still around

I've been a bit of a bad updater lately, and I think I finally figured out why. At first I thought maybe I'd run out of things to say. Then I thought I'd gotten lazy and quiet. Then, that my sewing time has been sucking up more of my energy than usual (and it has, but that's not why).

Finally I realized it's all my nephew's fault. Well, not his fault, but certainly because of him. It just so happens that I am totally enamoured with this little guy, and he sucks up gobs of my time. Whether it's holding him, or cooing over him while he's sleeping, or watching Bunny turn into a  giant marshmallow and fall in love with little baby feet it just so happens that tons of my time is taken up loving on him. Or his parents, because I figure one of the best gifts I can give to new parents are a couple of casseroles that just need to be popped in the oven, or someone else to give the baby his bottle while they eat their own dinner.

I probably spend about an hour with baby in my arms every other day. And oh man is that time well spent. Seeing the cute little dimple in his ear. Changing his little bum, which they didn't think I'd actually do. Watching his expressions while he sleeps. Seeing his arms careen out of control. Listening to the angry cry in the bath. Yeah he's pretty awesome.

long weekend bliss

Last weekend, the government decided to give us a statutory holiday. A silly one, maybe, but hey it was nice to have a long weekend in February. It seems a little nuts that February is nearing the end already.

If you ask Bunny, he'd say it's a little nuts that I'm saying the long weekend was "blissful". We did some very hard work over the weekend, that resulted in a few mini freak outs (mostly due to outside forces annoying the pants off us) and three long slow days of anxiety. It's work that continues, but we slogged through the worst of it sequestered in the basement and now we're just moving forward and continuing. It's a big deal all around.

Here's the thing, though. Even cranky, anxious and grumpy I would choose three days with no one but Bunny and the dog before anything else in the world. Curled up on the couch, working on our projects, watching the last season of Fringe and countless movies and reading some crappy fantasy (metaphysics needed a few days hold for this) and watching Bunny play video games is not a bad way to spend a weekend. I ate so much junk food I almost puked.

So three hard days were kind of blissful, just for the company. Tuesday morning after Bunny had left for work and while I was getting ready, I had the suckiest puppy dog ever. It's like he knew our quiet little weekend together was coming to an end and it was time to get back to life as usual.

holiday spending

Our bank account is feeling a little deflated this month. Kind of par for the course with the holidays happening here, and at the end of the day we're still leaving the month with more money saved than we had at the start of the month, but still. Not the amount of savings I'd hoped for, even though I knew my hopes were realistic.

This year we had two very different Christmas celebrations. At my mom's house everything was about big gifts, and large presents (or in some cases, large amounts of presents) were given and received. Bunny's family on the other hand did away with the gift exchange entirely, except for our teenage niece because the whole fun of Christmas is giving gifts to younger people.

I much prefered Bunny's family Christmas. As much as it's fun choosing gifts for people, and receiving gifts, it just doesn't do it for me really. I mean I love picking out the "perfect" gift, but sometimes the perfect gift is really just "here's something I know you really want and I tried really hard but it's personal and so I got a gift receipt". Which is just no fun. Maybe I'm feeling grinchy because I feel guilty about the fact that Bunny and I are exchanging part of his gift to me, because while it's beautiful and thoughtful it won't ever get worn. Which makes me feel crazily guilty, and it's not the way that either of us wants to feel about the gifts we give each other. At the end of the day though the big gifts don't do much for me.

The gift I was most excited about buying was for Bunny, and it was a whopping thirty dollars but it was perfect for him. Next to that getting my brother a small collection of sports accessories and some gifts for our niece was super fun. The gifts that I was most excited about receiving were all small ones: beautiful earrings from my niece, quilting classes from Bunny (seriously! the man bought me quilting classes), a sewing box and some fabric from my mom.

Christmas wise the "spending money" bit really gets on my nerves. It seems to miss the point, sort of. Every year in my family we all struggle to come up with giant wish lists of things that we want and that fit my mom's planned Christmas spending. (Maybe it somehow goes along with how strongly I reacted against the idea of a bridal shower?) Somehow all I can think is how much more interesting might it be if we set a small spending limit ($20? 50?) and tried to be more creative within the budget.

Then again, there's also the realization that if and when babies come I may feel completely different about spending money. I'll probably want to spoil my children a little bit, at least around Christmas. Although "budget" is probably the least of the decisions we have to make about babies and Christmas, when the time comes.

