burnt toast life

the garden that love built

In honor of my three year wedding anniversary tomorrow, I have a sort of lovey-dovey post.

I’m not one for mushiness. Eric and I are a make-it-through-anything, meant-to-be-together couple, not an in your face, so-cute-it-makes-you-want-to-vomit couple. Some of the strongest indicators of his affection often come in the form of actions, not words. This weekend he put away the clean dishes without being asked. Yes, it’s minor, but to me it spoke volumes. This weekend he also built me a garden.

In this post I mentioned that Eric’s solutions to problems are often well thought out and elegant, whereas mine are slipshod quick fixes (somehow he took this as an insult, though it wasn’t intended to be one). Allow me to clarify this further. When we first purchased our home, the kitchen featured custom built, solid wood shaker style cabinets in a dark oak finish that were covered in about 20 years of caked-on grease. They were literally sticky to the touch; it was disgusting. However, these cabinets were so gorgeous that anyone with a little bit of vision could see the potential. We immediately disassembled the cabinets with plans to paint them off-white to brighten the whole kitchen. Once the doors came off, we noticed that the base underneath the sink had gotten wet and rotted out. Eric immediately made plans to replace the wood and rebuild a sturdier bottom to support our under sink necessities. Guys – this. project. took. days. It’s my absolute favorite example of his meticulous project planning because I was so fixated on the real project at hand – the cabinets – (which were also the biggest pain in the ass and took well over a week to complete) that I did not give a shit about a stupid under the sink cabinet base that no one would see again ever. I got frustrated. I’m sure I said some harsh words. But now? I have a cabinet base that won’t ever fall apart again. It’s already gotten wet due to some faulty plumbing and has withstood the test of moisture. Had it just been me replacing it, in typical slipshod fashion, it would probably be a soggy, unusable mess again. I’d be spending double the time on a self-described “stupid project.”

So back to the garden. I’ve always been wanted a backyard vegetable garden in a vague, daydream-y way, but haven’t really done anything about it. It seemed a huge undertaking, and lets be honest – I’ve never had much of a green thumb. I just want to have a green thumb, and that’s definitely not the same thing.

I got out of work early on Friday and didn’t feel like going home, so I called my mother-in-law to see if she was going out shopping. She said she wanted to head to the local nursery and use up a gift card that she had won, and that’s how I unexpectedly ended up with a blueberry bush and tomato, squash and pepper plants that needed a place to be planted, preferably before they shriveled and died. I was stressed out immediately.

We had a couple of things planned for the weekend and as usual, Eric’s list of priorities differed a bit from mine. He wanted to fix the heater in our camper and build a fire pit out of a pile of rocks in the backyard, whereas I just wanted to “make the yard pretty.” When I explained in increasingly panicked tones that I needed a garden before my poor plants died from inexcusable negligence on my part, he sighed in exasperation. I figured this would be another month-long fight ending with dead plants, tears and resentment. But then he surprised me and moved one of my priorities to the top of his list.

We had an above ground pool that got destroyed during a freak October snowstorm, and Eric had torn down the pool and ripped out the pool deck, which is why we had some extra lumber lying around just taking up space. Eric took that wood and began to build me my garden, almost as though he knew what I wanted more than I knew what I wanted (probably true). It didn’t take days; it took hours. By Monday evening, I planted those tomatoes, peppers and squash in a garden that I didn’t even know I needed but am now convinced I absolutely cannot live without.

You see, he doesn’t always do what I want him to do. We don’t have enough money to go away for the weekend to celebrate our anniversary. But now I have something – a tangible representation of love that will (hopefully) bloom and grow for the whole season. And that’s more precious to me than a cheesy, sappy card or an overpriced B&B stay could ever be.

loving my love garden

loving my love garden

ten years ago today

hopeTen years ago today I was 18. I had just ended a three year relationship with the boy I was convinced I would marry. We had broken up many months before, but were still “hanging out,” and my heart gave him a March 1st deadline that I surprisingly managed to stick with. It’s like there was a before and after, and once the calendar struck March I shut off my feelings like a faucet. I wish I still had that kind of power over my emotions.

