First Day of School

So today was my spawn's first day of 2nd grade. She woke me up at 5:00 am with the great words "Mommy!! It's the first day of school, we have to get ready!!" Now I don't do 5 am without considerable prodding and coffee so I told her to go back to sleep.

45 minutes later.....

Spawn: "Mommy, is it time yet?"

JayLee: "No honey, it's only 545, you don't have to be at school till 8 and we don't get up till 630."

Spawn: "But Mommy, it's the first day, I don't want to be late."

JayLee: "You won't be now go back to sleep."

45 minutes later...

JayLee: "Now it's time to get up, you can watch cartoons while I take a shower."

Spawn: "No I'm going to get dressed."

By the time I got out of the shower, she was dressed and had her lunch half made. I was only in there for less then 15 minutes. She was at school at 8 am on the dot. She looked so grown up with her backpack and her lunch box, jumping out of the car and heading to class.

This afternoon when I picked her up from daycare she was full of tales about today. My baby is growing up. At least the most important thing to her this afternoon was to tell me about her day. I even made sure that I left work on time just so I could hear about it. Cause you know that is what it's all about anyway, being there to hear about the first day at school and pack the special things for lunch and to make sure that the all the right stuffed animals are tucked in with her at night.

The Explosion

Well about 11ish or so last night I get a call from Vader. Now really, to my way of thinking unless something is wrong you really shouldn't call that late but I guess no one taught him that. Because I wasn't right by my phone I didn't see it blink (I turn the ringer off when I go to bed)

It seems that he's finally been served the noticed that I filed child support and he wasn't happy about it (big surprise there) So he accused me of avoiding him, like this is such a hard thing to do if I wanted to, I mean really all I would have to do is go about daily life and there problem solved, he's avoided. Then he started in on things from back when we were together, now this is what I don't get about this part. We had this really big long many hour conversation when he got engaged and both agreed to leave all that stuff in the past and I've tried to stick to that, yet he keeps bringing it back up. So in the middle of him going on about how much he's been working and that is why he hasn't seen my spawn, and how he wasn't going to pay me because now he would have lawyer fees and would end up in jail and such, he says to me that I am making my spawn think badly of him and he always thought I was the most evil person alive.

WHAT!?!? I mean first off, I don't say bad things about him to my spawn, she sees what he does and has made her own opinions without any help from me. Second, because I am tired of dealing with him and his excuses on why he can't pay child support I went and did what we should have done in the beginning and just put it through the state I'm evil? Then he hits me with I put my self in this situation and I forced this on him.

In his mind, I got pregnant on purpose to trap him and there is nothing I can say that will make him think otherwise. I don't even try to fight that fight with him anymore, it's pointless. So off on that rant he goes and I just hung up. I wasn't going to try to fight a loosing battle not at what was then 1130 at night. I'm sure that I'll hear from him again and if not oh well, I guess I'll see him at the proceedings for the child support.

For now, I assume it's Game On.....I never wanted to play this game though.

Time marching on.

So tonight was orientation for my spawn's school. She's going into 2nd grade. I look at her sometimes and wonder when in the hell the last 7 and a half years went. It's hard for me to realize that some of the time just passed by almost without my noticing.

I find myself thinking about all the things that we've done and all the things that we have yet to do and praying that there is enough time to do them all. Isn't that always the way though? At least I find that it is with me, I'm always worried if I am enough, or have given enough or feel like I haven't given or done enough. I suppose that is part of being a parent.

For a while now, due to circumstances way beyond my control, I've felt like I haven't been a good parent. Then one of my friends (who doesn't happen to have kids) said to me, "Well JayLee, What is a good parent?" After I started describing, what in my opinion, was a good parent, I was hit with, "Well, duh, you do all that." And I realized that I did. I was always there when she woke up, I was there for field trips at school, I was there for the special holiday things that went on. I praised art work that I wasn't really sure what it was but it was supposed to be a house and a tree so that is what we saw, I have put aside homework of my own to help her with hers, I've stayed up until all hours decorating cupcakes for fall festivals because having "pumpkins and ghosts drawn on them were cool Mommy." I guess that at the end of the day it may never seem like it's enough until I'm sure that she's going to grow up okay and then I'll still worry.