Holiday budgets are hard, really. How does your family handle it? Do you do big gifts, little gifts, secret Santa exchanges? Do you wish things were different?

why Christmas is my favourite holiday

Four years ago today I walked into my next door neighbour's home and met the rest of my life. Since then, Christmas has become my favourite holiday of all.

I don't know if I've ever revealed here the fact that meeting Bunny was love at first sight for me. Although I'd known of him for fifteen years (being that I knew his family well), he'd only actually lived next door for about eight months when I was eight years old, and we'd never had an actual conversation. I probably hadn't seen him at all in the ten years before he became my everything.

In the years since the only way I can describe meeting Bunny is this: pure magic. There was a literal shift that I felt inside myself, there were stars in my vision and a knowledge with absolute certainty that this man was the person I would spend the rest of my life with. The axis that my universe was on reoriented itself to accomodate him. I still can't entirely accurately explain that evening.

The next day I remember talking to a friend in utter disbelief and telling her that I had just met the man I would marry. I went back to school and had the same conversation with other close friends and was met with the response of: who are you and what have you done with the Sheryl we know? Treating a relationship, or a potential relationship, with any sense of seriousness was out of character for me.

Before Bunny I never believed in love at first sight. I didn't even particularly believe in romantic love in general. That moment changed everything.

I'll be taking the next few days off to spend time with family and cherish the time we have together. Hopefully your holidays are as wonderful as I anticpate mine being.

the birthday that wasn't

Poppa Bunny's birthday passed very recently. He would have been 68. It's still hard to believe sometimes that he's not with us anymore. It seems so unfair that he didn't even get to see what 68 looked like. That he didn't get to be here for either of his babies getting married. That he's not around to see the magic the family's up to right now.

For the last few months, Poppa Bunny's death for me has been inextricably linked with my miscarriage. Those losses share an anniversary and some difficult emotional ties and I have a very hard time separating them from each other. It's been a long time since I've been able to feel grief for one without being a little overwhelmed by the other.

Poppa Bunny's birthday though is all him. We had a small birthday dinner, just the immediate family, for him. My mother in law wasn't going to, originally, but Bunny brought the idea up and a family friend stopped by with a surprise gift of some venison. It's a little crazy how thinking about a dead deer makes me tear up for him. But that's a big part of who Poppa Bunny was.

Today I can't stop thinking about the last time I saw Poppa Bunny before the stroke, before he died. It was Mother's Day, and we'd come up to take our momma's on a joint dinner out. After hugging goodbye, before I left, I tugged one of his socks off.

changing expectations, culturally

My mind lately has been pulling itself back to the question of what it means to be a woman in the modern world. What we expect out of ourselves as human beings, women, wives, mothers and all. It's a hard question because so many conflicting things are expected of us, by virtue of being women. Every choice we make is a little bit heavier. Particularly lately I've been thinking about what it all means in terms of parenthood.

When babies eventually come, would I rather be a working mother or a stay at home mom? Actually having a choice in the matter is a pretty big luxury in and of itself, and I'm lucky in some ways in that I have some easy options both ways. If we can afford it, I have a husband who would support me staying at home past the end of government mandated maternity leave. If we can't, or I decide I want to be at work either way, I have access to free childcare. Let's be honest: free childcare is a huge deal. So going into motherhood I'm in a pretty privileged decision to make my choices.

I think about being a working mother though and I rather shudder. I just don't want to do all of that. Then I realized something that struck me as kind of strange. We expect a lot more out of our own parenting than we used to. As women have been climbing up the corporate ladder, chipping away at glass ceilings and just generally increasing our expectations on the work front, so have the expectations on the home front.

It's not enough to just have a happy, healthy kid anymore. Said kid also has to have music classes, and participate in sports and athletic activities. There's a lot more help with the homework expected, and chauffering each kid to an activity a day (pottery classes, piano lessons, soccer practice, French club, Girl Guides). In general parents (fathers as well as mothers) are expected to do a whole lot more with their children. Raising a well rounded child isn't enough, we need to coddle and cajole, and be a much bigger part of our children's lives.