Ten years ago today I had a horrific fight with my parents. I can’t remember exactly what I had to do – I think I was supposed to drive my sister somewhere and didn’t want to. I remember my mom screaming at me on the phone. I remember throwing the phone at my sister’s head (probably aiming for it) and slamming her bedroom door open so hard that it left a door handle-shaped impression in the drywall. My mom had taken away my car until further notice and I. was. PISSED.

So you see, Eric and I are a product of circumstance. He really was at the right place at the right time. I had met him about a year earlier when he started working at the (now out-of-business) Hollywood Video where I worked. That was my very first job. We only worked together for a few months before I left to become a barista at Wegmans, but I still stopped by to rent movies and hang out with my former coworkers. It just so happens that not long before this colossal fight, I had stopped in to find him red-eyed and delirious, working 14 hour shifts because someone had quit. Sympathetic, I brought him a double mocha from work and he gave me his number in case I “wanted to watch a movie or something sometime.”

I had his number handy on that night of rebellion. I was feeling young, I was feeling reckless. Screw my ex-boyfriend who stopped loving me! Screw my parents for taking away my car! Screw the whole messed up world for messing up my life! I dialed the number and asked if he would come pick me up and rescue me from my parents. It was so out of character for me; I knew him, but barely. I remember standing at the end of the driveway when he pulled up in his beat-up red pickup truck and took me back to his house. I remember feeling vindicated.

We watched a movie. We got drunk on rum and coke that we drank out of mason jars. I remember it was one of those nights that I never wanted to end. I remember when his hand kept creeping closer and closer to mine. I saw it coming, but I pretended to ignore it. I distinctly remember when he finally kissed me. I didn’t go home that night.

The next three months we were inseparable. I forgot what it felt like to not have him around. We hung out every day for every hour that we possibly could. I was smitten. I was falling hard.

But then there was drama… always drama! He stopped taking my calls. He started getting distant. We went back and forth for a while. I didn’t let him go without a fight.

It’s been ten years… I could write for days about all the things we went through. We were always extreme – so happy, so sad, so angry, so euphoric. We had no even keel, no happy medium. We were passionate in every moment.

The highlights: We got engaged in 2004, set a wedding date in 2005. Called it off. Got back together. We got engaged again in 2006, set a wedding date in 2007. Called it off. Got back together. We got engaged in 2009 with a triumphant rally of “third time’s the charm!” We wanted to be married, but the timing was never right. Too much crap kept getting in the way.

We actually, really, finally got married in 2010. Our relationship has changed so much since it’s rocky start. I trust him completely. I love him. It sounds so simple, but to me, it’s profound. Over the course of our break-ups I kept trying to love other people because it would be “easier.” I kept trying to take the easy road, but my heart kept sending me back to him. He’s the only person I could never get over.

My friends – and even me at my most self-righteous – would love to tell you it was all his fault. A lot of it was. He had the tendency to be immature, stand-offish, distant, mean and childish. But remember, he was a man in his early 20s. It would be stranger if he wasn’t acting that way. And for all my indignation, I was no angel either. He brought out my most needy, clingy, annoying, controlling, nagging and even obsessive tendencies. We were mutually flawed. What we really needed was time to grow up. Both of us.

It may sound alarming, all those break-ups. All that heartache. I wish I could explain how I “just know” that he’s the one for me. Let’s put it this way – I could have chosen someone more compatible. I could have chosen someone more stable, less dramatic and more even-tempered. I could have. But every single time I did choose that kind of person, Eric stayed in my heart and my heart never felt peaceful. If I let my mind wander, it landed on him.

He’s the one that got away… except I never let him get away.

my favorite picture of us

my favorite picture of us

spoiler alert: we’re not pregnant

I’ve debated a lot over this post. Probably more time than one should devote to thinking about something as inconsequential as a blog post. Here’s why I ultimately decided to do it:

1) It’s what’s going on. The most successful blogs are real, gritty, everyday life, right? So why wouldn’t I put this out there? This is what’s happening in my life.

2) It got harder and harder to post about other stuff. It felt like ignoring the biggest thing – the most important thing – the elephant in the living room.

3) This is like my worst kept secret anyway. I’m mostly open about it with people who I know and even sometimes with people who I don’t know. So organizing my thoughts and putting them all down isn’t going to be some big revelation.

