Category: relationships

music · relationships · the girls · vids

Every day is Mother’s Day

thebethy3 Comments

momnmeSo. Today is Mother’s Day.

I couldn’t go home to see my mom this weekend, because of BethyGirl2’s soccer game last night, and a project due on Monday morning.  (By the way, she scored her first goal ever. Proud mommy am I.)   It was just too hard to squeeze in 8 hours on the road.  I know Mom understands, but I was pretty bummed about not seeing her. 

In my weird techygeekgirl way, I decided to change up my myspace a little… you know, change my default pic to a “Mom and me” pose…  and then realized that as my song, I had Hot in Herre by Jenny Owen Youngs. Not exactly jiving with the mom/daughter theme, if you get my drift. I proceeded to embark on a wild goose chase through myspace music to try and find a song that even remotely had to do with motherhood and its virtues… of course, one with some essence of cool about it. Because that’s how I roll.
But I digress.

I ended up going through my favorites, and found this song by Rosie Thomas. I had always liked how it sounded, but hadn’t really taken the lyrics in. (Which is sort of odd for me, because I’m usually very lyriccentric. yes I just made up a word…)
Gah. too much coffee tonight, I can’t seem to stay on track. Here’s the song, and just in case you’re on your way to a fire and can’t take the time to watch the video, here are the lyrics.

If you had any sort of awkward childhood, I think you’ll be able to relate to this song. Shoot, my own father told me that he thought I had the ‘longest awkward period in the history of awkward periods.’ Nice, huh? 😉 He’s right, by the way. (Love you, Pop.)

So. After watching and listening to the song, I really started thinking about how supportive my mom has been, not just in the past few years, which have been very tough, but throughout all of my strange, timid, geekorama existence.
Thanks mom…
for volunteering in my class,
being my girl scout leader,
teaching my ccd classes,
putting notes in my lunchbox,
giving the evil eye to the horrid popular girls in junior high,
making me list 10 good things about myself when I was 13,
talking to me and making sure that I knew I could talk to you,
paying mucho bucks for cheerleading camp and uniforms,
chaperoning my senior trip and somehow still being cool,
making me want to go to college,
paying for college,
paying for my wedding,
loving my girls,
loving me even when I wrote that awful letter (out of love, but still…),
respecting my choices even when you disagreed,
and supporting me in every single possible manner during the last 3 years, which have easily been the most character building of my 34 years of life.

There is absolutely no way that I could repay what you’ve given me. Having you for a mom is a privilege and a blessing.
Happy Mother’s Day.

church issues · mind blurbs · music · relationships

I.Love.This.

thebethy4 Comments

Dan, I’m sorry, but I’m totally stealing this from you. I adore Imogen Heap, and you have to share, that’s all there is to it. 😉

I’m leaving in an hour to go see someone from the church I used to attend. She’s one of the people I really felt a connection with; she was my friend. I’m kind of hoping to continue that friendship now; it’s been, wow, 10 years (is that right? I don’t know…) since I’ve seen her. I’m anxious, yet hopeful, that she wants to see me because of me, and not to ‘save’ me. I mean, I know her beliefs, generally, and I know that part of her religion is to preach it to others, so I’m pretty sure that’ll be part of it. I’m nervous. Can’t type what I’m feeling, really. I want her to see me and see that I’m not a bad guy, I’m not the enemy, I’m just a woman who couldn’t deal with those beliefs anymore. I don’t want to look at her and see her looking down at me. I want this to be about friendship, and not religion.

I guess I’ll know tonight, huh?

Wish me luck.

And Happy Cinco de Mayo to all you party people. Be careful.

relationships

Uh oh.

thebethy11 Comments

So I was surfing blogs this morning, in my 12-hour-disney-shift-plus-two-hour-ihop-shift stupor, and I made some lovely discoveries. One is A Yoga Coffee Outlook, which led me to ~

allow_2b_their_option.jpg

Now, it’s not like I haven’t heard the saying before, but every time I read it, it’s like a mental reminder NOT to get in too deep. I live in fear (okay, i’m not exactly ‘living in fear, but you get what I’m saying….) of being the one who cares more, of being the little dog who runs around saying, “pay attention to me! pay attention to me!” Guess I did that for a long time, and I’m on the lookout for old habits.
Now I seem to be in a cycle of:

  • love love swoon
  • feel nice and comfy
  • overthink
  • worry about being a Clingy Girl
  • try to make a conscious effort to step back
  • flunk out of Stepping Back
  • decide that it’s silly to play games, and I’d rather give in to LoveLoveSwoon and ComfyFeelings, regardless of the possibility of future hurt
  • repeat

Wow. I just wrote that out.  I feel slightly neurotic.  Please please please someone tell me that I’m not the only woman who does this. 

Poor JohnnyFive. Your favorite female has issues.

I think I’ll go to work now, and consider tearing down this entire post. Sometimes I reveal too much of TheBethyBrain.