It's backwards, you know? We have less time at home, to take care of the house and raise the kids. Yet we have bigger houses which take more maintainance, and we have increased the demands of childrearing, which takes its toll. There's less time to go around and we are supposed to do so much more of it. Of course it doesn't work as well as everyone would like it to.

internal conflict

Lately, I've had a lot of internal conflict about our living situation. There are a lot of things that I miss about where Bunny and I used to live. It's not just those freedoms, though, it's also the fact that I flat out loved our old home. It was a place where my relationship with Bunny really flourished, where we took a lot of big steps together. It was where we first created our own shared space, and really settled into a happy shared lifestyle. It was our home when we got engaged, and where we first started investing in serious joint possessions. It was ours in a very visceral way. There's a certain pride in having your own home, and a sense of ownership there. Our home spoke to the lives we lived together, and who we are as people and as a couple. We had a great community, we lived in a city that I loved, and where we were nearby to most of our friends - or at least going to see our friends was only a short trip away.

Then there's the cultural stigma of being adults living with our parents. To be honest as much as this is in my mind, I'm not overly concerned about it. If people who don't know me want to judge my living situation, well, they'll do that. With all my own internal conflict I just don't have the energy to care what others think. What's hard though is balancing being an adult, and a responsible, productive member of society against living with a parent. It's hard to feel like an adult when you're constantly being parented. I struggle with being trivialized, and it's a constant battle to get my mother to treat me as the woman I have become rather than the child I was. The longer we've been here the more it bothers me.

Having just a basement, that's still not entirely ours, isn't so easy at times. This house is my mother's home, and while I grew up here it's never really been my home. I don't feel at home here. As much as I hate to admit it, for most of my young adult life in my own personal definitions of what would signal "success" and "failure" at life in general the number one signal of failure has always been living with my mother post-university. That's been a hard one to wrap my head around.

We don't live here because we have to, although financially it makes a lot of sense right now. We're more than happy to be real, equal financial contributors to the home, although that's something that we can't seem to convince my mother to let us do. (So we help out in the way of home repairs, cooking and cleaning, and buying my mom special presents). We choose, albiet somewhat passively, that this is our living situation.

Beyond the finances there are a lot of benefits to being here. Because our moms have been next door neighbours for twenty years we have the benefit of having our entire immediate familly under one roof. (Except my brother, but he's in school so it's a little different.) It's nice to be able to be so close to everyone and that's a real pull factor for us to stay put here. It's probably the biggest reason, even above finances, that we haven't too seriously started looking for our own place. The difference between being a thirty second walk from family and a ten minute drive is huge.

Bunny and I are constantly reviewing and talking about our living situation and the potential changes we'd like to see to it. Timelines for when we'll change things, and how those things will actually change. He has an easier time with the whole matter, maybe because the reasons for us being here were much more profoundly about him than they were about me. What's so difficult is that whatever we do, we lose out.

Stay here, we lose on the privacy and ownership and pride in having our own home. We lose freedom and independence that are still highly important to me. When we get our own home, whether we buy or rent, we're giving up the direct and easy access to family and the chance to build and strengthen those relationships. We end up making a financial output that, while it makes sense, leaves us with much less freedom and less ability to save for our future.

talking about it

It's been almost three months since the miscarriage, and I'm only now getting to be comfortable talking about it. There's a big part of me that thinks "this is over with, what's the point in bringing it up" but that fact is it's not over. Sure, the physical loss is complete, and I've had enough periods to be sure that my body is back on a normal system again and things are in working order, but it's not over. I'd be kidding myself if I didn't admit that the miscarriage is going to have a huge emotional impact on our reproductive future, and affect how I feel about future pregnancies. Even in my ability to be as supportive as I want to be of my pregnant friends. The emotional process of dealing with this doesn't end so easily.

When we were pregnant, as much as I was really, really excited and wanted to shout things from the rooftops Bunny and I made the decision not to tell our families about things until we were three months along. You know just in case something happened. I knew without a shadow of a doubt that I would not have been able to handle my mother's reaction if I did have a miscarriage (love her, but she has no ability to respect my emotional boundaries no matter how clearly I set them, and she's made it clear that this was still the case when Bunny's dad died). Not telling my mother made it an easy decision not to tell Bunny's mom, as information flows back and forth pretty quickly through them. It's what I get for marrying the boy next door. Momma Bunny found out that we were an item through my mom (way back when), because within minutes of me telling her she went and told Momma Bunny, so I have a pretty good gauge of how unfiltered that stream of information is.

