Apparently my door was to blame. 

I’ve done a lot of pondering since that day. The louder the outside world has gotten, the more I have retreated into myself.

I’ve come to a couple of conclusions.

1. None of us want to feel helpless.

2. None of us want our lives to be controlled by someone else.

As far as I can tell, the root of everyone’s opinion can be pulled back to these basic, very, very, at the gut level, things.

—

I tell you that, to tell you this:

I’ve thought a lot about this blog space of mine – wondering what to do with it, looking at the journey it has taken, considering the rebranding, renaming, whatever.

When I realized, “Kaiser Mommy” has become perfect for me.

I am Kaiser Mommy, dictator of my own life.

I am Kaiser Mommy, protector of my people.

I am Kaiser Mommy, looking at how to improve, trying to do better, figuring out what works better now, and what worked better in the past.

I am Kaiser Mommy, rejector of bull, curator of joy.

With a smile, I realized, that even in the name of this space, I have arrived exactly where I am meant to be.

—

Talyaa once told me she thought I was a part of showing the world a new kind of woman – a year later, I think I am seeing what she meant. How many women do you know who teach special ed kiddos all day, parent a gifted boy at night, keep a house and life of her own design, spin fiber from her own alpacas to knit into clothing that will cover a gun strapped to her hip, use wireless internet to search how to make corset stays from the French Indian War era, who has a tiny bomb shelter survival cabinet and no idea what is for dinner tonight  . . . all while bucking all norms and happily living with her love – 15 years younger?

I think they broke the mold when they made me.

I had a dream a week ago, full of anxiety and nasty, nasty fear of change. I woke up relieved to realize that I’d lived through all the change and there was nothing to fear. I’m long past the wondering what my life will turn out to be, and nicely settling into the time where I can work to refine it into exactly what I want it to be.

I have some goals set – something to share another day. It was just time to get started in this space again.

xoxo

Kaiser Mommy

1. If you would like to send a card, letter, expression of love, to Noah’s family in CT – please send them here:

Noah’s Ark of Hope Fund

261 S. Main St. #332

Newtown, CT 06470

If you would like to send something to Victoria, please contact me via the button on the left side of the page.

2. Monetary donations for Noah Pozner’s family.

Keep watch, dear Lord, with those who work, or watch, or weep this night, and give your angels charge over those who sleep. Tend the sick, Lord Christ; give rest to the weary, bless the dying, soothe the suffering, pity the afflicted, shield the joyous; and all for your love’s sake. Amen. – Episcopal Online Book of Common Prayer, Compline

I woke this morning on day infinitum of feeling low grade miserable. I caught something about a school shooting and passed it by.

It wasn’t my world, it happened to some people “over there”

Until my I saw my heart friend post that her family was in that school.

It was suddenly closer to my world.

Until I learned her nieces were safe …. Her nephew unknown.

Her Kindergartener nephew.

Suddenly it wasn’t some abstract event – I was connected to it. As I scoured for details, the school I pictured was a mix of where I work and where MY Kindergartener goes.

I stood vigil with others for the hours of the unknown. Feeling that silence that feels less hopeful with the passing minutes.

Until the two word message that told me hope was gone.

There’s a door in my house with holes in it now. I poured my grief through my fists and when my fists didn’t work, I used my elbows, because I was sure as shit breaking something.

M’love pulled me away from the door, while I raged and sobbed and remembered all the other times I raged and sobbed and screamed for my “internet friends”.

In the next half hour, we the friends of the internet bound together, with our love language of black humour, with our experience sadly acquired over years of dealing with personal tragedy in the very public social media space.

Gather your people. If you don’t think you have people, find yourself some. Again and again, life shows us that we will need people to guard us, because the monsters under the bed are sometimes real.

We will share with you how to help, when we know the best way to help. In the meantime, please know that your job here is to send your prayers, your thoughts, your love to those who need it and be excellent to each other.

I’ve been trying to figure out the now and the next. I’ve been trying to get my act together.