Longwinded preamble aside… Eric and I are have been trying to have a baby for two and a half years but we don’t have one yet. There, I said it. My master plan was to wait until I was pregnant and post a whole long thing about the process leading up to it, but this “side blog” was getting long and frankly unreadable. I wanted to wait until I actually achieved the goal to post anything. Why? Because I don’t want anyone to know if I fail, that’s why.

Confession time: I used to blog about this under a super secret name and not tell anyone about it. This BBT blog is more lifestyle, less specifically allocated, so I’m going to keep things light (not that the situation is light, not in the least). Basically, I want to give an overall view of what’s going on without being too graphic. However, if you do want or need specifics, I have a gold medal in over sharing. If you ask nicely, I’ll quote you medical history and test results all day long. I just don’t think most people reading this particular blog care to know.

In the fall of 2010 we went for fertility testing and figured out the problem. Knowing the problem does not mean that you can afford to treat it, however. Most insurances cover the testing portion, but when it comes to treatment there is little to no coverage. Currently 15 states require providers to cover at least some of the treatment costs, but Pennsylvania isn’t one of them. And so we bid adieu to a potential $15,000 medical bill and decided to keep on tryin’ the old fashioned way (giggity).

So far, clearly, it hasn’t worked. Again, I could write pages and pages on the subject, but I’m just going to gloss over a lot of fine details and say this much: the past 2.5 years have featured plenty of tears, venting sessions, joys, ups, downs, hopes, despair, prayers, selfish tantrums, weird dreams, one ill-advised visit to a psychic, fights, make-ups, fights again, and pretty much every other emotion on the spectrum. We’ve learned an awful lot about each other but we still don’t have a baby.

Fast-forward to a couple of weeks ago. A friend suggested that I research clinical trials as an alternative way to pay for the IVF that we need according to the specialist. Lo and behold, the first result that Google returned sounded promising. New Hope Fertility Clinic in Manhattan is currently running a study comparing 2 different types of IVF (though saying the words “clinical trial” to one particular friend got the immediate response, “But does that mean you’ll grow a mustache?!”) The whole thing sounds legit.  And best of all, minus the cost of testing and some meds, it’s totally and completely free. Free! For those of you who don’t have conception challenges – this is comparable to winning the lottery. At least it feels that way to me.

We aren’t in yet. Our consult is coming up soon and we could still be rejected from the study for any number of reasons. Despite the cliché and despite how much I DETEST this phrase – everything does happen for a reason. So if we don’t make it in, something else will come along. A month ago I wouldn’t have even believed this opportunity existed, so it proves that anything can happen. That’s why when that Ellie Goulding song comes on in the car I totally bust out some crazy vocals. Anyway, I will keep y’all posted on what transpires (nice details only). But I really, really REALLY hope we get in. I really do.

fighting the good fight

First, just allow me to apologize. I am forever one step behind when it comes to trending articles, videos, fads, etc. You can hear me saying things like, “Wow! So how about that Zumba?” two years after everyone else started doing Zumba. Maybe I live under a rock. Maybe I don’t watch the news often enough. Maybe it’s all of these things. But despite this delay, I almost always eventually figure out what everyone is talking about/loving/hating/eating/watching.

That was a rather lengthy preamble to introduce an amazing article (and yes, it’s from 2009). I stumbled across this gem from columnist Laura Munson. It’s a piece she did for The New York Times entitled “Those Aren’t Fighting Words, Dear.” I think everyone should read it. But if you don’t, the story in short is that after 20 years of marriage her husband requested a divorce, claiming that he didn’t love her anymore. Rather than rage, cry, become vindictive, or shut down completely, she chose to not believe him. She spent a summer giving him all the space he needed to be unreliable and unhusband-like, all the while remaining stoic and putting up with his shenanigans like a saint. In the end, they stayed together.

I can completely relate to this piece. No, I have not yet been married for half a lifetime. I don’t know the exquisite pain that must go along with hearing those words from your partner’s mouth after building a life together. I do, however, adopt the same tactic when it comes to marital spats that Laura Munson suggests. Rather than fight back, I fight passively. This was not always the case.