A little ways back some circumstances changed and for a variety of reasons it made sense to tell a few members of Bunny's family what had gone on for us this summer. I had my first honest and in depth face-to-face conversation with someone about the miscarriage. It felt really, really good. It was freeing. The conversations went on without any tears, but with lots of love and hugs and understanding. I'm still not ready to talk about everything, and I'm still not sure if I'm ever going to get around to telling my own mom, but actually having a discussion about it? So good.

Partly probably because I could see the healing within myself, that this thing that I couldn't even think about without crying could now be the subject of a rational conversation about life and what happens therein. Progress, you know? Baby steps.

Do I expect this to be all easy here on out? No. But as long as there are more forward steps than back steps I'm ok with that.

things I miss about having an apartment

It's been over four months since Bunny and I moved in "temporarily" with my mother. Four months. We weren't supposed to be here this long, but life got away from us, as it so often does. At this point we're a little ambivalent about how much of a rush we're in to move. We like being so close to the families, but it is really hard living with my mom and not having the same level of freedom and independence.

Because things are not the same when you live with your husband in your mother's house. It's an odd situation, but it works for us now. There's a lot of stuff that I miss though. Just to indulge myself here's a list of the top ten things:

1. Walking around in the nude. Clothes at home suck.
2. Spontaneous living room floor sex. (PS, you may not want to sit on our carpet.)
3. Our couches that are waaay comfortable but are stuck in garage style storage.
4. Queen beds. The twin we have now works, but there isn't much room for the two of us to toss and turn.
5. Not needing to talk to anyone other than Bunny when I'm in a bad mood.
6. Lights on at night. My mother doesn't believe in this, and Bunny and I go a little crazy in the constant darkness.
7. Our artwork! We have some great pieces that we love displaying, but can't right now. We also have a whackload of pictures we've been planning on framing, but there's not a lot of sense right now in doing that.
8. My own kitchen. Organized my own way. With me knowing absolutely everything that's in it. And all my lovely pots and pans out.
9. Feeling free to have friends over. I guess I could do so here, but I just don't feel comfortable doing so.
10. The satisfaction of knowing that Bunny and I are making our own way in the world, taking financial responsibility for ourselves. That feeling is huge.

married money

As I've already mentioned, I don't really feel like my relationship with Bunny has changed much, other than just being altogether more awesome. So many things are exactly the same. Still, some things do have to shift slightly and coalesce into a more unified front.

One of those things? Our finances. And honestly, it's a strange one. Bunny and I have always been very clear on the general definition of how we'd handle our money when we got married, and we have pretty clear guidelines. What we knew going into the wedding was this:

• We're of the "one pot" completely joint money philosophy
• We both want and need the freedom of personal spending money, and so we will both get monthly spending allowances
• I will be nominally in charge of our money (balancing the budget and checkbook, handing out both of our allowances, tracking and paying the bills) but Bunny is to have an absolutely equal voice in how we manage our money and is to be kept 100% in the loop of our financial status
• This means we'll probably have monthly budget meetings to review where we stand and make sure I've updated Bunny on what's gone on in a clear form (not just "oh, we spent too much on groceries" in passing)
• We both have large financial expenses (my student loans, Bunny's final apprenticeship classes upcoming, Bunny's work supplies which can get super expensive but are tax deductible) that we will work at together

Going into marriage we were both very in the know about each other's finances. He knows what my debts and savings are, I know what his assets and credit cards look like, we both know how much the other makes on any given paycheck and we made decisions about how our expenses worked as a team. Still, our bank accounts have been (and at this point still are) completely separate.

Those accounts? They won't be merged until mid November at the earliest, because we're doing our damnedest to make sure we have a solid picture of our finances before we get going on this. So October is Track Our Spending Month. We're each jotting down every purchase we make, even if it's only bus fare or a couple dollars on coffee. We'll keep track of the cash flow and at the end of the month I'll play with the numbers and, and put together a budget to suggest to Bunny. He'll take a look at things, see how he feels and if there are any tweaks he'd like to make, things I'd forgotten, or inequalities that I'd missed and then we'll update it until we reach something we both feel good about.

We've done this before, though less intensely, when Bunny quit the design firm to go back to school. What we hadn't done that time is completely merge the money. So it's just a step past from what we've already done with our finances. But it's still different.