Last night, I thought about the last week. Alex’s room is meticulously clean after he and I spent last Sunday cleaning it together in exchange for a LEGO Prisoner Transport. (Legos are hot currency around here – I can get him to clean and sleep through the night in his own bed using them.)

The rest of the house is a pit of dispair.

Except for it’s not.

I thought about why the laundry has been sitting out all week. Well, part of that is procrastination, another part is just not buckling down and doing it.

What did I choose instead?

I chose Alex – we have read books, watched every Busytown Mysteries on Netflix, discussed the intricacies of Huckle Cat’s day, gone to soccer, cuddled on the couch, gone to church, gone to school, done homework, talked about his day, made his lunches.

I chose M’love – we have spooned, slept, showered, bought a 55 year old WWII era gun, field stripped it, greased it, discussed it, shot it – we have watched Scrubs and HIMYM, we have discussed politics, world events, cooked dinners . . . I chose the man who, when Alex was missing his daddy yesterday, turned off what he wanted to do and put on Alex’s current favorite show. The man who marketed a BIG OLE PEPPERONI PIZZA for dinner to make Alex smile when he was sad.

I chose my work – That job I love – I spent almost 40 hours there this week – (I played hooky on Friday afternoon but I was there for PTO and Open House on Thursday night) – I supported coworkers, I tried to be the good instead of the bad, I was joyous in working with my students, I showed kids who weren’t even my responsibility that someone gave a damn about them, I had meetings, I completed paperwork, I was conscientious, I was a damn good employee. (Except for the hooky part – but I didn’t have anything on my schedule and I would have sat in my office and done pretty much nothing – might as well cash out that sick day and go home.)

I even chose Scout – Which people tend to be amazed when the ex-husband is considered a priority – but I’m a much better ex-wife than I was ever a wife – I gave him a place to land for 2 days so he could do the job most important to him – be the daddy to Alex. I supported his parenting, I gave him the space to be the parent for as long as he could, and I rebuilt the Lego Fire house he accidentally shattered while trying to clean up that meticulous Alex room – before Alex got home from school.

I was a neighbor, a daughter, a friend.

I realized last night, that while I may not have YET figured out how to keep a clean house, while I may have put on five pounds of happy fat and my jeans don’t fit again, while I may not have all the money I might like to have – The mess in my world is a sign of all the better things I have chosen to focus on. The mess is a sign of LIVING this awesome life, which is a change for me, usually mess is a sign that the corners of my brain are not okay.

I have everything I have ever truly wanted. I love my house, my car, my job, my son, M’love, my family. I need nothing more. My next lesson to learn is how to take care of what I have.

I wrote it expecting responses that would move me forward. Instead, your voices told me to stay the heck still and be gentle with myself.

I found myself extremely grateful I took the time to write and share, because each of you saw something I did not – a value in waiting just a little longer to act. An okayness with watching just a bit longer.

I sat with it. I more or less meditated on it. I got a visual of my whole life and everything I was wanting to do, wanting to act on and accomplish. Then like some television special effect, in all that chaos of potential, I started zooming in, pinpointing what was most important.

It was the wisdom of what I already knew. Pick something, focus, accomplish. Don’t try to do 20 things at once. Do SOMETHING and do it well. Do it with purpose and focus and it becomes its own little sacred space.

I set aside the thoughts of making money with the etsy store, writing the book, cooking perfect meals, running a mile . . . whatever.

I cleaned our kitchen. We can sit at the table to eat without pushing things over to a side or a corner. The dishes are clean, the trash doesn’t smell. There is room for the four of us who are regularly here to base our mornings – cereal, coffee, meds, water, car keys, uniform hat.

I focused on a single knitting project. Row after row of stitches in long strips that I will weave into a rug. It won’t be perfect, but it will use up a lot of what I have collected in a way that will turn a mess into something useful. (Hello my life metaphor, how are you today?)