The absolute hands-down worst fight of our entire relationship occurred on August 20, 2010. Whoever claimed that the first year of marriage is the hardest wasn’t kidding. It doesn’t matter what we were fighting about on that evening – what matters is that a series of smaller fights over the previous three months culminated into a spectacular volcano of pure anger that lasted well into the next morning. I should probably mention that we were married that May. And while that fight was raging I truly believed that our marriage was over.

Many men turn into their father. My husband has plenty in common with his dad, it’s true. But mostly he is exactly like his mom (sorry, Cindy). When he is worked up and combative, he tends to say things that aren’t true. My biggest mistake for those first three months was believing those things. So when he said things like, “I hate you. This is terrible. You’re the worst thing on Earth. I’m leaving you,” (um, I have cleaned this up considerably. You don’t want to know what he really said) I fought back. Then he fought back. And then the fights became something out of a terrible, terrible soap opera.

The secret to fighting with him, I finally realized, was to believe absolutely nothing that came out of his mouth. Or even to believe the exact opposite. Because not only does he not remember half the things he spews while going off in a fit of fury, he also doesn’t mean them. Ever. It was a hard lesson to learn and sometimes it’s a hard lesson to practice. It’s a lesson that Laura Munson took to heart on a much, much larger scale. I’d like to think I would have the courage and strength to do the same.

I have no idea if this method is considered “healthy.” It’s sort of like refusing to negotiate with terrorists, I think, and in this scenario his dramatic proclamations are the terrorists. By denying them validation and praying they go away quietly, I am weeding out the truths from the exaggerations. I am separating the real arguments from the overinflated petty bullshit.

We still fight all the time. It’s part of what makes us us and it goes hand in hand with a passionate relationship that I can’t live without. But now the knock-down, drag out fights of legend are fewer and farther between. I no longer live in fear that our next fight will be the end because learning how to fight properly has instilled a sense of security in me. I don’t know how, but so far it’s working.

Of course, he definitely just read this entire post, so he’s on to me now. I’ll let you know how it’s going in three months.

happiness on delay

I’m a happy-delayer. What I mean is that I like to intentionally deprive myself of good things and get the bad things out of the way first. I’m sure a lot of people do this – getting the difficult tasks done makes it more likely that you’ll finish the whole project. The problem is that I married a non happy-delayer (an instant-gratifier?), which has led to some interesting arguments.

For example: if I bought a flavor of juice that I didn’t really care for, I would be sure to buy a better flavor the next time I went shopping. I would not, however, open the new juice, drink the new juice, or even think about the new juice until the old juice was gone – not until I had suffered through it. Eric, on the other hand, will forget about the old juice the second the new juice hit the refrigerator shelf. I try to argue him on this point and say, “Why don’t you finish the old one first?” to which he replies logically, “Because it’s disgusting.”

Sometimes I wonder if it kind of goes back to the whole discarded food thing (doesn’t everything?). Maybe it’s a waste not, want not situation. But then I think that no, it’s actually more than that. I enjoy the anticipation of waiting for the new juice. With every sip of the gross old juice, I think, “This takes me one step closer to deliciousness.” And it’s a proven fact that the anticipation of a thing makes you happier than getting the actual thing. I read a study once that claimed employees rated their happiness much higher the week before their vacation than when they were on the actual vacation. Seems strange, but makes perfect sense in my twisted head. Once you are on vacation, it’s impossible to stop counting the days that you have left before you leave. With every fun activity, you can’t help but think “Only 3 days left of this. Then it’s back to the old grind.” But before vacation? That’s when your imagination can run wild, imagining all the exciting times that you’ll have… once you suffer through 2 more days at the office, of course.

Today I got an email from a friend into my work inbox and made myself wait to read it. I intentionally read all the emails around it and left it unread so that through each tedious task of my day, I could look forward to reading it after I had finished the self-appointed hurdles I had to jump to allow myself to read it. Did it make that hour go faster? Of course it did.

