The Bitch is Back

This bitch still has fabulous ankles. See? I wore these to work today. Because I may be 38 - but I still kinda rock.

Semester is almost done. Papers to grade. Shopping to finish. I am Addicted to True Blood and have read all the books too. SOOKIE!!!!!! I am also now reading "Let the Right One in" after seeing the movie ( which was kick ass) and am hooked. I know. Totally NOT the Social cognition stuff I am supposed to be reading...or the papers from class that I should be grading - but when the Vampires come for me, I'll have a full working knowledge of their social hierarchy and rule system. Zombies too. I'm ready and up to date thanks to the "Walking Dead" comics.

I have some posts that are partly written. Some funny. Some salty. Some a little sad and bitter. Some Professional Dawn in there too. But all me.

But here - as a teaser into my mind are the bits and pieces of draft posts that have been sitting in my blogger drafts for a year or more. Sometimes I write a little something and save it...or get distracted. I find them fascinating. Little slides into my mind.

So here they are. Take them as they are:
7/29/06
You can't know things until you know them. Yeah. I know - it sounds trite.

Blogging has become a part of my identity. Had you told me this, July 2005, I would have stared at you, dumbfounded. I had no idea of what a Blog was, let alone the desire to write one (or three) myself.

I was many things, most of them complex and not quite defined. But Blogger? What's that?

Eleven months later, I am a speaker at BlogHer. I am a writer and an advocate. I am a facilitator for women to begin to talk about the things that bother them. I am a destroyer of the cult of motherhood. I am Dawn.

8/30/06


I know, I no longer have a "bebe" to carry, but these signs at Loblaws made me happy. The parking spaces, right up front next to the handicap spaces must be a godsend to parents trying to wrestle child, groceries, car seat and every other thing involved with the care and upkeep of a young child.

You have my Mommy Loyalty, Loblaws

9/09/06

Ok, so I never smoke in front of Emily. Ever. I wait until she is asleep if I am going to have a Infrequent cigarette on the porch. I mean, a pack lasts me months!

I just like one every now and then. No every day need to smoke. But sometimes? A glass of wine and a cigarette? Heaven.

So, last night I wait until Emily is asleep. I pour my lovely glass of Merlot and creep out onto the porch. I sit in the warm breeze. I watch the stars and the lights of the cars that drive by. I smoke. I drink. I smoke another cause the first one was so good.

Time passes.

That's when it happened. A voice from the screen door:

"MOM! ARE YOU SMOKING!!!"

to which I replied in the only way I could:

"What the hell are you doing out of bed?? Get back in Bed!"

Then I ran into the bathroom to brush my teeth and wash my hands.

It's a sad state of affairs when I get busted by an 8 year old. I feel less guilty when she's caught us almost having sex.

09/29/06

Well, hello there folks from the Huffington Post. I didn't expect to see you all here. Of course, you caught me at a rough time...starting my PhD and all. I am less witty and prolific than usual, as the life force is being sucked out of my very marrow by my three classes.

They are:

Cognitive Development
Seminar in Curriculum Ideologies
Research Design and Methods

Hold yourselves back, I know those are some HOT topics. And would you like me to start talking about the Lit review (non Norton Anthology version) I have yet to begin. And why is that?, You ask.

Well, the crack smoking and prostitution is taking most of my free time, and what's left I spend abandoning kittens in alleys. And kicking puppies.

Or it could be that becoming a part time Stay at home mom and a full time student seems to be kicking my ass more than I expected. I mean, I worked full time during my Masters degree. How much harder could it be to NOT work and go to school?

Confucious on a Croissant! It sucks ass. (Yes, donkey gelatian ass) I run around all the time. I make sure the child is bathed, dressed, has a lunch and all her homework/school forms, is walked to school, then I run home to do the dishes, straighten up and throw the laundry in, then I try to read a little before I have to have lunch (which I have to MAKE), then I think "How will I use this last hour before I pick her up from school and she terrorizes me until I wrestle her into bed?"

And these are the days that I Don't have class, or meetings, or running around to kiss the asses of various academics and beg them for signatures. Can I be blamed for wanting to punch the little Masters degree girls who:

1. Have no children/not married
2. Talk about children as if they know everything
3. Have never held a job outside of internships
4. Complain about how busy they are

I want to jump up on my desk and shriek:

"HA! You people have NO idea what busy is! And you are collectively going to be shocked as shit when you meet a real kid one day, cause they don't act the way you've read AT ALL. And I dare you to insinuate to their parents that it is the parents fault. I would pay good money to see that Deathmatch begin!" (Back me up here, Feral)

but I don't. I sigh. I look away. I listen to ridiculous statements about children and families. I close my eyes.


