and i'm back

This was me. On a beach in Mexico. Mexico gave me Robert Smith hair.

My four day vacation in paradise has come to an end. We got home around 10pm last night, and have been doing what everyone does after vacation.. Going through a little shell shock at trying to get back into ordinary life, unpacking, and doing so much laundry that I'm sure won't get put away for another week or more. And recouping from a stomach bug that hit me early this morning. I'll spare you the gory details.

I can't quite express how amazing the entire experience was just yet. I'm piecing together the words. I felt a wild awakening inside of me that I haven't felt stir in quite some time. There was something freeing about putting your feet in the ocean and knowing you were no where near home.

I'll have pictures galore once this slight stomach bug I caught decides to let me really get back to my life.

xo

im ready for my vacation now, just dont make me try on anymore swimsuits

I’ve mentioned it about a million times, but this coming Friday I leave for a four-day weekend in Mexico.

I’m pretty much beside myself and can’t function as a normal human being until I’m on that plane.

We have someone staying at our house to watch the girls (aka our dogs), all of my clients are aware I’ll be away, I have my away message all raring to be put on display, and holy crap I need to be away already.

Last night Kh and I got a little over zealous and looked at 600+ photos of the resort we’ll be staying at on TripAdvisor.  I needed to get a better idea of what I should plan on wearing, I know, a little silly right?

I bought 5 pairs of shoes for this upcoming trip, or rather Summer in general really. 4 pairs of sandals, and one pair of wedges. This isn’t including the pair of sandals I bought last minute at an end of season sale last Fall. I probably only plan on bringing 4 pairs with me, however. Kh doesn’t think that’s reasonable, but I completely do.

On her way home this past Friday she stopped in to H&M real quick to get some shorts and dress pants for herself and ended up buying me a vacation purse. I’m pretty much the luckiest girl ever. She knows my style so well she can buy things for me. Uh, true love.

I also found this super cute maxi dress at Kohls, surprisingly enough. It has multi-color triangles on the bottom. While shocking it’s not all black, I’m pretty much in love with it.It's in the top right, the others just didn't do it for me.

Tomorrow when my household settles down a bit more, I plan on doing some last minute shopping. I need to get at least two more bathing suit tops (shoot me now, kay?), and one (who am I kidding, a couple more) maxi dresses.

I’m mentally preparing myself for the saga that is trying on a swimsuit. A couple of years ago I found the cutest two-piece, tank/halter top swimsuit in the maternity section at Target. Do I care its maternity? Not in the slightest. It’s got a scalloped edge on the bottoms and fits my curves.

On my last adventure to Target I thought I’d try on a few (4) bathing suits to humor myself. And humor myself it did not. The two that humored me the least?

The first one was a one-piece, with a built in padded bra situation. The particular size I was trying on fit me great in the mid section. But if you cast your eyes lower you’d look upon the forming of a camel toe, and if your eyes wandered upwards you’d find my boobs strangely getting choked down, but not even remotely filling up the padded cups that were sewn haphazardly into the top of the swimsuit. Like some kind of stretched out taffy with a ping pong ball in the end. And by ping pong ball I mean a nipple and my hard boob parts.

The second one was a black halter top that fit great, but the bottom portion of it let me say hello to my old friend camel toe that I had just seen a glimpse of previously. It also strangely rode up my butt crack and wouldn’t even come close to middle of my hips.

I left Target feeling like I had been slapped with a heavy dose of body shame and sprinkled with some self-loathing. Do you know how I changed it?

I got naked. Stood in front of my mirror and said “fuck you Target bathing suits.”

Of course I waited until I was home to do all of the above-mentioned naked shenanigans. But that’s generally what I do when I’m having a day when I feel less than or some how not fully whole as a result from shitty fitting rooms and ill fitting clothing.

So in closing. I’m going to fucking Mexico in 5 days and my mind is completely shot. I will be sitting my ass in a chair, on a gorgeous beach, drinking before noon, and writing in one of my many blank notebooks. I plan on clearing my head, centering myself, and probably drinking too much and chasing an iguana around.

xo

flowers, tattoos and a good cause

You know what’s fantastic? Having a couple of glasses of wine on a Tuesday night and thinking “shit, I leave for Mexico in 10 days.”

I mean, at least that’s what I’m thinking tonight.

This past weekend was one of those jack-shit happened but I barely had any time to get my own stuff done kind of weekends. The never-ending saga that is my crappy cars health kicked in to over drive. We spent most of Saturday waiting for an appointment to get a flat tire fixed, only to have the tire place tell me they didn’t have the tire we needed. Then we spent 2 hours Sunday morning waiting for said tire to get replaced. It was great..

