Year 7

Its taken this long for me to allow myself to realize that I have no fucking clue how to grieve you. There are stages and the last once is supposed to be accompanied with this literal physical release that is a kind of giving up of all the pain and hurt and sadness to the universe. I havent done that yet. I havent even come close. I can feel it all inside wanting to be free, wanting to be released from the cage Ive made with cement blocks and mortar and heavy heavy chains. But Ive forgotten where I put the key. My hands dont remember the pathways of tearing down this house I built myself to contain you. And so it sits, heavy in my chest. Full of all my incredibly intense fears of truly having to let you go.

For the first few years I couldnt even talk about you with family. Your death was an invisible pink elephant crying in the corner, anguishing from lonliness. Someone look at me!! Dont you see me?? Im still here!! But I refused to look. Your death was a faraway thing, like someone discussing the pyramids who'd never actually been to Eygpt. I was told how strong I was, how well I was doing. I couldnt cry with people about you. And to watch others cry about you to me? The rage!! The horror! NONONO STOP. You dont get to be sad. You dont get to cry. I am the one who should not ever have to get out of bed again and here I am comforting you? Too much. Too much. I block things out. I dont want to feel them again, I dont want these memories of these people telling me these things about you that I already know. How could I not know? I lived in you. We shared the same blood. You were my home.

This year there is an acknowledgement for the first time of how much anger is there. Thats a step, maybe I am moving forward? But slowly so slowly. Dragging my feet and shouting the entire way. So much anger. How could you leave me???? You were all I had !!! Just you and me for forever and now forever is gone because you left. You left me.
You
       left
             me
                  here

You went somewhere I cant follow. So Here I am. Here I sit. Here I lay. Here I eat. Here I sleep. All the while trying to continue wanting to do it without you. I am trying. I try.

I listened to a woman speak about Death. She said we choose our paths in life, that before we are born we plan it all out like blueprints, and every heartache, every loss, we signed up for. We chose to experience it. She said there is a heaven but its more like here than we imagine. She said I will see you again, that you are around, that you can let me know youre with me. I get a brief mental image of you in a garden in this heaven she described, which is funny because you never were really into outside and plants like me and gram are. But I see you clear as day, with a little rake and you look up like you just remember you had somewhere you were planning to be, but that you got too immersed in your work. These things swirl around in my head like leaves caught in a tidepool and the undercurrent that pulls at me without fail is the wanting. These are things I want to believe. I want so bad for these things she said to be true. Equally as hard, I feel the weight of my cement house, tethering me in disbelief, unwilling to let me feel this hope, this joy.

The grief of you wont let me feel things. Childlike wonder still gets through probably because thats something Ive never given up. I can still feel the stars and a beautiful sunset or sunrise or a giant flock of birds fully. But other things, very important life altering things? They are grey around the edges. My wedding, the births of my children, building a new home with my husband, all have these little grey edges. Like photographs forgotten and left too long in damp basements.

 I want to be fully happy again. I want to see the true joy in all things. Ive just forgotten how. I still laugh. My husband makes me laugh. My kids make me laugh. I love watching them. I stare at them for culminations of hours and hours upon hours. Watching them play. Watching their little minds figure things out, make up stories. In them I see me and I want to protect them from these hurts I harbor within. I want them to grow up feeling secure and free and light. Lightness. All childhoods should be made of lightness. Heaviness is an adult thing.

Every passing year it becomes more clear to me how much I dont know. I do not know if this is the correct way to lament another souls passing. Is it supposed to take this long? Shouldnt I feel patched up by now? Why cant I remember how to remove these chains and bricks from around you? I dont know. I dont know. Im trying. I try.

But time passes. It moves on. I wonder what you think of me, what you think of what Im doing, what Ive done. Are you proud?  Do you wish you could hold your grandchildren upon your lap? I tell them about you. I will never stop telling them. Jack has your fiestiness. Mookie has your eyes. He really does. They are hazel. I hope they stay that way. I mourn a bit for the baby girl that I couldve named after you. Is that wrong? I dont know. I think I just wanted to be able to see something alive that was part you and carried your name. Something I could see and hold and touch and love. But Mookie has your eyes. And Jack has your spirit. You are in there, just as you are in me.

Today I will go to your grave. I will clean it and put up some yellow and organge flowers. And I will hold my head up to the sky and wait for the sunshine to fall across my face and pretend its your hand there. My children will be with me. We will go and sit to honor you. We have not forgotten you Holly Marie.

And yet, this story isnt one of hopelessness. Grief, Im learning, takes time. Grief, isnt what we are told it will be, its a russian doll with 55 inner pieces. What we are told equates to the cheerful smiling face painted on the outermost doll. I am working my way through these dolls, and when I get to the tiniest one I think at last I will be free. Free to fully feel again. Free to throw this hurt to the universe and to only smile when I think of you.
Im trying.
I try.