It didn’t all get done this week, but I’m pleased with where I am this Saturday afternoon. I found one small step to a routine and I have kept with it. I focused on *A* step, rather than ALL the steps and I’m good with that.

This is where I am right now.

Back in April, my friend Carrie sent me to a site with guided meditations, specifically because there was one about opening my heart to love that she thought would help me.

Night after night I would pick one and listen. One was a focusing on finding some kind of answer. I went with the flow of it, and the answer that came was “you don’t have long.”

Which immediately scared me. It felt omnious. I tried rationalizing it into something else – like I don’t have long before this life I’m living changes … a new stage beginning … something other than the feeling there was a definite end in the not so far off future.

Right after that, came M’love and things were good. Life was different, clearly a chapter change from a few weeks before. I was finally able to learn lessons about love while I was happy, rather than in the deep. I could see a future, but was fully enjoying the day to day without some goal in mind for what the relationship needed to be.

I started doing yoga and immediately fell into pain. Hours of massage later I am finally better . . . and not doing yoga. Which is bad. I know the yoga was pulling up things that needed out. Liv gave me all the information she had on helping me through it, helping my heart with the grief working itself out.

Heather lost her Jackie! – A beautiful, brighter than the sun woman, younger than me – gone.

Talyaa found cancer raiding her body. She’s fighting back with an “I don’t have time for ‘somedays’” attitude, but is finding that the minute to minute isn’t fun – that the intentions are great and optimistic – the living it is harder.

M’love needed to hear that he could still be his own person, even with me. That he was welcome to build a man cave in his house, that our life together could actually take place not in each others’ spaces every available minute. He doesn’t see forever, he sees right now and wants to make sure this is all good in the moment. (Apparently that ‘carpe diem’ tattoo on his shoulder really did soak in for him.) Even though I think we used different words to mean the exact same thing, even though we are in the exact same place with what we want from this relationship, it still stings and still pulled me out of the safe happy zone I was in with him, and I’m working on getting back to the business of being happy in THIS moment, since this is the moment we know we have.

All of this has left me knowing I need to live right now, just do it, make today count, don’t put off till tomorrow what I could do today, seize the day, live in the moment . . .

Yet I’m not awake. I don’t know how to wake up. I get it, but I have not yet acted on it. I’m stuck in the gray.

Frankly I’m scared that if I don’t get myself woken up that something really bad is going to happen to force my eyes open. I’d really like to avoid that and just act on the lesson I can so clearly read.

And yet, my house is a mess, I have not yet begun running, my blogs remain quiet, my finances a disaster, my knitting remains unlisted, my thoughts are still unfocused… scattered… my heart is hollow… my mind is distracted ….

I need you. I need a restart. I need this Labor Day weekend to be a focus time to start and sprint for a while. My intentions are all lovely, but I need action. I need to act. Right now.

I arrived in New York for BlogHer12 at noon. Amazing Photographer Lotus and I sat in the bar, eating 25 dollar small plates of food and drinking 15 dollar drinks. (Red Wine and Vodka Gimlet respectively.)

Avitable, Greis and Amalah and her husband met up with us. I dropped a wine glass and broke it. I took photos of Loter and I.

I woke up Thursday morning, thankful for being smart enough to drink a lot of water and take a Vitamin I before going to sleep. Remember some OTHER photos I had taken with my phone, hit “delete” several times and then went about my day.

I wandered Radio City, Columbus Circle, Central Park, 5th Avenue and Times Square before coming back to the hotel to strip down, cool off, watch some Olympics and take a nap.

The conference began a little early because THE PRESIDENT, as in Mister Barack Obama, was giving a welcome address to attendees. I don’t care if one is Republican, Democrat, Purple, Alien or went to Chick fil A on Wednesday – BlogHer is my favorite conference, THEY see me as valuable enough to have me work with them FOR the conference, The President of the frickin United States sees THIS conference as valuable enough to take time to speak to all of us – I am a very excited girl. A link to President Obama speaking at BlogHer12.