I guess the thing that I have the hardest time with is not feeling responsible for the shortcomings of Vader (her father) As of today, He hasn't seen her for 3 months. It breaks my heart. She says she doesn't care, that she doesn't want to see him and I do believe her. But she sees other kids with their dads and she gets this look. The "that is what I'm missing" look. As hard as I try I can't make it go away, but I keep trying.

I guess that is all I can do, keep trying. Perhaps one day I will convince myself that it's enough. Maybe as she gets older she will think, as she thought today, that I am the best Mommy in the world and she loves me more then anything. I know that I love her more than anything and I wouldn't be who I am today without her.

And just when I thought life was getting back to normal...

So I'm trying to become a firm believer in "everything happens for a reason" Sometimes I can see the reason, sometimes, more often then not really, I have no fucking clue as to what the possible reason could be.

This happens in my life, my work, you name it. True story, I started talking to a guy. I thought he was a really cool guy. We had an awesome "first date" I guess you would call it. Well, it was awesome to me, he seemed to agree with me or so he said. So awesome first date. Happen to be seen by one of my co-workers, who later asked me about it. So I dished some vague details, name, just started talking. Nothing major. Co-worker in turn told someone else, normally not a big deal but they called me on it like a week later. Okay so whatever, I mean really I'm friends with this person too. So during the course of conversation it comes out that the guy is on my Face Book. Now, I have almost 200 people on my Face Book, I mean really, ya know. But my "friend" says "Maybe I should go and friend request him." To which I replied "No, don't do that." You would think that if someone was your friend they would listen to you. But she did it anyway and when I called her on it the reply was "I just couldn't help myself."

So this happens to coincide with apparently things going crazy where he works and communication between him and I falling off. So needless to say I was in a word, confused. And in another word, pissed. Confused, because I couldn't figure out why he wasn't talking to me so I asked. Pissed because my "friend" did something that I asked her not to do and what I saw as a violation of the girl code.

So now I'm lost, I have to try to express my feelings to my "friend" in a manner that will be understood. I really need a way to get my point across without having to slap her with a clue bat and ask what in the hell she was thinking. I mean I guess she was trying to be helpful but really, I didn't want the help.

And on the other hand I have to figure out if the guy I was "talking" to is being straight with me about why we haven't been talking. I mean I really don't want to jump to conclusions and I don't want to come off sounding like a jealous idiot since I mean really it's only been one date and a few conversations. I would rather just talk to him and say like so, do we still have something here or is what we thought we had over. So in that respect I'm just kinda waiting. I mean, I hope he's mature enough at his age that if he's just not that into me anymore he would just say that.

At the end of the day whatcha gonna do right?

My Mommy

Today is my Mommy's birthday. She has in her own words become an age that she considers unacceptable to speak so we have settled on the all purpose age of "39"

My mom really is my hero, she managed to be a successful single mom way before it was acceptable to be a single mom and always taught me never to give up on my dreams. She also had the task of putting up with me and my sister and my dad through many moves, the first Gulf war and living in Europe for 6 years, without killing any of us.

So to the best mom that I could have and the best grandma that my spawn could have, Happy Birthday.

Love you Mom!!

The end of a Dream

I heard that sometimes you need to let go of one dream to make room for others. I guess I haven't heard anything more true lately.

Not to sound too much like MLK but I had a dream, and it was a nice dream. But it was killed. For a while I was able to live that dream and for that I will always be grateful. That short moment in time when everything was as I thought it should be. The moment that was never meant to last. Perhaps it was there to teach me something. I'm still trying to process all that I have discovered from it and the subsequent events that lead me to today.

Now I have to let that dream go completely and the person with it. That hurts most of all because they were so much a part of every aspect of my life for so long that I am having trouble understanding what my life will now be like without them. I do know that in a lot of ways I became a better person because of them. Hopefully we will find our way back to each other someday and able to recapture the friendship that was such a special part of my life.

And so I go on my way, in search perhaps of new dreams.....or perhaps if they happen to find me. Because life doesn't stop when your dreams end, it just demands that you start dreaming over again. Maybe this time, I'll get lucky....After all life is a Cabaret ol chums, so go to the Cabaret.