Angel's "Rated-G" Spot

On this, the dawning of our anniversary, I want to take a few minutes to blog about my amazing husband, the wonderful man that I had the stupendous good fortune to wed ten years ago today.

How do I even begin to convey everything this man is to me? I could take up all the available space given and still only scratch the surface. I guess I could just begin at the beginning......

We knew each in other in high school. In fact, we graduated in the same class. Yet we knew no more about each other than two satellites orbiting the same planet; I knew his name and he knew mine and we knew some of the same people and that was about it. He was already dating S.'s mother at the time; that alone would have been reason enough for us to never speak. She was then and is now one big bad mama-jama. If you valued your skin, and I did, it was safest to avoid even looking at him.

Over the years, I heard things about him here and there....a mutual friend told me when he got married, and I remember hearing about S.'s birth in 1990. I got busy with life, marriage, and child-bearing myself and he didn't cross my path again until after my divorce from J.'s father in 1994.

I was working at a pizza place, living with my mom and trying to raise my daughter. I had enrolled at the local community college and was to begin classes in the fall. Changes were in the wind. And one night I got a phone call that ended up leading to the biggest change of my life. It was him; calling out of the blue, not having seen me since our high school graduation in 1986, to ask me out on a date.

Needless to say, I was blown away. Couldn't have been more surprised if you'd smacked me in the face with a dead fish. I mean, I'd never even had a conversation with this guy. It turns out that he was divorced too, and had been donating at the local plasma center to make ends meet. As the fates would have it, my sister worked at the plasma center, and was all too happy to give him my number when he asked about me. He told me later that he'd had a crush on me in high school; in the cafeteria, he would use the crowded room to stare at me without too much chance of getting caught. He tells me he still has fond memories of a tight, pink angora sweater that I used to wear. I loved that sweater; it was my favorite. It trips me out everytime I think about it that I never knew he looked at me.

That first date was the beginning, and it's never ended. 

I think it was his eyes that I first fell in love with. He has these incredible blue eyes. They have little laugh lines in the corners from where he smiles so much. And when he looks at me with those eyes, in that look that he saves just for me, I feel like the most beautiful woman in the world.

He works with his hands, a painter by trade. His hands are big and warm and capable, up to any challenge. I've seen those hands do everything from fix a car to cradle a tiny baby. The same strong, sure hands that can paint a bedroom in two hours rub me to sleep nearly every night, and I could pick them out of a line-up with hardly a seconds look. Those hands were the second thing I fell in love with.

Each year that flies by brings me a greater contentment. I was so right to marry this man!

He treats each person he meets with equal kindness and respect. He's a loving and creative father; I've written before that he attracts kids like a magnet and his own are no exception. He's always the one that has to help daughter J. with her homework because he has an air of patience that I have yet to acquire in dealing with my headstrong child.

His friends are many and his enemies few. He's loyal to a fault; I know that whatever happens, he's got my back. I think that's the most special thing about our relationship....he knows everything about me, the good and the bad, and he loves it all. We have a curious sort of mind-meld born of familiarity that is sometimes spooky. Some examples: We were getting the kids ready to go somewhere when they were younger and I was thinking "I need to tell the girls to get their shoes on" and I heard him call out, from the other room, "Girls! Get your shoes on!" The other night I was sitting here playing games and I thought "I wish I had some chocolate" and he walks up behind me and lays a Milky Way on my desk. Usually I can just think about what I want for dinner and he'll suggest it.

The downside of loving someone this much is that you open yourself up to a world of hurt. My worst fear is something happening to him or one of my children. After that, I have to trust that he's got my best interests foremost in his thoughts, no matter what, and to believe that even if I change physically he's still going to be true to me; that he'll still love only me. I've entrusted him with my heart, but I know that no one will hold it dearer: I am reminded every day, by his words and by his actions, that he cherishes me.

He is my soulmate, and because of him, these last ten years have been the best ten years of my life. I look forward to many, many more. The challenges that we face only make us stronger; we make each other the best people that we can be. If I have to get old and gray, if my body must progress into old age even if my brain still feels young, then there's no finer person I could have chosen to make the journey with.

Happy Anniversary, baby. 

On the bulletin board above my desk, where I can see it when I'm writing, there is a yellowed, dusty scrap of paper. 

Sorry I've been away so long.

Things have been keeping me....shall we say, "occupied". Scratch that. Only two things have been keeping me "occupied"......my family and my finances.

We'll start with the family.

