Kaiser Mommy

Choose Joy. Every Time.

January 19, 2019

It’s all shiny when I have time to myself. Get back into the work/school routine and watch how doing what I love falls away. So many things to say during the week and give me a quiet, windy, cold, Saturday morning and my head is blank. Of course. This is what a former principal called The Mean Season. Too deep into winter gray to remember summer, too far away from.. Read More

January 2, 2019

So. 43. This 40 life crisis is still in full tilt 15 months later. It’s boring now. It’s been boring for a while. The laying in bed not sleeping, worrying about what happens after this body takes its last breath. Wondering what the point is. Wondering what I’m going to do next. I’m glad I wrote the thing above (click the link my chicks). It tells me where I was.. Read More

40 Life Crisis

This middle age shit isn’t for chickens. This about middle age was particularly breathtaking. I was super pissed at myself that I didn’t create those words myself. The hot sticky shame of knowing I have more to give than my ass on the couch playing a game on an electronic. All the fun milestones we wait for while growing up are behind me. Graduations, Marriage, Career, child(ren). No more bling.. Read More

Who knows what to call it

It’s been an impossible few weeks. The world is on fire, America is dying, I don’t even know how to write anymore. All of the thoughts that have been in my head in the late nights. I just don’t care. There is no point. Save for the future, die at 61. Save for the future, scrimp, deny yourself, nursing home at 68. Screw this. I’ll never be rich, I’m always.. Read More

January 9, 2017

10:17 am gonna be one of those classes where its real hard to make my face not tell my feelings 11:41 am Made it 9 days into 2017 before the first ER appearance (Mom) I’d take selfies of us but she could still smack me down. (even with an emesis bag and weird BP). 4:00 pm Made it 9 days into 2017 before the first ambulance transport to KC. (Mom’s.. Read More

40 years, 11 months, 19 days

On the eve of 40, I wrote the retrospective of life up to that point – 39 years, 364 days. I wrote about Mom When I look at Mom, she looks more like my grandparents and less like my Mom and it scares me and sometimes I can’t look at her. Sometimes I let myself try to understand that the empty gut horror oozing through the numbness feeling will hit.. Read More

When the finances hit the fan.

I read something in August or so about a couple who consciously let go of their home because they knew they couldn’t keep up with it and they could choose a life or choose to keep paying faceless mortgage brokers. In August I again paid all my bills and my minimum payments on the credit card and felt all the things you feel when things are tight but not quite.. Read More

The Veil

I woke up this morning talking to Dad. About how he was bigger than life. Knowing that if he were alive, he would still be making mistakes that would keep us apart … me mad, him stubborn. He felt very close. Once I was up, I saw the date. August 16th. He was born 69 years ago today. No wonder he was hanging out … he was waiting for a.. Read More

Mindfulness

This one word sums up everything I need to work on. Solution to a messy house? Mindfulness. Solution to my weight? Mindfulness. Solution to my money? Mindfulness. I simply need to stop and focus on what is in front of me. Simple concept. Difficult to do. I have been working on our bedroom, I repainted the closet – getting rid of the paint from a friend who isn’t a friend.. Read More

What do I call this?

Family legend has it that sometime in the spring of 1948, my grandfather was found in his shop beating a piece of metal with a hammer. He was beating some KKK emblem into something unrecognizable so no one would be able to own this thing of his father’s with pride. Missouri is a difficult place for race. It has been described as a home of covert racism rather than overt.. Read More

This little place of mine …

I’m gonna let it shine… I’m grateful for this place. I haven’t told anyone I’m writing, haven’t posted on Facebook links to these posts, even pretty sure the feed is busted and not going to people who have given a damn in the last eight years. But I’m grateful at the end of the day to have this place I created for myself and to come back to it. I’m.. Read More

Hole around my heart?

There is something wrong near my heart and I don’t understand it. When I try to relax, especially when I need to go to sleep, there is this space around my heart that makes me feel uncomfortable. Like if I could massage it and get blood flowing to it would help. I don’t know what is wrong. I can’t stretch it, I can’t breathe it, I can’t fix it. It’s.. Read More