It is no secret that my past is not a pretty thing. From the age of about 17 to around 27 my life was a mess, to put it mildly. Things that happened during that time tend to come back to haunt me, especially at bedtime. I believe it's a major source of my insomnia. I spend a lot of nights crying into my pillow.
A lot of this rethinking showed up with my counseling for my Asperger's diagnosis. Social training not only taught me how to interact and read others, it also taught me the cruelty of others, cruelty that I did not have the capacity to understand before my training. I have a tendency to review past interactions, interactions that meant nothing to me at the time, and feel immensely hurt now that I understand them. Boyfriends who I thought I loved at tender ages cheated, and it didn't hurt for more than a second, or even at all. Donny's abuse really didn't have much affect on me until much later, and once I figured it out, there was no pain at all. I was able to walk away from a years'-long relationship without a drop of hurt or care. I'd moved on emotionally before I'd even moved out of the house. Within hours of the boot flying at my face, actually. I remember it being a huge problem in the break up. He would cry and yell and scream about how angry and hurt he was and that he loved me and needed me, and we had to make this work, and all I could muster was a bored stare. There was a common complaint of, "How can you be so cold?" He's not the only one who has ever said that. There are people in my life that I should be intensely angry with. This is what keeps me up at night. The coldness is gone, and now my emotions, or at least my thoughts, seem to understand what happened around me, and it hurts. I'm pretty sure my emotions were intact before, but they weren't connecting with my brain. My behavior acted accordingly, that's for sure. With each hurt, I got a bit more reckless, but my noodle never connected it with the emotional "pain". I suppose that's because emotions don't have a mental reaction, really. They're not connected to anything. To me, emotions are just words, or a fleeting physical reaction. My chest aches now, though, so that's something.
OK, I am interrupting this pensive whine-fest for a little WTF. I am trying to earn Swagbucks, and I'm watching SBTV, and one of the food videos is seriously, "Spatchcocking a chicken, how to". W.T.F? Spatchcocking?!?!?!? What in the heck is that? I suppose, if I actually WATCHED the video, then I would know, but I don't actually watch the videos. I turn them on, and then do other things while they earn Swagbucks for me. That way I can get a free HDTV for Christmas. http://www.swagbucks.com/refer/kbaum1608 You see what I did there?
Also, I was poking through my stats, and there's a way to see what people search to find my blog. I gotta say, some of y'all are SICK, dudes. Well, probably not my regular reading dudes, but some of y'all who land on my page. There are my homies, who find me via Googling my blog or clicking through from FB or the blogs we all share as IndyMoms, and then, there are the strangers. Some of them are looking for help, mostly parenting an autistic stepkid. Sorry, can't help you there. Some of them are looking for an outlet for anger, "my stepmom sucks". Then, there's the sickos looking for porn. I promise to you, several of my "readers" have found me by searching for adult websites featuring stepmothers. I'm happy to say you will find none of that here, sirs.
Though you might have ten years ago.
Sunday, November 13, 2011
Thursday, November 10, 2011
For the sake of Pete!
Who is this Pete person, and why are we always worried for his sake?
Have we, as a people, forgotten the fine art of the apology? I ask this because of an instance I witnessed in the halls of my established educational facility (IUPUI). The incident triggered in my mind several other incidents that were of the same ilk. What happened was this: A girl was sitting in a busy hallway. Classes had just let out, and the hallway was filling with walkers. Sitting girl is quite tall, and decided she needed to stretch. To do so, she stuck her legs out into the middle of the hallway, tripping someone. She was tall enough that her legs went almost to the other side of the narrow hallway, blocking nearly the entire path in which people were trying to walk. The person she tripped got upset and said, "Hey, you probably shouldn't stick your legs out into the hallway. People will trip." At this point, shouldn't the response from sitting (and now tripping) girl be, "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to trip you." Shouldn't it? Instead, her response was, "Pay attention to where you are going. You could have stepped over my legs." I don't understand the response, but I see it a lot. Instead of apologizing to the person who has been offended, hurt, etc., the offender blames the offended for being offended, as though the offender's offensive action is the offended's fault. Offend. Just for good measure because I hadn't typed it enough.
