We're "official"

I've finally been able to update my blog format. Finally!!!

The celebration of awesomeness now continues over at 

shortywithastory.com

I hope to see you there!

Recipe for a road trip

A lot of memories are made this way.

We are family who love to travel. We may not travel big, but we do travel fairly often. We try to get one or two road trips in a year, and as the boychild only has two more years left in our house, we've got to get our fix in while we can.

You'd think after all these years that we'd have some sort of a routine down. We'd be road tripping experts or something.

Of course, if you were really thinking that, you'd be wrong.

Allow me to demonstrate:

This is how normal organized people road trip:

Pack all bags for the family in advance. Make sure, of course, that everyone has enough clean underwear and clean socks and a jacket - even if the weather calls for 90 degree temps in the middle of the desert. You know if you don't pack the jacket that it will probably pour buckets/sleet/snow.

Even if you're in the middle of the desert in the middle of the summer. Because, of course it will.

And, for the love of god you will most definitely need clean socks - especially if you are traveling into the desert, but even when you're not - especially if you have a teenage boy.

Have toiletries set out by the sink, ready to pop the toothbrushes into their covers and toss in the deodorant and daily essentials into the bag as soon as you've used them last for quick packing.

Find all charging cords, cables and ear buds, gather all iPads and Kindles and, of course, phones and put them in one place. A separate pocket or insulated pouch or something that you can easily grab and go.

Plan for and purchase a well-rounded, generally healthy snack list. Things that travel rather well without spoiling. Grapes, cucumbers, nuts, granola bars, baked crackers, maybe some hummus packets. Bottles of water. Ice packs that you've remembered to throw in the freezer. That kind of thing.

Make sure all children have things to keep them occupied, but not glued to a screen the whole time. Coloring books - but only with twisty colored pencils or maybe - if your kid is older - markers. Add some trivia puzzles, card games and imaginative playthings - dolls or cars or whatever.

Research family-friendly road trip games to keep you entertained as you traverse the never-ending landscape of Wyoming or, god forbid, fucking Kansas. Traveling through those states is like entering the Twilight Zone.

And, of course, lots of music that the whole family agrees on. Because that exists.

Which means that this is naturally how our family road-trips:

Know that there are clothes to pack, but realize the night before that half of the items you're planning on bringing are still dirty.

SHIT.

Panic slightly, then say fuck it to sorting and fill your extra-large capacity washer to over capacity with jeans and delicates and dressy clothes and stinky socks and pretty much every piece of clothing your family owns (that isn't clean, because naturally, the clean clothes are out of season) so you can get ALL THE LAUNDRY DONE RIGHT NOW.

Pray that everything will dry fully sometime before midnight, so you won't have gross mildewy clothes upon arrival.

Get distracted on your phone (damnit Facebook!) and conveniently "forget" to head to the store to stock up on foodage. Instead, pull whatever remaining snacks you have in your pantry and fridge that the locusts children haven't already eaten. If you live in a house with children or teenagers, you will probably have to sort through empty boxes, discarded wrappers, and wilted fruit to find what could be deemed as acceptable. Throw this hodgepodge of snacks into a plastic grocery sack, because you don't have enough energy to figure out where your "nice" bags are. The road trip snacks will consist of something like four old packets of fruit snacks you can't remember buying, two granola bars that fell behind the cans of corn, slices of one half of a cucumber that was left on the counter after that night's dinner (totally not slimy, so you're good), thrown in a ziplock bag. And, if you're lucky, a semi-opened bag of your favorite chips (only slightly stale). Don't include the ice packs, because your children have lost them all.

Hardened traveler advice - no matter how desperate you are, do not under any circumstances bring the fresh broccoli and cauliflower as a healthy snack option. Seriously. HARD PASS ON THAT SHIT. Believe me. You will end up regretting it for hours. Consider that the gift that keeps on giving.

Be sure you pack a water bottle or two - if you're lucky enough to find a matching lid.

Know the whole time you're scavenging for snackage that you're going to be stopping at a gas station within two hours of departing, and that you'll be stocking up on Hot Fries and Cheetos

and Twizzlers and vanilla Coke - even if you've given up crap food.

