anyone folded laundry around here? These are all valid things he could say. There is PLENTY to be done. I COULD be making myself useful.

But I’m a little lost right now.

I had my first son when I was in college. Very responsible, you see? I realized, after his birth, that hey, you know, I should probably study something with an associated career path. But as bills mounted, cars broke, and life happened, I realized that I probably just needed to get a job. Not a great job. Just any job. I’d finish up, get a job, and maybe even go back to school once the kid got a little older. 

Then I had another kid. Two months after I earned my degree. Told you I was responsible. Stayed home with the babies for awhile. Child care costs pretty much offset any meager earnings I’d find.

And then, after awhile, when I couldn’t justify my existence any longer, I decided I’d teach. To describe my experience would make this already excessively long blog post completely unreadable. Let’s leave that for another day and just say it wasn’t for me.

I then took a job with the state. It’s not easy for a woman with a shitty degree and limited qualifications to find a dream job, lemme tell you.

I then had another baby because I am a GENIUS and transferred to another state agency.

Neither of these state jobs was my dream. That’s gonna take yet another blog post. But the real kicker came when my dad, who lived with us due to his bipolar disorder, was diagnosed with terminal colon cancer. 

I kept the job for as long as I could. Life was work, doctor’s visits, chemo, work, and commuting between the above. I gave the kids what I could and my husband the remainder of what was left, hung my head, and dealt with it. And then I just couldn’t anymore. 

My dad began to have more trouble at home. We didn’t have anyone to stay with him, no family near, no one to check in. My paychecks, cut because I had long since run out of paid leave, ceased being worth the child care I was paying. Mercifully, my husband said it was time to let it go.

Two months later, we learned that my dad’s cancer, which had heretofore been responding well to treatment, had spread to the bone. Two months after that, he lost his battle.

Since that time, I have stayed home with my youngest child and have mostly enjoyed it. I haven’t been the perfect SAHM—remember, I’m one of thosemoms, but I played with her every day, read stories, snuggled a lot, went to school functions during the day…it was pretty amazing in contrast to what life had been like before.

And all was relatively well. Until she left me.

Now that my youngest is in school, I can’t really justify staying home. We need the money. We are managing, but we’re not fabulous by any means. And I need a purpose, hence all the crying.

My husband, who is the single best human being on the planet, in my opinion, is valuable. He has a good job that he enjoys. He is excellent at what he does and is respected. He earns a pretty decent living. He works normal hours and comes home and does the dad thing quite well.

And then there’s me. Me who has the same education as my husband but never quite found the right path. Me who had to put that career stuff on the back burner to deal with family stuff. Me, who has brains, who is a quick learner, who wants to be really great at stuff, who was always told she had potential, who could do something…what am I supposed to DO now?

I don’t know.

And I’m pretty sure that this novella I’ve written on this readerless blog isn’t helping me figure it out. But you know. 

At least now, when my husband asks me what I did today, I can say that I cried AND wrote this blog post.

He’ll be so proud.

Please Allow Me to Introduce Myself

I am one of those moms.

No, not one of those bitches who think that their $800 handbags will make up for the fact that they wear gym clothes everywhere—those ones who only ever talk about manicures and diamond earrings yet look perpetually frazzled and as though they probably haven’t slept with their husbands in 18 months? No. Not one of those.

I’m one of the other kind. The kind who lets her kids eat fast food. Yes. Lets. Actively.

The kind who has used TV to babysit her children when she just. needed. a. freaking. break.

The kind who says, “Uh, huh. Uh, huh. Uh, huh,” because everyone is talking to her ALL AT THE SAME TIME and how on EARTH is she supposed to make any sense out of it?!?!

Yeah, I’m one of those.

I bet you’re proud you’re not like that. You lovingly prepare homemade food containing nary a trace of artificial ANYTHING from fully organic shit grown/raised in your very own backyard. Which you religiously weed every morning at dawn.

TV isn’t allowed in your house. Except when PBS airs some sort of symphonic performance. And then you all crowd around, enrapt, and snack on kale chips.

You not only listen to and treasure every word ever uttered by your children, but you document them, old-fashioned style, in a moleskin journal. Well, in like 70 at this point. Because they are so highly verbal.

You are THE mom. The mom of TV sitcoms, gently humorous memoirs, and Good Housekeeping magazine. You are the ultimate Pinterest mom. Your hashtags are #homemade #handmade #handsewn #fromscratch #allnatural and #glutenfree.

You, of course, are perfection.

And I am one of THOSE moms.

I will make you feel better about yourself. I will validate every sacrifice you have ever made for your family. I give you reason to exist, because you exist because of my existence. Or some such bullshit.

Oh, yeah. I’m one of those moms who curse. Sometimes, IN FRONT OF MY KIDS!

But on the off chance that you are not one of the treasured June Cleaver moms of the world, just in case you are one of THOSE moms, too, perhaps here, if you should ever come across this little nothing blog that I will likely forget about within 72 hours, you will find a little comfort. 

You are not alone. There are others like you. Others who suck. And I am one of them. :)