But back to my instant-gratifier hubbers. In a way, I think he can teach me something. Like… it doesn’t really profit anyone to suffer through disgusting juice. I deserve to be happy, and I deserve it right now, not later. Like that whole life’s short, eat dessert first thing; maybe I can incorporate that – at least partially – into the suffering that I somehow think is unavoidable in life. There’s enough sadness that we can’t avoid, so when it comes to those little things we can give ourselves to make the day a little brighter? That’s when it’s OK to just throw out the disgusting juice.

wordless wednesday

I know, it’s been too long! I wish I had some good excuse, something like “I’ve been busy working on my novel,” but the truth is that I’ve been busy catching up on recorded episodes of Auction Hunters. Anyway. I do have a whole post planned out and I’ve even arranged to blog on Nazareth Patch too (yay!)… I just haven’t been motivated. I spend all day writing and when I get home at night, sometimes the last thing I want to do is stare at a computer screen. But anyway, just so y’all don’t think I gave up on the blog, here are some pics for wordless Wednesday. Or in my case, not so wordless, but not as wordy as usual, Wednesday.

the unbearable sadness of discarded food

1) See? I told you this blog wasn’t just about dogs. This post has nothing at all to do with dogs

2) I dedicate this one to my sister Ashley, who graciously put up with me panicking, chastising, and lamenting for 5 straight hours at Addison’s baptism celebration because there was just. too. much. food.

Leftovers make me sad. An abundance of food that will likely go to waste makes me anxious. Throwing away week-old stir-fry often moves me to tears. Ok, the last one is an exaggeration – but only slightly. It has only recently come to my attention how much inanimate objects, particularly food, make me uneasy or even upset. It’s a very difficult thing to explain if you’ve never felt it. But if you have experienced it, you may be thinking, “Yes! That’s how I feel, too! And I thought I was the only one.” IKEA captured it perfectly with their lamp commercial a few years ago:

Oh, that commercial makes me tear up. I’m not crazy – I know that lamps, rugs, and leftovers don’t have feelings. But it’s so easy to assume that they do, or to create them in your mind. Bear with me, I’m going to try to paint a picture: Imagine a yogurt. Just a regular, plain container of yogurt. That yogurt was manufactured and shipped to your grocery store and unloaded onto a shelf. Its entire purpose in life (ok, assuming it has a “life”) was to be consumed and enjoyed by someone. That’s why I find it so upsetting to throw away spoiled yogurt – it’s like discarding a wasted life without meaning. Is this mentality a stretch? Perhaps. But still I can’t shake the feeling that food has a distinct purpose and should always reach its intended destination.

This also works the other way – I get a deep sense of satisfaction from chopping up that last green pepper for my salad just before it spoils or perfectly timing meals around the almond milk expiration date. And anyone who drinks almond milk knows that it gives me about 3 months – which is part of the reason I prefer it to cow milk. Quick expiration dates are highly stressful.

I know at least one other person who feels exactly the same way I do, and this comforts me into believing I’m not insane. Plus, IKEA clearly made that commercial for a reason, even if that reason was to sell more lamps. I think this post makes it obvious why we absolutely had to adopt that dog (dammit – I knew the dog would sneak his way in!) I feel deeply sympathetic for unloved food, so when you start to tell me about actual LIVING things being mistreated, my compassion meter goes off the charts. My hierarchy of empathy goes something like this: household objects –> food –> plants –> animals –> people (especially babies).

So the moral of this story is that if you plan to get a new lamp, please do me a favor and have a yard sale, or at least donate it to Goodwill. They may end up throwing it away, but then the responsibility is on them. And then I won’t know about it.

 

how to become a mother overnight

I swear, this blog isn’t just going to be about puppies. But the dog is new and the blog is new, so this is what I have.

It’s no secret that Eric and I want to have children, but haven’t been blessed with one yet. I guess that’s a very short and compact way of summing up a much more complicated reality. But anyway, that’s not the point of this post. The point is that I used to mock people who treated their dogs like children, talked to their dogs like children, and behaved as though their dogs actually were children. Now that I have a dog, I’m starting to understand why this is so easy to do.

It all started at Marshall’s when I was shopping for a dog bed and various other accessories. I started perusing the dog toy section and thinking, “Ooh, this one’s cute. Should I get the wittle bitty lambie or the wittle bitty lion? Oh my, but then there’s a giraffe, too!”

baby toy? dog toy? both..?

Yeah. It felt suspiciously like shopping for a small child, and the similarities were not lost on me. Plus, from the moment we brought him home to live with us, Eric automatically became daddy and I became mommy. Ryder’s new tag bears our last name. It’s like we effortlessly adopted a very furry child.