Fold previously-discussed laundry, then remember that you still have to pull the luggage from the garage. Cross your fingers against extra surprises, like mice or spiders. Silently curse living on a mountainside if you find the extra surprises. Dance a little jig should no surprises jump out at you. Shove everything into the luggage, then recruit another family member into sitting onto the suitcase so it can be zipped.

Try to find all of the toiletries. Fail miserably, except for the toothbrushes, toothpaste and deodorant. Somehow forget to pack the deodorant that you do find, which, of course, is a giant mistake if you have any other human to travel with. Realize that you'll also be spending another fortune on "travel size" options... again... when you get to your destination.

Beg, plead and barter with your children to pack their own bags o' fun. Don't worry about the electronics - mostly because they won't necessarily remember the power cords to go with them. Give up caring on whether the crayons get dropped onto the floor and mashed into the mats, only to be found a month later. Declare that your car is "kid-friendly" anyway, so really, it's not like anybody is going to notice.

Try to pack the electronics and cords

, but forget them on the kitchen counter on the way out the door. You might all have your phones, but you'll now only have one charging cord to share between four of you. Whomever the cord actually belongs to will suddenly get very possessive of said cord and forget their sharing lessons from Kindergarten.

Fall back on the traditional license plate and alphabet games, because lord knows you haven't had any time to research any alternatives. Now that your whole family have dead cell phones (sans one person, who still isn't sharing), you can't really do that from the road. And no, you can't use the Q in the license plate ahead of us so STOP CHEATING! Laugh like maniacs because despite the plea to stop cheating, everyone is and you're all now just blurting out random words.

Is it bad that I take pride in the fact that the children have memorized the lyrics and dance for this?

Take turns playing music. Sing along at loud volumes to mostly appropriate, and some - eh, not so much - not necessarily in tune or on beat or whatever, but just for the fun of it. Small arguments break out because so-and-so has chosen five songs, and what-his-name only got two songs before it went back to so-and-so. The small arguments get bigger, until finally, one or both parents yell back to DON'T EVEN BREATHE TOWARDS EACH OTHER that nobody gets to choose the music now and we have to go back to the radio.

And, after hours of forced family interaction, end up at your destination a little rumpled, a little smelly and a lot of exhausted, but full of good memories nonetheless.

Best. Sound. Ever.

To me, there is no greater sound than that of my teenager laughing.

Especially if I am a part of that laughter in any way, shape or form.

You see, there was a time, not so long ago, where the boy child and I butt heads constantly.  My husband would declare that we were too alike, cut from the same cloth so naturally, of course we weren't getting along. That tenuous time between my son morphing from the boy child into Mandrew certainly had some rocky moments. For both of us.

It was almost as if when he was struggling with all these emotions and growing pains and hormones that deep down, I couldn't handle him getting to be so damn big so damn soon. I was mourning the gradual loss of my sweet little boy who was way too quickly growing into this strange young man.

But then, all of a sudden, somewhere towards the end of his middle school experience, something clicked.

I was getting compliments from my adult friends telling me how when he saw them around town, even when he was with a group of friends, he would purposely stop what he was doing to go say hi to my friend and give them a big hug, asking how they were like it was something all teenage boys did, with no qualms and no embarrassment.

I'd get reports of his compassion and kindness and desire to make people laugh. The comedian part didn't always come at the best of times, usually more like the middle of biology or something, but nevertheless, it was there.

Huh. Looks like we were raising a good kid after all, sometimes in spite of ourselves.

It took moments like those to step back and realize that even if raising a teen is hard ass work, life wasn't about constantly arguing about schoolwork. Or chores. Or other responsibilities that never seemed to get done. Which, to be honest, we still do to some extent.

As long as we were raising a decent kid that was all that mattered. In the grand scheme of things, big picture wise, that's going to take him further than anything.

It wasn't until I could step back and acknowledge the boy child for these traits that I could also begin to appreciate his humor. Which, to the shock of absolutely nobody, is a lot like mine. Pretty sarcastic. Definitely silly. Maybe sometimes a little more than a little odd.

We text each other stupid memes or silly videos, like someone in a  T-rex costume running or really bad song parodies.

We'll talk to each other with horrible accents. We'll wear ugly Christmas sweaters and onesies and silly hats.