Smooch.

relationships

Rambling

thebethyLeave a comment

So.

I’m in my post Johnnyvisit funk again.  This one’s different though.  Heh. I have a sense of purpose about me… life changes that need to be made, to make me better, more independent.  Why is it that I’m 34 and am just now getting the feeling that it’s grown-up time?  Oh well, I guess I’m glad it’s arriving.   The New and Improved Bethy? Maybe.  I think I’m afraid of becoming the New and Usedtobemorefun Bethy.

Reading a new book… Stumbling on Happiness….It’s not a self help book, or a guide to becoming happier… More like a tutorial on how the brain works, how and why we seem to really suck at predicting our future happiness.  So far I’m intrigued.  I have a feeling I’ll be commenting more on it as I get further in.

And I think I’m quitting Disney soon. 

church issues · relationships

Reflections on Sara Teasdale

thebethyLeave a comment

Home from work today… watching wedding disasters on Lifetime, seriously craving some ahi tuna, and reading Sara Teasdale. Ahh… just what I needed.  I came across a few poems that really hit home to me, and especially relate to my life these past few years.  (Yet another blog that will have no significance to anyone but me…. but so be it.)  Thought I’d share.

“Leaves” represents so much to me. Many years of trying to be someone that I am not… the leaves to me represent friendships that I absolutely had to release in order to live life the way it should be led.  Sometimes those relationships  keep us from seeing all that life has to offer, and once we release the fear of losing those ties, we’re able to trust ourselves and our consciences.   So much of this poem relates to my c of c experiences. 

Leaves

One by one, like leaves from a tree,
All my faiths have forsaken me;
But the stars above my head
Burn in white and delicate red,
And beneath my feet the earth
Brings the sturdy grass to birth.
I who was content to be
But a silken-singing tree,
But a rustle of delight
In the wistful heart of night–
I have lost the leaves that knew
Touch of rain and weight of dew.
Blinded by a leafy crown
I looked neither up nor down–
But the little leaves that die
Have left me room to see the sky;
Now for the first time I know
Stars above and earth below.

And the flip side of the coin.  Some relationships, incredibly,  refuse to fade with time… the ones that don’t simply allow us to be who we are, they revel and encourage us to discover more of ourselves, and make us better.  I am incredibly grateful that I have seen both sides of this coin, so that I can appreciate it all the more.  I wouldn’t trade the loneliness; without it I wouldn’t have recognized true love.  If one day it’s gone, at least I’ll have known that it exists.

I Remembered

There never was a mood of mine,
Gay or heart-broken, luminous or dull,
But you could ease me of its fever
And give it back to me more beautiful.

In many another soul I broke the bread,
And drank the wine and played the happy guest,
But I was lonely, I remembered you;
The heart belongs to him who knew it best.

xoxoxo

relationships · vids

How Life Works

thebethy1 Comment

Thank you C. and K. and L. and all the letters in between, for putting us exactly where we’re supposed to be, right this minute. Without you, we wouldn’t be possible. 

“And it is in the humble opinion of this narrator that this is not just “Something That Happened.” This cannot be “One of those things…” This, please, cannot be that. And for what I would like to say, I can’t. This Was Not Just A Matter Of Chance. Ohhhh. These strange things happen all the time. ”

*edit*  In answer to Danny’s question, this is the intro to the movie Magnolia. If you haven’t seen it yet, go do that. It’s a life-changer. Promise.

relationships

I knew better, but I read it anyway…

thebethyLeave a comment

Ya know, grr at me.
I should know better. I don’t need to stalk anymore. But nooo, my stupid curiosity wins every time, and I can’t help it. I read it. Knew it was there, have known, and had successfully avoided it. Until today. Why why why? Ugh.

So now, I get to walk around with his emotions in my head. Which equals questions in mine. Am I a consolation prize after all? Second choice?

I am better than that. Than questioning my worth in someone else’s eyes. It’s nothing he’s done, he didn’t put the questions there. My search for insight, for, somehow, proof that I am better than she was, has gotten me again. And I don’t know what to do about it, because you know I’m not going to forget what I read. hell, what I bookmarked for further torture.

Wish I hadn’t.

relationships · the girls · work

January 10, 2007

thebethy2 Comments

Well hey, and crap. Knew this was going to happen…
I link this thing to my poetry and then give it to myspace. Ta-da! Instant afraid-to-say-what-I-wanna-say syndrome. Oh well. I’ll eventually talk to the 5 about it and see if it bothers him, cause what prompted today’s worry was that I was going to mention our little tiff last night. Gah. I hate when I do stuff that seems like a good idea at the time, and then backfires.