If you like being tempted by a vending machine full of chocolate bars at 9am.

Sunday afternoon I talked my friend into coming with me to a local tattoo shop that was having a fundraiser for families that were affected by the Boston Marathon bombing. Several other tattoo shops in the area had done the same. A sheet of flash had been drawn up of Boston Strong inspired tattoos, and I’m all over random tattoos. Especially for a good cause. 

 It’s my little Pru. I asked for some pink, and gave my artist liberty on the rest of the colors.

I took a nap once I got home. Because what else do you do at 3pm on a Sunday? Amiright?

Once I woke up, Kh and I walked to one of our go-to places for an early dinner. We forgot it was Mother’s Day and got to enjoy the wonderful entertainment of listening to awkward interactions of Mother’s and their sons/daughters significant others.

On the walk home Kh bought me some flowers from a lady on the street. 

Oh.. She’s a keeper.

Even if she did use my $10 to buy them.

xo

i need a month of weekends

It's Wednesday. I woke up this morning thinking it was Friday, and I was beyond heartbroken when reality set in. I have 16 days left until we leave for Mexico. I am so ready for this vacation. I'm almost afraid to return from it and have to get back into daily living.

I've been having some fantastic weekends as of late. Lets start with the last weekend in April shall we?

Kh and I took a day trip to a local Zoo. Ok, not so much a day trip as it's literally 10 minutes from our house. It was a pretty sad excuse for a zoo, and I'm still convinced most of the animals were trying to kill themselves.

The flamingo enclosure smelled like fishy poop death, which was heightened by the intense body odor emitting from a few of our fellow onlookers. We got to see a tiny bat almost pee on his own face while hanging upside down, that was pretty funny. 

Kh was pretty entertained with the llamas, and the monkeys. I found this pretty awesome wood carving.

I asked Kh to take a picture of me. Kh has this habit of taking a million pictures of me, in every single state of talking. Goofing off, mouthing back at her, and doing my impression of what I usually end up looking like. 

 I think the bottom left shows off my personality quite well. 

After the Zoo we went up to Salem to grab some lunch. We sat outside and soaked up some more sunshine. And drank some beer. Obviously.

This past weekend we wandered around Somerville Open Studios. My friend Janine over at Salvage Love was participating. She has some amazing reclaimed wooden art, refurnished furniture and jewelry. She also had beer and some wine, so that was an added bonus. 

Later in the night we went to our favorite restaurant with some friends. We gorged ourselves on yummy food, and our waitress/bartender/owner kept bringing us sample drinks. 

Since I'm on the topic of weekends. This coming weekend we're going to be celebrating our two friends graduation from law school. Fancy cocktails and good food. I'll probably even con Kh into going shopping for Mexico attire. 

xo

i'm just not having it

Let me tell you a story.

Yesterday I was bringing a client home. He’s a dog; just to make sure that’s known. We’re standing at the elevator waiting for it to make it’s slow decent to the first floor, when a woman walks up and stands next to us. Little man decides he wanted to start throwing up; he does that every now and again. So I stand there, waiting for him to finish doing his thing. 

He finishes just in time for the elevator doors to open up. I glance over at the woman who is giving me the nastiest glare you can imagine. I get in the elevator, and this exchange ensues.

Woman: You better clean that up. Don't you dare just leave it there!
Me: Does it look like I have paper towels on me? Ill take care of it.
Woman: I'm so sick of seeing messes all over this place.
Me: I highly doubt it was him all over the complex, mind your own business.
Woman: It IS my business! Leaving a mess like that! How dare you! (she continues on for a while)
Me: It's time for you to shut up now.
Woman: (with disgust) What did you just say to me?
Me: (while smiling) You heard me. It's time for you to shut up now.
Woman: (dumbfounded glare)

I took the dog back to his apartment, got him all settled in, then headed down to the concierge to let them alert maintenance to take care of it. I would have myself, but again, I don’t carry cleaning supplies in my back pocket.

There are a few things that infuriate me instantly. One of the biggest would have to be when complete strangers find it somehow acceptable to speak to you in public in a disrespectable way and are shocked when they are put in their place.  I’m not sure where people get the gumption to do things like this, but I really don’t stand for it.

This ranges from people cat calling out of car windows, inappropriately touching someone (in my case, my tattoos),  or even those times when you’re at a bar or in line at a store and someone gives you the stink eye or talks about you within earshot. Even worse is when I hear someone say something about a friend/relative, I get a little crazy.