We do interpretive dance, just to get a rise out of the other. My hands-down favorite is probably his Muppet dance. Freaking priceless. It's really too bad that I can't share it, because you would eat it up too.

We make horrible puns and try to top one another with pranks. And maybe trying to find the worst hairstyle when we're traveling - man buns and comb overs and the like.

I know, I know... it's a little horrible. Don't judge. A mom has to do what a mom has to do in order to bond with her son.

And sometimes I'll get awarded with a deep laugh that lights up his face and rolls through his body, collapsing his giant, 6'2" frame in half. This is usually paired with a "Moooommmm" in a semi-sarcastic voice, his eyes crinkling at the corners.

I love that shit.

I wish I could put moments like these in a jar, display them on a shelf so when I'm old and crotchety and gray, I can open one up and relive the pure, unadulterated joy, one last time.

If only.

Until then, I'll eke out every single moment, every chance I can in my quest to hear that laughter again. Because it truly is the BEST. Sound. Ever.

You say you're afraid of WHAT?!

So, I may or may not have a completely irrational fear.

OK. Full disclosure? It's completely, 100%, unapologetically irrational.

You see, I'm afraid of deer. Specifically, of being hooved to death by a rabid deer.

I know, right? 

I know that the chances of that happening are so slim that they're almost non-existent. The key word here is "almost". Probably deer don't even have rabies. Whatevs. It is what it is.

And the sad thing is, I have no reason for this. Like I said - totally irrational. I will, however, freely admit this in a pretty self deprecating way, laughing freely at myself because I know just how stupid it is.

I don't relay this information expecting one to nod and say something like, 'Well, now that you mention it, yes, I do see why one would confuse Bambi with the demonic spawn of the forest.' 

I will say that I absolutely do not need one to not only ignore my fear, irrational as it may be, but also to ADD to the fucking beast.

Eight or so years ago, Mick and I found pretty much our dream home. A cabin in the middle of the woods, on a little bit of land. We have gorgeous views of prominent peaks, with mountain foliage ablaze of neon green and conifer-ish colors, when our Rocky Mountain version of Mother Nature decides to play along with the rules. Even better, we were less than a mile from Target. Everyone wins.

At that time, Sis was just about to start Kindergarten, and was about the size of a pixie. The boy child just going into 4th grade, and even though he was tall for his age, he wasn't big by any means. And, since I'm neurotic anyway, it's not like I was going to be letting these kiddos out of my sight when they went to play outside. After all, it's not like we were in a neighborhood any longer. 

We met our new neighbors shortly after moving in. They came down the hill bearing a plant for our garden. Bwahahaha! First mistake. The poor dear thought I could grow something. Half the reason we live on a woodland enclave was so I could avoid gardening, since I tend more towards a black thumb than anything. But I digress.

They were a sweet, older couple. Gina and John. Well, they were sweet until we started chatting. 

I jokingly referred to the dreaded deer problem, sure to include that as Colorado girl, born and bred, I could still appreciate the beauty if wildlife and honor the fact that we've developed land that encroaches on their territory, and yada yada. Just because I can appreciate nature's abundance, certainly does not mean I don't have some deep down, innate fear of the things.

"Oh dear," Gina assured me with a smile and her thick mid-west accent, "you're just going to love it here. You see that bed of flat grass right off your porch? Well, that's where a whole herd of them bed down at night."

Delightful. Sigh.

"And the deer are just the start," she continued. "Why, we have bears down here all the time. They'll come right on up on your porch and just peek on through your windows. Ya know, if you garden with fish oil they'll come right up behind you and sniff your ear. Heck - John and I even feed them."

Call me crazy but I'm pretty sure that's illegal, lady.

"We see foxes and rabbits and chipmunks, all sorts of God's creatures, all the time. There's even a mama mountain lion up on the ridge there who'll come down and prowl on the BLM land right behind us on occasion." 

Fan-fucking-tastic. By this time, I swear I'm a little light headed, as I see my tiny sprite of a daughter playing in the shade from the corner of my eye.

"Oh, and one time, me and John were playing with a squeaky toy with our dog Spike when wouldn't you know it, a coyote jumped right out from our bushes thinking it was a baby rabbit. Gosh, I wish I had a camera. It was magnificent."

Well, shit.