In memory of Holly Marie Stadnik

June 12th 1957-Oct 22nd 2008

#LetGo

Being a human person on this planet in the last 300 years, and more so being a woman human person on this planet, we are told from the time we are very small that looks are the most important quality we posses. The way we look, our physical attractiveness and how fuckable we are/ how long we can hold that title trump all other qualities we have. A woman's kindness, strength, intelligence, athletic ability, humor, wit, ingenuity, leadership, empathy, and artistic talent don't mean shit if she isn't also conventionally physically attractive. And we've swallowed this crap and bought into it and put it up on a pedestal as Gospel truth mostly because our mothers did, as their mothers had before them. A cycle of inter-generational self abuse. Decades of negative inner monologues, of missed social gatherings, of crying in dressing rooms and hiding under layers of makeup or clothing or both.

As a 31 year old woman, I'm finally fucking sick of it. I'm done.

By done I don't mean that I have the mental willpower to never have a negative thought about myself again. I mean that when I do think something negative about my physical appearance, when I begin the "I cant/I shouldn't/I'm not ___enough" I am actively pumping the brain brakes and shouting "NO!!!" super loud in my brain face like you would when the dog starts to pee on the carpeting. I'm over telling myself what not to wear, what not to eat, how not to act. I'm just fucking done with it. I'm tired of fighting who I am and who I have the potential to become. I'm sick of trying to make myself fit into the box of what is acceptable for a woman to be. Have you ever seen I Heart Huckabees? If not, get that shit on amazon video or something. One of the stories in the movie involves a swimsuit model realizing that she just wants to eat a fucking brownie without wanting to kill herself for it and wear 18th century bonnets and overalls all day because that's who she really is inside. 

That's pretty much where I am at. Bonnet and overalls and a big ass bag of Mickeys donuts. Sitting in my driveway barefoot, watching the birds fly around.

Look, I'm not telling you to stop caring about how you look, or to stop setting fitness goals or to stop lifting small vehicles at Crossfit or writing meal plans or redoing your makeup on your lunch break or making sure your shoes match your work blouse. If those things bring you joy and DO NOT BRING YOU STRESS/DO NOT MAKE YOU THINK NEGATIVE THINGS ABOUT YOURSELF, by all means, you keep on rocking in the free world sister. I just want you to make sure that anything you do that somehow involves your appearance, you are doing 159% because it makes you feel good and not because someone/the world told you to.

You do not need to change who you are for other people.

I repeat: YOU DO NOT NEED TO CHANGE WHO YOU ARE FOR OTHER PEOPLE.

On the left is me 5 years ago at my wedding. I P90X'd and ate chicken and green beans for a month to get to that level. On the right is me a week ago. 5 years have past, two big ass baby boys, and shit looks differently. Here in the States, it is no longer socially acceptable for me to wear a two piece. I'm supposed to fucking throw in the towel and hide my stretch marks and skin saggage  and extra fat from the delicate eyes of the masses. I'm supposed to feel ashamed. I'm supposed to feel lazy. I'm supposed to feel unhealthy. I'm supposed to do whatever it takes to fix this or hide this from the world. Buy a big ass box of Spanx and pretend this isn't what my body looks like now after growing and birthing two lives. But guess what? This is reality folks. I look like this now. I'm not going to hide it or cover it up or pretend its not there. Maybe Ill get super motivated next month and bust my ass doing some fitness program and my body will look close to what it did at my wedding. Maybe I'll start mainlining liquefied donut holes and gain the 75 preggo lbs back. Maybe I'll do neither and this is how I look from now until the end of my days.

The point is this: how I physically look truly impacts the rest of the human population exactly zero percent. Am I a decent human being? Yes. Do I try to be kind and do no harm as much as possible? Absolutely. Do I go out of my way to help people? Yes sir. Am I funny? Your mom sure thinks so. Can I still rollerblade and ride my bike like I did in my 20s? You bet your sweet ass I can. Do I know my great grandmas meatball recipe that came over with her from Italy? Yup. Am I  trying to be the best parent I know how to be? Every single day. Can I read faster than lightening? Indubitably. Am I a tiger in the bedroom? Ask my husband, but duh, yes.

Are you starting to see a pattern? Are you catching my drift? These are the things that matter in life. Who you are and how you act and what you do and how well you do it. How you look is but one tiny facet in the jewel that makes up YOU. YOU have the power to stop kneeling before the alter of the False God of Womanly Perfection, you just have to take a mental step back and let go.

I went to the beach over the 4th with my family and I wore a bikini and it was weirdly one of the most freeing moments of my entire life. Not even when I looked like an extra for the Victoria Secret fashion show did I ever feel this liberated in a swimsuit. It was like I finally exhaled after two and a half decades of holding my breath.

I want for you to exhale too.



I love you you beautiful majestic stallions

Have a wonderful day

~Maria

Angel Food Cake-a-thon

Greetings!

Today I decided to try and make an angel food cake out of a box--don't get it twisted--because I'm having friends and kids over and its approximately 765 degrees out so eating brownies or heavy pie would kick you directly into Type 2 Diabetes. When its hot you must eat light feeling desserts because you cant just not eat a dessert when you have guests over. Its one of the commandments.

At the store I picked the only angel food box mix that was available.