The girls: Are doing really well.. had a teacher conference with Abby’s teacher this morning. Eyes tremendously poufy due to the whole weirdness last night. I wasn’t really happy with Keith seeing that, since he SO knows what that pouf means. Happiness is the best revenge and dangit I don’t want him to think I have a care in the world. Oops. The girls. 🙂 Abby needs a swift kick in the pants to resume effort in math at school; she’s already taking 6th grade math in 5th grade, but I think she expected it to be as easy as it’s always been for her. Bless her heart, she’s just like me sometimes, with the tenderheartness… crying at the drop of a hat, when the teacher asks her if she needs help. Mrs Ortiz said today, and it made me cry (surprise)… “Abby seems to want to just suffer in silence. I just want her to be happy.” Amen. That’s what I want too. It just seems that she’s so intimidated by her teachers, and I guess at times… well, not so much intimidated as much as fearful of hurting mine and Keith’s feelings. She just doesn’t want to talk about things that bother her. I know that we need to get her out of that habit, or I’m going to lose her in teenagerdom. That scares me.
Kate’s rolling on as usual. Cracks me up… any issues she has with this divorce will result, not in academic problems, but in behavioral, I can tell. She has to write sentences with her spelling words, and apparently yesterday wrote a sentence using the word ‘mouth’… “Kelsey’s mouth just will not stop!” Oh geez louise, this kid. Even though it’s true, I can’t believe she wrote that and turned it in to her teacher. I would never have had the nerve.

The Job: Still loving it, utterly. I’m not as entertaining, perhaps, as some of the other cast members, but I do enjoy sparking a smile in some of our more weary guests. I like to think I give them enough cheer that they don’t grump up, cause really, who wants to be grumpy in Disney? or for that matter, hang out with ole grumpy grandpa?
I am having a bit of a time with the friends thing. Everyone I work with is either many years younger, or many years older. There’s no one there like me, ya know? But shoot, I’ve never had friends my own age… they’ve always been older. So now, I’m the old one, and it’s hard to get used to. I enjoy everyone SO much, but I feel SO different. I guess that’s the name of the game for me now. Sort of depressing. My best friend is miles and miles away in Ohio. which leads us to…

The love interest: Miss him terribly. Last night we had a tiff, sort of. Really just simultaneous grumpiness, I think. In any case, there was a little bit where we weren’t talking, just because it seemed like a train wreck, and neither of us could say anything right. In that time, I prayed, prayed that this would not fall apart. I am so entirely emotionally invested in this that it scares the bejeezus out of me. or the Jesus into me. you know what I mean. I remind myself over and over that I’m fine on my own, fine on my own… like a mantra. But I don’t want to be. If this doesn’t work out, I will be by myself for a very very long time. By choice. Because if this isn’t perfect, then I give up that perfect exists.

The church: Well, I think that Catholicism is winning… seems like I long to go Mass now… I’m still awfully confused about where I’m supposed to be. I’m hoping that at some point, it becomes clear to me. I have to get the idea out of my head that there is some awful WRONG choice. Cult mentality strikes again. It’ll come.

The house: Messy, but will be straight and lovely and de-Christmased by the weekend. Looks like I may have visitors every weekend til the end of the month. Should be fun. 🙂

The divorce: Seems wrong to have a love interest spot along with an unfinished divorce topic, doesn’t it? Well pfft on you if you think so. Walk in my shoes. 😉
I’m hoping within the next month that I’ll be a free woman. Poorer, dangit, but free.

Still lovin life, and happier than I have been in a really really long time.
I wouldn’t change a thing.
If you’re reading this, comment. I have to know who to be appropriately embarassed around.

church issues · goals · relationships

The Worlds Collide

thebethyLeave a comment

So this morning… I was looking for a way to put my poems on myspace, or do an rss feed, or something. Well, when I got here, I ended up putting my poetry blog onto the new blogger format, which, unbeknownst to me, stuck my poetry blog onto the same profile as this one.
At first, that posed a bit of a problem, because, well, for a few reasons:

  1. This blog was not necessarily known by any of my friends. I was just sort of doing it to be doing it, you know? Not to be read by folks who actually know me.
  2. I’ve given out the poetry link to quite a few of said friends. Not sure how many of them actually look at it anymore, since most of those folks are in Tallahassee, but still.
  3. Which means that now, the people who looked at my poetry blog would be able to also see this one. Ready for a sublist of why that’s a problem? ok:

a) My heading on this blog. Some of the people that have the poetry link, heck most of them… are members of the church that I refer to as a cult. I’m afraid that I may hurt some feelings. I do still feel that way, and hesitate greatly to change my wording just because someone is looking. However, my intention is not to make anyone mad with that label. I’m not judging the people who are still there. Ok, enough apologizing. It’s my blog and I can write what I want, right? ugh.

b) Not sure if I’m completely ready for 2 worlds to collide. It’s kind of like Work George and Fun George, a la Seinfeld.

So.

That being said, I’m going to leave it the way it is. For so long, I felt that I lived 2 different lives, and had to hide one from the other… and I don’t want to feel that way anymore.

Here’s to 2007. A Year of Oneness.