Thanks for turning my completely irrational fear of rabid deer into an actual fucking, totally legit fear of carnivorous creatures roaming the forest that surrounds my house. Really - I feel just great about that. The fact that I was hyperventilating at this point didn't seem to phase my new neighbor.

Somehow in my ridiculous admission, Gina must have heard that I LOVE me some wildlife, not that I don't really super love them unless they're far away and/or I'm behind some sort of barrier.

This could be a lesson in actually listening to hear what someone is saying, folks.

Needless to say, now, almost a decade later my kids are still not allowed in my yard alone. And maybe, a large part of the reason why we have dogs may or may not be due to wanting the big and scary animals go after them first have them warn us if danger approaches.

As for deer, well. I continue to have a love-hate relationship with them.

Yes, they are beautiful. Generally, I know that they are harmless.

The last few years, we've had a buck and two does claim our yard as home base. We often find them nibbling at the edge of grass along our twisted driveway, or bedded down in the middle of our yard. There is really nothing more spectacular than seeing these gorgeous creatures bed down, with the sun shining through their huge ears, and the foliage glow gorgeously and surreally around them. 

But that buck think's he's the shit. I'll step on my porch to grill dinner, and there he'll be, pleased as punch, munching down on what passes as a "natural" garden (i.e. whatever the hell decided to grow with no help nor hinderance from me), mere feet away. The bastard doesn't even flinch any more. He just continues his business like it's no big deal.

This is a real pic of a real deer that I took in my real yard. If you can't tell, he's really an asshole.

Don't think I'm not watching you, buddy.

Breaking out of the box

Hey there lovely,

Recently, after months of agonizing over a final decision, I wrote my farewell letter to five years worth of friends and customers from a recent journey. I'm a pretty primo multi-tasker (if I do say so myself!), but in order to move forward, I had to cut away one of the things that was holding me back.

I've been wanting to get back into writing FOR-EV-ER. Well, years, at least (if you happen to see the last post I had here, you know - two years ago. Oops.

Really, I dream of writing all the words, all the time. But too often I found myself wasting time with other endeavors. Like Facebook. To plan my business. Naturally.

*cough*

So, with a tear in my eye and butterflies in my stomach, I said goodbye to something that I loved tremendously.

Now, in it's place, is this - Shorty with a Story.

Much like anything else I do in life, I've decided to jump back into this writing thing head first, with much gusto and little thought.

I do a lot of faking it 'til I make it.

Generally it turns out great. Sometimes, eh, not so much. Hopefully this turns out to be a happy medium.

I think one of the main reasons why it took so long for me to jump back on this bandwagon was because of fear. I was afraid of not being enough. Or being too much. Or even worse, something mundane and in-between. Ugh.

It took months of hemming and hawing over what I want the "theme" of this blog was going to be. 

Should it be yet another mom blog, similar to the humor column I had once upon a time in a little podunk, small town newspaper? My kids are so much older now - who really wants to hear funny stories about teens. And, could I tell those tales without being a total embarrassment to said teens?

Would it be funny and/or cringe-worthy stories from various work and volunteer projects? Gracious knows I have a lot of those. But then again, who doesn't?

Would it be about life in general? Do you want to hear about my totally irrational fear (of deer, no less) or about the mundane details of adulting when you feel like anything but an adult?

Can I simultaneously make a positive impact on the world, when sometimes, all I want to do is bitch about something that irritated me, like traffic or tourists?

Decisions, decisions.

I wear - like many of you - so many freaking hats. Mom. Wife. Friend. Chauffeur. Chef. Maid. Babysitter. Bookkeeper. Writer. Creator. Inspirer. Dreamer. Doer. Baker. Sassy pants. Leader. Follower. Fun-haver.

The list goes on.

Why, I asked myself, if I wear so many hats, would I limit my public writing space to just one? That sounded just so dull. 

I plan to have this blog as an adventure. A fun and funky road trip. Really, who knows where this windy path is going to take us.

So I tossed that "theme" shit to the wind and came up with this blog.

I'm a short girl with big ambitions, full of stories from all parts of my life. And yep - even some that aren't part of my real life. I'll throw in a little fiction, just for giggles. This is going to be a blog without an overall theme, because labels are lame.