It’s about time more people stand up for themselves and not let people get away with it.

Don’t take no shit.

xo

 

the ripples of a tragedy

 

I first came to Boston when I was in middle school for a field trip. I fell in love with the streets that seemed to start and end with no warning. The tall buildings that weren’t to tall to strain my neck while I stared up at them.

When I was 15 I came back to visit and knew it would be my future home. I rode the sprawling commuter rail and wandered the frozen streets daydreaming of making it home.

I came back when I was 19 and started making a life for myself. My knuckles were bloodied with how hard I pounded out my new life. Boston isn’t an easy city to get started in, but I was determined.

I’ve lived all over Boston. I lived in someone’s living room on the floor for 3 months just to get my foot in the door. At night I’d go up to the roof and have a view of Fenway Park, lilt up with crowds cheering. I’d smoke cigarette after cigarette waiting for the urge to go back inside to come over me.

I left Boston for a couple of years, but I came back. The city always called me back.

The second job I ever had in Boston was at a spa, on Boylston Street. The spa was located at the finish line of the Boston Marathon. The week leading up to the marathon we’d sit at the window watching everyone set up. Scaffolding and bleachers unfolding and being erected.

I left the spa, and over the years the spa has moved farther down the street.

I’ve since worked at two other day spas and salons in the area. Leaving behind me a lot of close friends and acquaintances still working in the area.

I used to take my lunch and sit in the park in Copley Square. Throwing pieces of my sandwich to the birds.

I’ve always made it a habit of avoiding Boston on Marathon Monday. It can be a crowded and hard to get around if you aren’t there to watch the race, and I’m not one for race watching. Or crowds.

I had just walked into a client’s house when the news of explosions in Boston came on the tv. A tv that the clients never leave on, but happened to be on this particular day. I sat staring at the tv, finally knocking myself out of the stare I had fallen into.

I come home and tell Kh and her friend about it. We all sit on our phones, reloading and reloading any news page that’ll give us information on what’s going on. I don’t have cable.

I was truly in shock. Everything seemed like a bad dream floating by. Everyone I know was touched in some way by the tragic events; Boston’s a small city.

News comes about that a former co-worker of mine was caught in the explosion, as was her teenage daughter. Her daughter sustained injuries to her legs, while she lost both her legs from the knees down. Unreal.

The rest of the week everyone seemed to be holding their breathe. Waiting. Listening. Taking everything in and trying to make sense of it all.

Friday morning Kh woke me up before 8am to watch the news. A shoot out in Watertown. We see pictures of the end of Kh’s old street. All of the surrounding areas are put on lockdown. By 2pm we leave the house to get some errands and work done. The streets aren’t empty, but its scarce out.

Everything calms down by the end of Friday night, but the ripples of what happened on Monday can still be felt. Everyone’s on edge, relieved but still in shock. It’s all most people can talk about.

One of the victims lived in my town. Her memorial service took place at the funeral home down the street from my house. I saw the mourners lining the streets and the heavy police presence on Sunday.

It’s eerie for me to think about how close I could have been to all of the events that went down. I’m in awe at how quickly Boston stepped up to get justice. The entire city went on lockdown until the suspect was apprehended. While I still haven’t formed an opinion on how I feel about it all, I know I am disgusted in the evil that can exist within a person. It’s devastating to think about those in other regions of the world that suffer this form of injustice and brutality on a daily basis. It’s those horrors we are spared from daily that make it ever more shocking when incidents do happen.

I’ve been out of sorts lately. I’m working on getting back. I need a few days of something terrible not happening to really help with that.

Boston strong.

xo

my heart broke just a bit more

I was 20, on the cusp of 21 when my roommates and I decided we wanted to get an apartment dog.

I spent months obsessing over what kind of dog, and even longer trying to find one. I came across a family that wasn’t very well off whose Chihuahua had a litter of puppies. I started emailing with the family and soon received pictures of what was soon to be our dog. My dog.

In the first photo I ever saw of her, she looked like a rat. A bug eyed rat the size of a remote control. No. Smaller than a tv remote control.

I met the family in a Target parking lot and handed  over $150, $50 more than the price they wanted for her, and $350 less than the original price they were asking for her.

I brought her home with me. She slept in my bed, peed all over my floor, and quickly weaseled her way into my heart.

She’s 6 ½ now and has been by my side through many of lifes journeys. She has seen my ups, my downs, and everything that’s been in-between.