The girls are grounded. Again. This time it's because they mutually agreed to withhold their progress reports from their parental units (that's us, I'm told). I am surprised by two particular aspects of this scenerio: 1.) That S. has turned out to be the instigator and crime boss in most, if not all, of the latest trangressions, including this one, and that 2.) They can get along well enough as a cohesive unit to plan something like this.

They both agreed, when confronted, that they knew they had zero chance of getting away with it. I asked J. what on earth she was thinking when she let S. talk her into it. J. shrugged, always the realist. "Mom, S. wasn't going to give you hers and I couldn't give you mine without getting her busted." While I am happy (and frankly, AMAZED) to see this kind of solidarity between my stepdaughter and my natural child, I must admit that I'm also a little disconcerted. Quite suddenly, it has become us against them. It's like a chess game....we make a move and then wait to see what their countermove is going to be. I guess the main problem is that I don't play chess.

I read somewhere that grandchildren are a parent's reward for not killing their own children. As a parent to teens, I can see the grisly humor in this statement. I can also see the thinly veiled truth. 

At least my animals are still as straight-forward as ever. Just feed them and take care of their basic needs (affection, grooming, a treat here and there) and they love you for life. They are also a source of constant amusement at a time in my life when there's precious little to laugh about. For instance, last night I was awakened, just past midnight, by a sound in the kitchen. Normally I wouldn't even hear a sound in the kitchen; it's quite a ways to my room. However, I have recently resorted to the use of a baby monitor to ensure that the teens residing in my home aren't trying to sneak out for a much-needed joy ride, since they're under virtual house arrest. I lay in bed, quietly listening to the silence, trying to figure out what had pulled me out of such a deep sleep. I was listening so intently that I almost jumped out of my skin when the ensuing melee began. It sounded like someone was throwing a bowling ball around my kitchen. Terrified, I jumped out of bed and threw on a robe, grabbed my trusty aluminum bat, and ran to confront whatever or whomever it was that was trying to get into or out of my home.

People with cats over fifteen pounds should take note here: When a very large cat is chasing a very small moth around a cluttered kitchen in the dead of night and you're hearing it amplified over a baby monitor, it is perfectly acceptable to freak out and think that you're a victim of a home invasion.

Finances are the other thing keeping me busy. We haven't been this broke for months. I've been looking for work, much to the dismay of my current employer, who has offered me a two dollar an hour raise and a guaranteed 50 hours a week minimum during tax season if I don't get another job. Go figure. If he'd pay me the same gross amount that he pays me during tax season but spread it out over a year, I wouldn't need another job.

The other day I finally got to do some grocery shopping and decided to take a walk on the wild side and buy some fruit, a luxury that we've been without for far too long. Peaches and plums and pears are in season now, and they're cheap and plentiful, so I stood next to the overflowing fruit bins, letting my mind wander as I filled up clear cellophane bags with the luscious, shiny produce. Later, when I got home, I began transferring the fruit to brown paper bags to let it ripen more naturally, a nifty trick I got from Alton Brown, who is a food genius.

I don't know what this particular fact says about me, but to my surprise I discovered that I had filled each cellophane bag with exactly eight pieces of each particular fruit. I distinctly recall not even looking as I filled the bags; certainly not counting, yet I ended up with eight peaches, eight pears, and eight plums. I guess my mind continues to keep order even when I feel so disjointed that I can't string two thoughts together. Another little bit of trivia about yours truly: When I worked for a local mini-mart chain, back in the 80's, I had a strange knack for being able to open my cash drawer and extract a bundle of twenty-five ones without counting. Could just pluck them out of the slot and there would be twenty-five. I was always winning the "Guess the amount of Jelly Beans in the jar" contests; won my sister a big stuffed bunny one year for Easter that way. Yet I cannot win the lottery. It's enough to make you cry. Anyhoo....onward. 

The Hubby and I are fast approaching our ten year wedding anniversary. We had planned to go to Las Vegas. Those plans were scratched when it became apparent that even if we could scrape together money for our plane fare and hotel room, we wouldn't have money left over to eat for the entire weekend, much less gamble. No sense going to Vegas if you can't eat or gamble. Adding to the money problem, I was shocked and dismayed to discover that an online friend had passed away without warning; he and a lot of other perfectly wonderful people were going to be in Vegas that weekend as well. Our trip was intended to be a combo tenth anniversary/Blogger's Convention get-away; we had decided to have two good times for the price of one. My friend's passing seemed to add to the general "you don't need to go" vibe that had shadowed the entire venture, so we decided to scrap the whole idea and just rent some dvd's.