05/12/07

I am rapidly approaching my one year anniversary of leaving the United States for Montreal, Quebec, Canada.

Now, Prior to my move here, I may have simply said "Montreal" - but now I distinguish that I am in Quebec - in Canada.

For those of you NOT in Canada - this is an important difference. Kind of like the difference between Boston and New York. Like the Red Sox and Yankees are the same team.

There are things I adore about my adopted country and province ( and yes, we are considering permanent resident status). The pace of life is actually slower. Yes. In a city the size of Montreal, my life is slower. Emily starts school at 9 a.m. Lunches can happily last 2 hours. With wine. And conversation. Bread is fresh and there are usually 2 bakeries/patessiere's within walking distance of most people's houses.

Now some of these things I notice because I lived in such a rural environment for a majority of my life. Montreal is a large international city. I see things that I have simply never seen before.

03/01/08

It is snowing again in Montreal.

Dude.

As with every end of winter stretch, I feel fat and lethargic. Months of minimal activity and bulky wool sweaters make me feel a bit like Jabba the Hut on a bender.

This makes me crabby and irritable

03/12/08

Dear Body,

We don't talk alot, you and I. I suppose we should talk more...you know, spend quality time with one another. In fact, I generally don't notice you unless I am 1) Feeling Fat, as I am now at the end of winter in Montreal, 2) Sick or, 3) Pre-Menstrual (which can coincide with number 1).

Having been asked about my relationship with you, I have had to stop and THINK about it. Did I always feel this low grade dislike or general apathy?

No. I am pretty sure that I didn't feel this way about you when I was a child - pre puberty. I was a normal, kind of skinny kid. Active, bike riding, swimming and running around. Busy. I never recall thinking I physically couldn't do something.

Then puberty came, and the notice of my male cousins, and eventually my father. Is this the moment that I abandoned you, Body? Was the betrayal of the trust of my father the moment that I turned my spiritual back on you? Was that when the seed of my ultimate apathy was planted? Does some of our relationship lay within the multifaceted dimensions of the relationship with my own mother and in her relationship with her mother?

Maybe.

I am, after all, built like the women of my father's family. German Farming Women. Good hips, strong legs, breasts that are intended to feed many healthy babies. My genetic heritage insured that I would survive famines to pass on my genes to new generations.

My mother has always seemed effortlessly thin. And Tall. Until her own hormones caught up with her in her mid fifties and she found herself a size 12. At that juncture, I welcomed her to the sizes of the real women of the world. Shit, I AIM for a size 12. That is my middle compromise ground with you, Body.


04/02/08


You know the days that seem to go on forever - and not in a good way? You stumble form one vaguely surreal moment to the next wondering when the hell this is going to settle down. Is there some kind of retrograde planetary situation that was not mentioned to you? Full moon? Tide shifts? Global warming? ANYTHING???

I've had a full week of that. Like disjointed Monty Python sketches, where I am the completely straight woman unaware that I am in the middle of a grand farce.

Last week, I developed a grand Facial Cavity infection...given to me by my child who recovered within a day on Monday the 3rd. By Monday the 10th, I crawled into a clinic begging to be put out of my misery. With the same child in tow, as it was ANOTHER snow day in Montreal.

One might not describe me as the warmest TA in the history of TA's, but I was Extra crabby last week. My very weak sense of usual decorum was invisible and it was clear to most that I should be approached with extra caution - if at all. Sadly a few students braved it - and possibly had their heads handed to them - on curriculum infused platters. Seriously. Don't mess with me about early childhood curriculum when I am sick....trying to tell me arts and crafts projects are curriculum will not engender warm fuzzies from me. Looking incredulous when I suggest instead of the FOUR arts and crafts projects that you create an experiment on Gravity and saying "Isn't that a bit advanced for Kindergarteners..." will earn you the look of death from me. Then I will very meanly suggest that 4 arts and crafts projects are a crap excuse for a curriculum project and that if I were your Director/Head of School I would toss your crap lesson plans out.

By Thursday, I will pick a fight with every professor/instructor I work with on topics as varied as the correct way to do annotated bibliographies and the use of colloquial language within a "script" that is being presented as if children wrote it. I came down on the side of the use of age appropriate colloquialism (i.e. "Hey, Guys!").

By Friday, I will feel slightly better. I will mentally process an invitation to appear on a National Business News program and respond to the producer saying... "Sure - why not." Because it seems just weird enough to fit in with my week.