The Wednesday before Easter weekend we noticed she had a slight wheezing cough. We took her to the vet and after Xrays, and bloodwork they found nothing wrong with her. Except her usual issues. A heart murmur that may have intensified, her degenerative back issues, cherry eye, and slipped discs in her knee caps.. Generally she’s a gigantic mess.

We take her home and the next day make an appointment with a cardiologist for the following week. Thursday night she gets worse, and by Friday we’re taking her to the ER for pets. They immediately rush her to the ICU and put her in an oxygen cage, and find fluid in her lungs with an Xray. She’s put on a lasik drip and everything seems like a hazy dream.

Kh and I leave the ER, unable to really speak and drive back home.

I climb into the shower in the dark and cry for half an hour. 

We begin the waiting game.

Later that night I get a phone call, she’s responding well but still in critical condition.

I couldn’t cry anymore. If my eyes stay open, they’re in a permanent squint. I take a sleeping pill and try to sleep.

I get a phone call at 6am. She’s doing better. Still on lasik. Still getting oxygen.

I get another phone call around 11. Same thing. More waiting. They ask if I want to visit her and bring her food.

We get ready and head up to see her.

I try my hardest not to cry when I see her get excited at the sight of us. She rushes to the front of the oxygen cage, an IV in her left leg wrapped in a gauze. A nitro paste taped to her right ear.

I get it together and choke back my tears. We stay with her for 20 minutes and feed her. She gets sick of us doting on her and starts to give me that “alright, enough already” look. We leave and get a stiff drink at a chain restaurant down the street.

We go home. I put on my pajamas and take up my ever vigilant mope on the couch. I have a few drinks. I take a sleeping pill.

We wait some more.

Easter comes and we aren’t interested. I get a phone call at 6am again.

Kh’s parents come up and have lunch with us. It feels good to try and distract myself. Kh’s mother awkwardly tries to divert the conversation and ends up going right to how she’s doing and when we can see her again.

I keep my phone in my hand every minute, not wanting to miss a phone call with an update.

It finally comes, right when I’m finishing my 2^nd glass of wine. I run up the 2 flights of stairs to make it outside in time to answer the phone call. She’s stabilized; her heart rate is down, fluid in her lungs is gone, and is well enough to be discharged.

I choke back tears and put on my game face to finish up lunch.

We pick her up at the ICU. She sleeps the rest of the night and I cry any time I look at her for the next 2 days.

Tuesday morning I take her to her cardiologist appointment that we just so happened to have kept from the week before. I cry the whole way there. I cry the whole way home.

I keep it together long enough to get to see her Xrays. Her tiny little rib cage. Her heart. I get to see her echocardiogram and try not to cry when he shows me the valve that isn’t working the way it should be.

She’s given her diagnosis. Chronic valvular disease. She had congestive heart failure and her heart murmur had worsened. She’s on the less complicated side of things. No liver or kidney failure or even signs of failure. She’s put on 3 different medications. She has to take twice a day. Indefinitely.

Her cardiologist tells me the general survival rate is 12-18 months after the initial congestive heart failure, but he has patients that are 2x past that and are healthy and doing well.

I cry the whole way home. I cry the next 3 days when no one is around, and lets face it, I’m always alone unless Kh is home.

Friday night we finally go out. We go out and drink and try to take a weight off our shoulders.

We start to notice a difference in her. Her energy is back. She’s playing with her toys. She’s humping her bedding and bringing me her favorite (albeit completely falling apart) favorite toy.

We take her to her follow up cardiologist appointment this past Tuesday. He says everything sounds good and she’s looking much better. We get her bodywork back, everything’s normal. No signs of kidney or liver failure which is our big concern.

I’m relieved and only tear up once.

That brings us to now. I try not to think about it. How terrifying it was, and how I don’t really know how much longer I have with her. I don’t know what my future would look like without her in it. She’s so much apart of me, I believe a part of me will die with her. 

I got sick of hearing people say "Pets suck" and "oh that's tough." I'm not one for words of empathy when it's hollow and forced. Out of all the pain I've felt in this life of mine, this has been some of the worst. 

I’m trying not to dwell on it. She’s here with me now. And that’s all that matters. Taking a break from worrying about what my weekends looked like, or getting caught up on what someone else wore during a week is the last of my concerns. Blogland, some times you need a reality check. Life isn’t really about how you’re decorating your living room or what you liked most on pinterest.

Real life lies outside these cyber walls, and I’ve been a bit too consumed with it.

 xo