I'll tell you what else this blog will contain:

Tales from a girl who married and had kids young, who has a huge and wildly amazing family. A girl who has strange fears and maybe too high of expectations and too little patience. A girl who really loves her friends, and really loves to make a difference. A girl who has no qualms about being silly, or frivolous, or even, on occasion, very cheap frugal.

You'll get tales from a girl who really cracks herself up, but also cries at happy-sad commercials and sappy, crappy movies.

You'll get stories from a girl who fucking loves the f-bomb, but tries to be appropriate in (most) social and professional gatherings. Probably not as much on here, though, because really, this blog is a spot for me to be authentically myself. And, since I like to cuss, there will be some spicy language to season the tales found on these virtual pages.

You'll get stories from a girl who believes in the good in the world, in seeing the best in people, and who believes that the universe is too small for us here, on this teeny, tiny speck of a planet, to know everything that's out there. A girl who believes miracles and the unbelievable still exist, out there somewhere, waiting with bated breath.

Some of these stories might be from my day to day life. Some might be works of fiction. Hopefully, these stories will provide someone with entertainment. More than that, they'll provide me with creative relief.

So, my friend, if you find yourself here and made it this far - allow me to officially welcome you to this adventure!

Introduction to Unemployment

Soon, I'll find myself unemployed. And while, really, all things considered, it's fine, after holding some sort of a job constantly for the last 20 years, it's still a shock.

If you ask my dad, he'd mark my debut in the business world at 5, successfully selling original artwork to neighbors in the parking lot of our condos for a buck a piece. Or, at 9, when I advertised as a babysitter in our apartment complex, only to find callers confused by my parents who were similarly seeking a babysitter for myself and my two younger brothers. 

But officially, my first job with an actual pay check was at 14 - as a surveyor in the mall, asking what few passers-by I could talk into a few minutes of their time for a $5-spot what they thought of the potato chip samples or movie clip they just watched. 

Yeah, I know. You're jealous of that job. I can feel it. 

Since that sweet gig, I've held quite the assortment of positions. 

As a teenager at Burger King, I sported a oversized polo and fugly khakis to offset my fine Adidas, and watched some shady deals go through the drive-through window while an even shadier "boss" hooked up with hoochie mamas in the supply closet, too stoned off his gourd to notice anything was amiss. 

After high school, I worked as a nanny to a drunken richy-rich who once slurred that she wasn't sure she could trust me to safely transport her sweet little girl to the park, while she was cradling the open bottle of top-shelf vodka closer than I had ever seen her to her toddler (true story). 

I worked as a floor manager for a Gap in a resort town, where I was subjected to thickly-accented foreigners who cared even less for their children than my previous charge, and whose nannies let the spoiled beasts run amok through the store and climb all over the new spring displays with muddy boots and matching wet ski parkas that cost more than my rent. 

As a small town newspaper clerk, I bemoaned the local yokels who would line up at any of the five bars on the block, waiting for the doors to open wide and swallow them whole at all of 10 a.m.

Most recently, and for most of the last decade, I worked hard for a service company that utilized my customer service and fake-it-tip-you-make-it HR skills. Often days, it felt more like babysitting 40 grown men and trying to make my lone female voice heard above the din of chauvinistic thoughts. But in all, it was cool - I worked with my husband (which, to the surprise of most, worked really well), and was blessed with an understanding boss and flexible enough schedule that allowed me to still be a mom. 

And now, shockingly, it's over. 

After a few days of stewing anger, I've settled into a state of acceptance. 

I'll take a few months off to find myself and figure out what I want to do when I grow up.

I'll play stay-at-home mom for the first time in the history of (my) ever for my two "used" babies, because nobody can call my 6' tall teenager or sassy-pants preteen a baby any more. 

We'll go on adventures. 

And, in the mean time, I'll write a few things down. Sort a few things out. Look to see what the future may hold, and see where the cards may lie. And you know... all that jazz.

So this, here, this is my experiment. My public journal. My way of working things out. This has become my place to record random thoughts and ideas. Knowing me, it's likely going to be filled with sarcasm. You'll find the occasional bits of snark, and probably an f-bomb or two. Don't be offended - that's who I am. And if you don't like it, don't read it. 

And if you do like it, well, it's for sale. Enjoy!

But seriously, though... I'll sell you my words. For the real.