Moreso, even if it is an accident, aren't you supposed to apologize? The girl accidentally tripped the other person. Had she said, "Sorry, it was an accident" then the tripped girl likely would not have walked off disgustedly shaking her head. Also, I'd not be writing this blog, so there's that. Thanks, tripping girl! Anyway, this links to another incident that happened a few weeks ago. Two groups of friends were out at separate bars. One person in one of the groups and one person in the other group don't like one another. Mutual friends of these two were out at separate locations. One such person posts on Facebook that they are at such and such bar with such and such people, including the one person from one group that the other person from the other group doesn't like. You following? No? Me neither. So, the OTHER person that doesn't like the one person posts to the mutual friend that, "I guarantee you'd be having more fun with us at this other bar." Rude, right? The implication is, "Oh, I see you're at that bar I hate with that person I don't like. You'd be having more fun at the bar I like with me instead of with those other horrible people." The people she doesn't like were linked to the post, so they could read the rude remark.
In this situation, a few people pointed out the rudeness of this statement. The offender, instead of saying something like, "Oh, that came out wrong. I'm sorry" said something to the effect of, "Lighten up. You all read it wrong." That's not an apology. You were rude. You possibly hurt someone's feelings. If you really didn't mean to be rude, and it was an accident, then apologize! If you don't apologize, and then say something along the lines of, "It's not what I said, it was what you heard" then you are blaming the person you hurt, making it all the more likely that you really hurt them on purpose and didn't think you'd be called out on it.
Same thing happened in a relationship I was in once. Boyfriend was in the living room with his friends and thought I was asleep. They got in some sort of testicle fight, where one of them didn't want to go see some nerd movie and one of them did, so they needed to prove that nerd dudes are not as good as not nerd dudes or something. My boyfriend needed his nerd friend to know that nerds are virgins and that he was not going to that movie or whatever because, "I get pussy whenever I want." I heard this. I was pissed. I do not give up the vagina just because some dude demands it, and it makes me look like a total hoebag in front of these friends to say that I do. It also made it seem like he had no feelings for me (not the case at the time) and that all I was good for was a piece of ass. I was not happy with this. So, I came out of the bedroom and demanded an explanation. Whose pussy WAS he getting into whenever he wanted, because it sure as hell wasn't mine. What explanation did I get? Not an, "I'm sorry, current love of my life. I was trying to prove to my buddy that I had more testosterone than he has." Oh, no! The "explanation" I got was to blame me. "I didn't say that. You must have heard me wrong."
There are many other witnessed incidences of this same thing, but I'm not going to recount them all to you, because my blogs are already too long as it is. Back to the main question, do we not apologize anymore? Seriously? Can no one admit when they are wrong? Because, dudes, I am telling this to you in all sincerity. THESE ARE SITUATIONS IN WHICH YOU APOLOGIZE!
You should listen to me, too, and I will presently tell you why. Because I have had social training, and if there's one thing torture taught me, it's how to be polite. I'm, like, a manners expert.
Have we, as a people, forgotten the fine art of the apology? I ask this because of an instance I witnessed in the halls of my established educational facility (IUPUI). The incident triggered in my mind several other incidents that were of the same ilk. What happened was this: A girl was sitting in a busy hallway. Classes had just let out, and the hallway was filling with walkers. Sitting girl is quite tall, and decided she needed to stretch. To do so, she stuck her legs out into the middle of the hallway, tripping someone. She was tall enough that her legs went almost to the other side of the narrow hallway, blocking nearly the entire path in which people were trying to walk. The person she tripped got upset and said, "Hey, you probably shouldn't stick your legs out into the hallway. People will trip." At this point, shouldn't the response from sitting (and now tripping) girl be, "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to trip you." Shouldn't it? Instead, her response was, "Pay attention to where you are going. You could have stepped over my legs." I don't understand the response, but I see it a lot. Instead of apologizing to the person who has been offended, hurt, etc., the offender blames the offended for being offended, as though the offender's offensive action is the offended's fault. Offend. Just for good measure because I hadn't typed it enough.