I went to a meeting, kissed my Lori Luna (Vice President of Events for BlogHer). I met up with Andrea (always my Mommy Snatch, but officially Savings Lifestyle) and went to the SocialLuxe party.

I passed someone and asked, “Why does she look familiar?” Oh because she is Summer Baltzer from Design on a Dime. Right. Uh. Sorry about accidentally touching your ass. No really. I am sorry.

I met up with a bunch of Curvy Girls at SocialLuxe and also at Babeland. After getting sippy cups, clearly it’s  time to go to the classy sex toy shop. I really really liked the Soho store – it was clean, classy, the staff was lovely, showing us how to turn off toys when we couldn’t figure it out. We liked that they only had “the good stuff” and that you could hands on (I said HANDS ON, not snatch on) test things out to see how it felt, buzzed, and worked. After all, I think it is well established that me and mine know our toys.

This year, I decided to try something different – actual thank you emails for private parties. So I sent one to the SocialLuxe planner and to the Babeland planners – I’ve decided that after blogging for five years and being at four BlogHer conferences, that I am now the old guard, what with the lack of squeeing, and worrying about my shoes, so this year I will be gracious and really work on saying THANK YOU to people. So far so good. I like me better this way.

It is now Friday morning and I need to get up and get ready so I can find lunch with MARTHA FRICKIN STEWART and get ready to mic wrangle my first panel this afternoon. Loves ya’ll, miss those who aren’t here, but you know I will incessantly text you. xoxo

I used to have one, but I don’t know where it is (Sorry Scout). After reading about non lethal self defense methods – I decided flashlight was a good first line of defense. (Click the link, it will give you specs like 200 lumens, and other info about why it’s a good choice.)

I grabbed the brightest one on the shelf yesterday, clocking in at 144 lumens. M’love said it would work great in the dark, not so much in bright daylight . . . and then blinded himself with it while sitting in the living room.

He told me to take it with me this weekend and to be sure to actually carry it ON me, that in my suitcase in the room would do me no good.

This morning I found the perfect holster.

I facemailed him a photo -

“found a place for my flashlight.”

“cant see the photo is it in your boobs”

“yes of course”

“let me work up my shocked face”

Yeah yeah yeah. So there you are. My next step toward personal responsibility for my safety. With mah bewbs. Use what ya got, right?

I grew up in tiny villages (300 people) to small towns (5000 people) to a college town (18K – with all the students).

I didn’t start locking my car till my backpack was stolen freshman year of high school. Mostly I was pissed because I had a report in there that was completed and untyped and I had to redo it.

I didn’t grow up in a bubble – Dad was a mortician, a county coroner, death happened, it also paid the bills. Sitting at Dad’s desk meant risking seeing photos of “oh wow, that’s what happens when a Ford Probe meets a telephone pole …. daaaaaaamn.” Going to get him from “the back” sometimes came with the shock of realizing he was working on a tiny little person who wasn’t going to grow up.

I live in an Air Force town. War and fighting are relevant in the abstract. After 9/11, when the skies were quiet everywhere else, we had B2s flying east … and home again.

I did grow up without violence in my face – it belonged on tv and very rarely made it close to my life. I didn’t think about things like “tactical advantage“.

The first time I touched a gun was when I was dolled up for bridesmaid duty, I drunkly tossed my arm around the waist of my matching groomsman and my hand landed perfectly grasping the butt of his gun. As I did the sharp intake of breath, he said “smile” …. and I did. Brilliantly beautiful smile covering the OMGWTFBBQGUN reaction in my head.

After that, I started dating said groomsman. I learned about not wanting to have your back to a door, I got used to glowing nightsights in the dark of a bedroom, paperwork filed in triplicate in airports, having a meetup point if shit went south at a football game and we needed to beat a retreat.

It was a different way of thinking, I didn’t like it, I didn’t like looking at the world with eyes sweeping left to right and back again while being on the watch for crazy. I got used to it though. It was a way of life, and at the root of it was the knowledge that being aware meant we had each others’ back. Nothing bad was happening TO us if we could help it.