And like having a new baby, I feel desperately guilty every morning when I leave him and anxious to get home to see him. The romanticized notions are basically gone, and he gets in my way and annoys me daily – you know, like when you have a kid. I’m proud of what he has learned so far – you can already tell he’s getting more comfortable in his own skin and he’s even learning how to walk properly. Our little boy is growing up so quickly…

One non-baby related thing that makes me very happy about Ryder is that he has forced me into exercise. For the past year I have made up excuse after excuse to go back to bed for an hour after waking up at 7 to pack Eric’s lunch. Every night I would go to be saying, “Tomorrow will be the day. I will stay up and do my Pilates video or maybe even go for a run. I will not go back to sleep.” And then morning would come and the bed would look so inviting that I would abandon exercise in favor of sleep. But now that I have this very active pup, I’m guilt tripped into walks in the morning. Well, the first morning was a guilt trip. Now I actually enjoy these walks, probably as much as he does. I actually have more energy during the day, and I feel just slightly less guilty about crating him all day. Eric and I even started taking evening walks, too, rather than flopping down on the couch the minute we get home from work. So all in all, this dog has improved our lives and given us a pseudo-child.

Don’t get me wrong – we still want a real baby. But he’s a nice distraction in the meantime.

must tolerate dogs

I’m not a dog person.

This may even be an understatement, especially since several friends responded to my text about getting a dog with, “What? Did pigs start flying to announce that hell froze over, too?”

The truth is that I never wanted a dog. A few years ago I would go as far as to say I disliked them, but really only when they were jumping or drooling on me. However, I married a “dog guy” and we talked about getting one since the idea of sharing our lives together finally became reality. He insisted that he needed a dog, and over time the idea grew on me. I even began to romanticize the notion, imagining a stoic companion to keep watch beside my armchair while I sipped hot cocoa and delved into a good book. In my doggie daydreams, of course, I never imagined a poorly behaved pup.

Eric and I clashed on what breed to get, and somewhat violently. I wanted a small, pocket-sized dog to carry around in my handbag and strut with down the street. His inclinations leaned more towards large, bad-ass dog that could be his best friend and not threaten his manhood while on walks. He wanted a pitbull; I wanted a pug. We both agreed that whatever dog we picked absolutely had to be a rescue from a shelter and not a pet store purebred. Since we disagreed on just about everything else about our future pet, the matter was laid to rest for the time being.

Then Friday afternoon rolled around. My mom forwarded us an email about a 7 month old Golden who needed a home – and fast. The email came with 2 snapshots, a sad tale of allergies, and a warning that whoever wanted the dog needed to make a decision before Saturday evening. We called and set up a meeting for the next morning.

We could tell Ryder was going to be a firecracker from the first time we saw him straining against his leash as his family walked him down the street. There’s just something about the way he walks – it’s as if he doesn’t quite know how to coordinate his front legs with his back legs. It was immediately apparent that this was a high energy, high maintenance dog – but he was a purebred Golden worth $1,000 that we were getting for free. He was a big dog (Eric’s happy) but a loyal, friendly dog that’s great with kids (Amanda’s happy).

Then we heard a bit about why the family was getting rid of Ryder, and that’s when I knew he was absolutely, without a doubt coming home with us. Eric already chastised me for speculating and giving credit to hearsay, so I’ll just say this – they (supposedly) did not give him the love and attention he deserved, allergies notwithstanding. It became apparent that he was my “burnt toast dog,” which went along well with my burnt toast husband and various other burnt toast people/items in my life. But that’s another story for another time.

So Ryder is our dog, and so far things are going well. He is rambunctious, excitable, and has endless stores of energy. My biggest complaint so far is the ridiculous amount of dog hair and dog dandruff all over my clean floor. It’s pretty obvious that he has never been to the groomer, so hopefully once we get that out of the way the shedding will be less intense. We took him to the dog park on Saturday afternoon and he had an absolute ball, plus he seems to play well with others. He sleeps curled next to our bed at night and follows Eric around the house wherever he goes. He clearly needs to be trained and to get comfortable in his element, but I can tell he’s a good dog already. We definitely made the right decision – though I still would not call myself a “dog person.”