Moreso, even if it is an accident, aren't you supposed to apologize? The girl accidentally tripped the other person. Had she said, "Sorry, it was an accident" then the tripped girl likely would not have walked off disgustedly shaking her head. Also, I'd not be writing this blog, so there's that. Thanks, tripping girl! Anyway, this links to another incident that happened a few weeks ago. Two groups of friends were out at separate bars. One person in one of the groups and one person in the other group don't like one another. Mutual friends of these two were out at separate locations. One such person posts on Facebook that they are at such and such bar with such and such people, including the one person from one group that the other person from the other group doesn't like. You following? No? Me neither. So, the OTHER person that doesn't like the one person posts to the mutual friend that, "I guarantee you'd be having more fun with us at this other bar." Rude, right? The implication is, "Oh, I see you're at that bar I hate with that person I don't like. You'd be having more fun at the bar I like with me instead of with those other horrible people." The people she doesn't like were linked to the post, so they could read the rude remark.
In this situation, a few people pointed out the rudeness of this statement. The offender, instead of saying something like, "Oh, that came out wrong. I'm sorry" said something to the effect of, "Lighten up. You all read it wrong." That's not an apology. You were rude. You possibly hurt someone's feelings. If you really didn't mean to be rude, and it was an accident, then apologize! If you don't apologize, and then say something along the lines of, "It's not what I said, it was what you heard" then you are blaming the person you hurt, making it all the more likely that you really hurt them on purpose and didn't think you'd be called out on it.
Same thing happened in a relationship I was in once. Boyfriend was in the living room with his friends and thought I was asleep. They got in some sort of testicle fight, where one of them didn't want to go see some nerd movie and one of them did, so they needed to prove that nerd dudes are not as good as not nerd dudes or something. My boyfriend needed his nerd friend to know that nerds are virgins and that he was not going to that movie or whatever because, "I get pussy whenever I want." I heard this. I was pissed. I do not give up the vagina just because some dude demands it, and it makes me look like a total hoebag in front of these friends to say that I do. It also made it seem like he had no feelings for me (not the case at the time) and that all I was good for was a piece of ass. I was not happy with this. So, I came out of the bedroom and demanded an explanation. Whose pussy WAS he getting into whenever he wanted, because it sure as hell wasn't mine. What explanation did I get? Not an, "I'm sorry, current love of my life. I was trying to prove to my buddy that I had more testosterone than he has." Oh, no! The "explanation" I got was to blame me. "I didn't say that. You must have heard me wrong."
There are many other witnessed incidences of this same thing, but I'm not going to recount them all to you, because my blogs are already too long as it is. Back to the main question, do we not apologize anymore? Seriously? Can no one admit when they are wrong? Because, dudes, I am telling this to you in all sincerity. THESE ARE SITUATIONS IN WHICH YOU APOLOGIZE!
You should listen to me, too, and I will presently tell you why. Because I have had social training, and if there's one thing torture taught me, it's how to be polite. I'm, like, a manners expert.
Thursday, November 3, 2011
Yay! A Blog!
I've been meaning to update this thing for the longest darn time. I have so much to say. Unfortunately, the blog crashed my browser every time I tried to update for the last month or so. So, I downloaded Google Chrome. I pinky swear it was because I wanted to update my blog and NOT because I wanted to play Angry Birds. Promise.
That. That is a lie. The Dudes have become obsessed with Angry Birds, and I wanted to see what all of the fuss was. I downloaded the Chrome version and beat it in a day. Meh. What I DO love about it, though. The sounds! SO FUN! I love the music and the little noises the birds make.
Ok, ok, I'm watching Supernanny. Sometimes, I watch this for tips. I do the Supernanny time outs for the Little Man. I do them with Big Man, too, but rarely. Little Man does what they do on TV. Scream and run, scream and run, though not all of the time. Depends on his mood swings. Big Man sulks to the corner, stands there for a few minutes, and goes about his way. Sometimes I watch Supernanny to say, "Oh, goodness, at least the dudes aren't THAT bad!" Then, sometimes I watch and go, "OMG, Little Man is TOTALLY that bad." Either way, it makes me feel better that I'm not alone, or that I'm not "that mom". This show also makes me realize that "that mom" is a stressed out messball. I feel for her in public. I find myself smiling and making faces at screaming babies and toddlers in the grocery store instead of disrupting my shop to go to a different section of the store until they're gone. THANKS, SUPERNANNY!