Now I am a good shot with a gun. Some guns. My accuracy varies widely. I know basics. Such as “always assume the gun is loaded and ready and treat it as such”, “only put your finger on the trigger if you intend to pull it”, “only aim it at something or someone you want a great big fucking hole in”.

Now I have to have conversations with my son about them. “See this? This is a gun, it is loud, it can put big holes in things and hurt people. If you want to see it, touch it, talk about it, you get an adult and we will explain to you anything you want to know. The gun sits on a shelf waaaaay up there where you can not reach it. Please do not try to get it alone – all you EVER have to do is ask and we will get it and teach you about it.” Calm conversation. Giving him facts he can understand, explaining safety, not creating fear, teaching respect.

In a circumstance of an intruder in my home, I’m fairly certain my response will be getting to Alex and bailing us out his window and running like the wind, all thoughts of bang behind me. I’m okay with that. In my head, my priority is having Alex’s back and getting us away from danger.

M’love is a raging rabid 2nd amendment fan. He has an assortment of guns, including the currently target for the anti gun crowd – the AR15. People are making points that AR15s are only for killing people … lots of people … no need for civilians to have them – Others are screaming 2nd amendment! 2nd amendment! Give me my weapons!

Here’s the deal as I see it. Ready?

Where is the limit of what weapons we want in the hands of civilians? On a continuum of Slingshot to Nuclear Warhead – where is the line drawn? Seems a reasonable way to go about discussion. Provided people are reasonable about it.

Which brings me to my next point. Reasonable people.

I held an AR15 last month. Shot it. Several times. Never had the urge to whip it around and shoot anyone. (To be totally honest, M’love snickered at one point and I did consider pistol whipping him with it… but that is another discussion entirely).

That man in Colorado? Something was sprung in his head. Take away his guns and he would have used bombs, take away his fuses, he would have used a vehicle, take away his vehicle and he would have used tomatoes. Somewhere along the way, he decided that mass murder was a good idea. I’m pretty sure he didn’t have a friend there who looked at his outfit and said, “Hey man, enjoy the show tonight, let me know if Christian Bale is still using the gargling marbles voice.”

I bring it around to this. We all need someone watching our back. We need to feel connected to a person or people or community. We need to give a damn about someone and want the best for them, want to protect them. We also need people who are looking out for us. We need the girlfriend who says, “I’m not going in public with you in that outfit”. We need the conservative/liberal opposites like I have with Mommentator. We need to remind each other to not be sheep when listening to the charismatic voices on the radio. We need the person who reminds us we have value when we feel like the whole world has gone crazy and is against us.

I believe focusing on the weapons is a mistake, I believe focusing on the people and what happened to lead them to that very messed up place is a better use of our energy.

We need people to have our back. We need to invest in others and watch their backs as well.

Suddenly, it was there. A facebook post of a class beginning showed up. Yay!

Last night was the first night. I pulled out my mat, the one that had sat in the closet for four years, waiting. I confidently walked into the class in my shorts and snug tshirt. I assumed I would know how to do everything.

Wrong, wrong, wrongity wrong. The teacher was new, this was her first class teaching. I don’t fault her for that, but new teacher and rusty perfectionist student. There were some rough moments in that hour.

I bent to downward facing dog and realized my shirt fell open and I could see my bra.

I stared at my knees and saw old woman wrinkly knees.

We went through a new-to-me sequence. I couldn’t keep up, I had no muscle memory for the rhythm of the positions flowing one into the next. At one point I gave up and lay in child’s pose. I could accomplish laying on the mat like a pouty preschooler, so I did.

I followed directions incorrectly, because I was listening and not awkwardly turning to watch (I was on the end with no reference at some points). I did things wrong in public. People could witness my imperfection, oh the horror!

There were mirrors. Views of myself I don’t get on a typical day. I could handle the ass up views, but the views me seated – boobs stacked on waist stacked on hips – I gritted my teeth and hated myself for a minute. I closed my eyes against the image of red faced, tit riddled, struggling Dawn. Comforting myself with “oh at least I can blog this”.