Oddly enough, I'm really not too bunged up about the fact that my anniversary is most likely going to spent curled up in bed, eating chocolate in some form, watching movies and snuggling with the Hubby. I guess I'm just easy to please because that's my idea of the perfect date. Well, you could throw a big hunk of medium rare filet mignon in there somewhere if you wanted to blast the date into the stratosphere but it's not a requirement.

To end my rambling today, I'll leave you with this: Sometimes when things are a big mess, even the most optimistic and positive person has moments when they just want to hide out until it gets better. That's where I'm at right now. I lost my subscription to Puzzle Pirates. My poor computer is sitting on my desk wondering why I abandoned it. I'm applying for jobs and hoping some money will fall out of the sky. I'm taking each day as it comes until I get to the point that I can start to think about the future again. My blogging is reflecting the fact that my days have taken on a kind of sameness; I deal with each new problem and wonder what tomorrow is going to bring and I go on job interviews (there is some good material there, though, I have to admit). That's pretty much it. So if I don't get around to comment as much in these next few weeks, don't despair. This, too, shall pass.

See you in the silver lining!  

Time for me to share some of the Google searches that have led to my space.....I bet a few of the searcher's were sadly disappointed when their inquiries landed them here....

G spot pictures (of course)

Hidden Valley Ranch Redhead (I can only speculate on this one)

Best Friend Wants To Date Niece (uh-oh)

Young Girls G spot (bet he's on the Registered Sex Offender's List)

Show Me Your G spot (ummm, no thanks)

G-Rated Sarcasm (yep, that's me)

Finding My G spot (need some help there, eh??)

I'm 15 Is A Sophmore at Nehi (what?)

Another week has scampered by on little cat feet.

One wonders where the time goes. Each precious day brings its own quota of surprises, disappointments, and tribulations. Each night I go to bed and say my prayers, giving thanks for being able to experience whatever is it that particular day brought to the continuing saga that is my life.

A few days ago I had dropped the kids off at school and was making my way home when I happened to go through one of those really nice neighborhoods: you know the ones....every well-appointed, immaculately maintained home sitting squarely in a perfectly manicured yard with the mandatory two-car garage. As I was driving by one serene home, I spied a woman sitting in a comfortable chair on her fabulous front porch, sewing on something, not a care in the world. I was suddenly seized by a stab of longing so sharp it almost doubled me over. For just a minute, I yearned to be that woman....to have that wonderful home, to be able to work in that beautiful yard, to have two nice, new vehicles in my perfectly organized two-car garage. To have a refrigerator full of food, to be able to pay my bills and still have money left over to take my kids out to dinner if I so desired, to have a college fund....to simply be able to sit on my front porch in my nice comfy chair on a balmy summer morning, sewing. How comforting it must be not to have to worry about where the next dollar is coming from.

It's not often that I wish I had someone else's life. It's only when the weight of the world is rubbing my shoulders raw.

That evening, while my psyche was still flooded with residual envy, my son came running into my room, wearing his Superman suit and shouting happily that he had arrived to save me. The suit is one of his favorite toys, and quite ingenious....it's made out of a tent-like fabric that clings to the body so it can be worn under clothes, and has its own little air pump built into the back. Whenever Little Man wants to turn into Superman, he rips his shirt off, revealing his hidden persona, and flips on the air pump, which immediately inflates the suit, turning him into a muscle-laden superhero.

The one drawback is that the air pump sounds eerily like a hair-dryer, which doesn't lend itself to the impression he's trying to create, but, bless his heart, he doesn't seem to care.

And save me he did. It's amazing to me how his joy never fails to put things in perspective when I'm floundering. He's supremely happy with his life in general; to him, each new day is an adventure. His needs are few and his wants, even fewer. If there's an upset here and there, it's nothing more than a bump in his road. He gets up, brushes himself off, and forges ahead. Somehow, although we're all born with this natural ability to be content with what we've got, most of us migrate to a different point of view....we end up spending all our time wanting what we don't have, and wishing that our circumstances were different or better.

I don't need the nice house. I don't need the nice cars. I can do without the comfortable pad in the old checking account.

But this little boy, flopping around on my bed with his hair-dryer motor whirring and his inflated muscles poking me in the eye....this I need. This is why I'm here.

We all need our heros. Luckily for me, Superman is a close relation.