I didn't look at the back because I was more concerned with the fact that my two and a half year old just decided its super great to slam the tiny baby shopping cart he was pushing into the back of my knee--after he put 3 bags of cheese popcorn into it. After getting it home, and after doing 75 other things, I was finally able to take a gander at this beast. I was instantly like oh fuck this noise. This is a box mix. I am used to maybe 3 or 4 simple instructions. Its why I enjoy baking. Its simple, its easy, once its in the oven your only job is to make sure you don't forget to set a timer. Not so with angel food, my friends, not so.

Lets start out with a general overview of the instructions, shall we?

There are 14 items in bold print and one sentence that is in bold print and CAPS LOCK.

THIS CAKE IS NOT FUCKING AROUND. 

We are already off to a bad start. The top right corner has a sentence That Feels The Need To Have Every Word In It Capitalized. Do Not Eat Raw Cake Batter. Ha! Ok. I'll also not eat an entire tub of noosa in one sitting. STFU Box. You don't dictate my life. Raw cake batter is not the equivalent to pure Colombian grade heroin, so just settle down. 

Ok first step: Move Oven rack to lowest position or middle position. Not sure why move needs to be in bold. You're already yelling at me. We are literally on step one. I look at my oven, think meh, there are 3 racks in there, I'll just put it on the middle because if there is one thing I absolutely will not tolerate its being yelled at by a box of fucking cake batter. I refuse to move the rack out of defiance. *This decision will come back to haunt me later.

Alright step two: Beat Cake mix and water in extra large bowl on low speed for 30 seconds, and then medium speed for one minute. Ok, that's oddly specific. I get out the stopwatch on my phone and prepare to follow these directions because I'm afraid if I don't the box will grow a tiny cardboard hand and slap me. I should mention before actually mixing at these precise timed intervals, I neglected to fasten the mixer attachments completely because I had to run upstairs to give a hug to a half asleep toddler who somehow managed to hit his head while sleeping in a crib. Naturally, I lost one spinner to the batter during my episode, at which point I grabbed it from what was becoming an increasingly frothy liquid and threw it into the sink. Onward we go--things are going so well!

You may recall from 2 paragraphs ago that I was warned NOT to eat the raw cake batter. Again, for no reason other than to show an inanimate object it cant control me, after mixing I dip my finger in and have a taste. It tastes like if you poured pop into a solution of watered down vinegar and sugar. Unpleasant. How will this turn into a delicious cake? I have no idea, clearly.

Next I'm told to pour this nasty vinegar/pop batter into some pans. There are differing instructions for all the different pan options and at this point Ive just stopped caring, and grab the first two pans in my cupboard, which happen to be acceptable. Success!

I pop these babies in the oven on the middle rack and set the timer for 40 minutes because the terrifying CAPS LOCK and bold sentence screams at me to DO NOT UNDERBAKE or you will unleash the fires of hell upon you and your children's children until the end of times. In my haste and apathy at these bitch ass instructions, I ignore the side note about batter overflowing if you use a certain type of pan because I'm all like I don't even know what that pan is, this doesn't apply to me--NEXT. 

Cue 20 minutes later, and while I'm doing my best to eat an entire container of hummus without coming up for air, I decide to stroll past the oven and see how my special little cake friends are doing. To my horror quickly turned apathy, I realize why there was so much fuss about the location of the god damn racks. One of my cakes has decided to grow through the rack above it like one of those poor trees that grows around a bike chained to it from the 18th century or something. In my haste to fix this situation I neglected to take an oven picture, but once having extracted the top rack, I did get a photo of the damage still clinging to it. So professional!

Lucky for me, I obviously didn't divide the batter evenly, so only one cake was seriously disfigured because of my hubris. I decide to go back and reread the rest of the directions to prevent another catastrophe, because at this point I'm guessing that this cake is going to require me to stand on my head while reciting the Sri Lankan National Anthem while removing it from the oven because it is the most high maintenance dessert ever. 

And look at that! The final explanation of what should be the easiest thing about baking--taking the already baked thing out of the fucking oven--is the longest paragraph in the instructions! I am told I must IMMEDIATELY turn pan upside down or on its side depending on the type of pan and am told to look on the side of the box for picture examples on how to not fuck up setting a pan down. This box couldn't fit all its bullshit onto the back, it requires an extra side with actual illustrations. 

Jesus take the wheel. It also reminds me to only set the pans on a heatproof surface to cool, which is good because I was planning on balancing them on my baby's head until I read that. 

The edges and tops are crispy as hell because I was so scared after messing up the rack thing that I was determined I would not underbake the entire thing as well. My brain is a constant mix of caring a lot and not giving a fuck at all, so this process was a roller coaster of emotions for me. 

The results:

One angel food cake that looks like it was run over by a child on a bike 

and 

One angel food cake that is pretty and gets to sit on a fancy platter as a reward for not being a mess like its brother. 

What have I learned from this experience? Angel food cake is a fussy bitch and even though I learned the hard way that the instructions do serve a purpose, in the future I will be buying this shit from the grocery store premade. 

Thank you for your time. Have a great HumpDay my Sex Kittens

~Maria