The last minutes were spent in relaxation – not before I totally jacked up yet another pose of course – relaxation I desperately needed.

I lay there and found it in myself to be proud of me. I had been awful at something, publicly and lived to tell the tale. I was sweat covered from MY efforts. I had been bad today, but I knew I would be better the next class. I would troubleshoot clothing options and try again.

By the time I got home, I was able to tell my love it was an okay class, I felt okay about it anyway. By the time I woke this morning, muscles in my arms and core are sore – telling me that even though I wasn’t perfect – I accomplished something in that class – I set a foot on a path to where I want to be – stronger, fitter, better.

I know Amanda got rid of the ugly and found that a week without kids is a good reason to get back to, ahem, basics, with her husband.

You can get new, black, non ugly underwear for 97 CENTS at “the Walmarts” my friends. They don’t even SHOW the 97 cent panties online, but LOOK – even online you can find 2 dollar non ugly knickers. 

Soma is having a sale where you can get 5 pairs for about 5 dollars each.

Jockey starts at 5 dollars, and they are really good about being sponsors for blog conferences, I’ve talked to their reps before and have always liked them.

The Hanes Outlet is running about 6 bucks each. I should have stocked up yesterday when I was there, but I was tired and excuse ridden.

You can hit etsy and start searching – These are handmade by Frolic and Frills for $7.95.

Panty by Post will run ya 30 bucks a month. (Love them, in case I haven’t mentioned.)

Etsy stores can run a gamut of prices – These are $79 from Guided by Stars.

Then I got all squirrelly and started looking for crazy expensive beautiful things – Like Nancy Meyer that has unders for OVER 400 dollars!

What I really wanted to do yesterday was start buying black pretty things for you and doing little love bombs of pretty for the ones I love.

Why? Why am I so hotheaded about underwear? I am done settling. I am done saying that what I have always had is enough. I’m ready to decide what *I* want and what is good enough to be a part of my world. My extremely valuable world. That goes for my lingerie drawer, my house, AND my heart. This whole rant is merely me starting somewhere tangible.

I’m worth so much more than some of the crappy hands I have been dealt. I am now and forever more going to throw out what doesn’t work or please me and bring in things and people and experiences that bring me joy.

Yes, starting with underwear.

Thanks to my darling new NuvaRing, I am on day FIFTEEN of my super special girly time. Yay laser ring!

I have seen my entire rotation of monthly underwear. Not, of course, the kinky fuckery, lacy pretty stuff for show and moan, but the … other stuff.

I’m here to tell ya. Screw all of that. I’m putting my foot down … or whatever. I’m rotating the ugly to the trash can. I’m so over it. Wedgie-wear? Gone. NO LONGER WHITE (you KNOW what I mean, girlfriends) GONE! If it isn’t in good condition and pretty – it’s outta here. I have a bathroom trashcan full of cast offs.

Even my beloved Panty by Post, I think, are just about done. Which makes me sad. Rather, it did, till I read their blog and there is a week’s work of Panty Makeover Posts. Now I feel EVEN BETTER about my cleaning out the drawers drawer. Also – grateful I don’t have Natalie Grunberg looking through my stuff. Oh the shame. (Also, thank you Zoeyjane for hooking me up with THAT fabulousness pre Chicago 2008.)

my pretties in a fresher, pinker, day

Now YOU. Go do it. NOW. GET RID OF THE TIRED, THE POOR, THE STAINED MASSES OF FUGLY UNDIES, YEARNING FOR A LANDFILL.

YOU HEAR THAT! A LANDFILL! YOUR HOGGY HOGGY VADGE DESERVES WAY BETTER THAN LANDFILL LINGERIE!

Go throw that ugly OUT and then get yourself something NEW and CLEAN and COMFY or PRETTY or something BETTER!!!!

*edit* BLACK UNDERS … think about it….