Aaaaanyway. WE BOUGHT A HOUSE! We closed on it yesterday and get to move in TWO WEEKS! It's a little bit stressful, though I think it's more stressful for the rest of the family than it is for me. Little Man is having a rough time of it, I think. We're trying to prepare him as much as possible for the new schedule, which is going to be CRAZY! We aren't comfortable changing him schools in the middle of the school year. We want to disrupt his schedule as little as possible. Plus, he's started counseling at his current school. Then, once we found out that the new school doesn't even offer full-day kindergarten, the deal was sealed. We'll be driving the dudes an hour to and from school every day. It's gonna be super nutso MaGoo until the middle-ish of June when they get out.
ALSO! OMGOMGOMG!! I GRADUATE IN MAY! I am all signed up for my final three classes: African Politics (my senior seminar), The Politics of Terrorism, and The Politics of Human Consumption. Gonna be loooads of research. I'm excited. I'm writing one huge super paper on the Iraqi conflict this semester, and it's been a really enjoyable project.
The most stress actually hasn't come from the dudes or the new house for me. It's come from the baby. Yes, baby. We are actively trying to conceive! It's very exciting for us. We've been planning it for a while. The stress for me, though, is kinda horrible. I am ready to get back to work, especially after I graduate, and I'm not sure that I can do that if I have a baby. My main goal after graduation is to start working on LuLunacy ASAP. However, I'd like to have a part-time money making job as well. I don't like not providing financially. If we have a baby, it wouldn't work with the daycare situation. As it is, we've got a while to figure it out. We aren't even pregnant, yet, and who knows if we will be. Yet to be seen.
Holy Mcbobbysocks, this Glam Fairy show is the worst thing I've ever seen. Time to shut off the electronics and practice guitar :D
That. That is a lie. The Dudes have become obsessed with Angry Birds, and I wanted to see what all of the fuss was. I downloaded the Chrome version and beat it in a day. Meh. What I DO love about it, though. The sounds! SO FUN! I love the music and the little noises the birds make.
Ok, ok, I'm watching Supernanny. Sometimes, I watch this for tips. I do the Supernanny time outs for the Little Man. I do them with Big Man, too, but rarely. Little Man does what they do on TV. Scream and run, scream and run, though not all of the time. Depends on his mood swings. Big Man sulks to the corner, stands there for a few minutes, and goes about his way. Sometimes I watch Supernanny to say, "Oh, goodness, at least the dudes aren't THAT bad!" Then, sometimes I watch and go, "OMG, Little Man is TOTALLY that bad." Either way, it makes me feel better that I'm not alone, or that I'm not "that mom". This show also makes me realize that "that mom" is a stressed out messball. I feel for her in public. I find myself smiling and making faces at screaming babies and toddlers in the grocery store instead of disrupting my shop to go to a different section of the store until they're gone. THANKS, SUPERNANNY!
Aaaaanyway. WE BOUGHT A HOUSE! We closed on it yesterday and get to move in TWO WEEKS! It's a little bit stressful, though I think it's more stressful for the rest of the family than it is for me. Little Man is having a rough time of it, I think. We're trying to prepare him as much as possible for the new schedule, which is going to be CRAZY! We aren't comfortable changing him schools in the middle of the school year. We want to disrupt his schedule as little as possible. Plus, he's started counseling at his current school. Then, once we found out that the new school doesn't even offer full-day kindergarten, the deal was sealed. We'll be driving the dudes an hour to and from school every day. It's gonna be super nutso MaGoo until the middle-ish of June when they get out.
ALSO! OMGOMGOMG!! I GRADUATE IN MAY! I am all signed up for my final three classes: African Politics (my senior seminar), The Politics of Terrorism, and The Politics of Human Consumption. Gonna be loooads of research. I'm excited. I'm writing one huge super paper on the Iraqi conflict this semester, and it's been a really enjoyable project.
The most stress actually hasn't come from the dudes or the new house for me. It's come from the baby. Yes, baby. We are actively trying to conceive! It's very exciting for us. We've been planning it for a while. The stress for me, though, is kinda horrible. I am ready to get back to work, especially after I graduate, and I'm not sure that I can do that if I have a baby. My main goal after graduation is to start working on LuLunacy ASAP. However, I'd like to have a part-time money making job as well. I don't like not providing financially. If we have a baby, it wouldn't work with the daycare situation. As it is, we've got a while to figure it out. We aren't even pregnant, yet, and who knows if we will be. Yet to be seen.
Holy Mcbobbysocks, this Glam Fairy show is the worst thing I've ever seen. Time to shut off the electronics and practice guitar :D