Even ahead of that, though, I can already tell that on an emotional level how I approach our finances has changed. What gives? Well, Bunny's been in some significant tooth pain for about a month now and I finally got him to go see the dentist. Turns out the poor man needs a two-part root canal. Which is clearly not so cheap and we will be saying goodbye to almost a thousand dollars at the end of the month in consideration for his health.

Why is Bunny getting a root canal a big deal? Because I pushed him into it a little bit, despite his financial concerns. He was going on about the fact that "he can't afford it" and doesn't have the money and wanted to wait. My response?

"We have X thousand dollars in emergency savings. You needing a root canal is an emergency. We'll take the money out of the fund and pay ourselves back. Your health is important."

Those emergency savings? They're technically in "my" bank account. This is literally the equivalent of my life's savings, the money that I have scrimped and scrounged for since having adult jobs and responsibilities. A year ago, in this situation? I would have without hesitation offered the money to Bunny for his health, no strings attached. What I wouldn't have done is framed it as his money. It feels amazing though, that my financial care and planning has enabled us (me?) to take care of Bunny's needs.

It feels a little odd, because I definitely do have a sneaky emotional attachment to those savings as "my money", but I also completely see it as our money as well. It's an interesting contrast inside me that I'm still working out. Clearly there is a shift, and it's certainly significant, but it's also subtle. I'm pretty emotional about money: having it makes me feel good, not having it makes me feel pretty crappy. So this joint money thing? May be a bit of an emotional ride.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Hey all, it's Canadian Thanksgiving so you're only getting a baby post today, because I'll be busy. Bunny's home from closing up the trailer for the year (seriously though, I'm bummed that I missed the entire summer camping season this year) and my brother drove home from school yesterday and I haven't seen him in about four months. So I'm enjoying the visits and time with loved ones.

In the spirit of the holidays, here's a round of things that I am thankful for this year:

• Seeing my little brother
• Making it through the hard parts of 2012 to get to the fun stuff on the other side
• Being married to Bunny
• Having great friends and family
• Happy things happening to the people I love
• Being able to pay for Bunny's Hallowe'en root canal with no worries
• Catching up visits and chats with some of my favourite people in the world
• Life, because while it's a wild ride with plenty of downs it's got its upsides as well and I'm glad I'm on it

So happy Thanksgiving to all (even if you won't be celebrating it for awhile). What are you thankful for, this year?

from the drafts: two of the cutest dogs in the world

*If you remember, last February my dog Cheyenne fell down the stairs, hurt herself terribly (the vet's best guess was a broken back) and we had to put her down. I originally wrote this the night before we put her down, and after I came home from letting her go I couldn't handle posting this.

This week I'm super busy with some crazy awesome plans and just don't have time to do as much writing as I'd like. I figured since apparently I'm not ready, willing or able to be too forthcoming about the emotional mess I've been navigating my way out of for the last month or so that I'd give you this piece.

An ode to Cheyenne, who taught me what unconditional love means, written when I was still holding on to hope that she'd be ok, for just a little while longer. (I've held on to a lot of lost hope this year.)

I happen to be very lucky in having two of  the most amazing dogs in the world. The one I live with, Jethro (also: Pooperpants) is a gorgeous Brittany Spaniel who lives with Bunny and I. At some point, he's supposed to be a stud dog and he's also a total little snuggle monster. He's given us a scare once or twice with seizures, and we love him to death.

My other dog is Cheyenne, an Australian Shepherd we brought home, unplanned, from the pet store on my sixteenth birthday. My mom had long ago decided that if we ever got a dog, as she kept promising, we would call her Cheyenne. That was the name on the window, and my mom asked if I wanted to see her. The poor thing looked like a little rug. At four months old she was timid as a mouse, scared to make any move and desperate for love.

I couldn't leave the store without her, and my mom couldn't either. Home came the dog. When my brother got home to the quiet scruffy thing in the back yard that night his stunned reaction of what the hell just happened was hilarious. Oddly, he'd always wanted a dog and I'd always wanted a cat but we'd bonded with opposite animals. That dog loved me like nothing else, and I loved her back. She cuddled me through some of the roughest times in my life.

Tonight my mom called. Cheyenne has had a fall down the basement stairs and isn't doing so hot. Either she's hurt her leg or her hip, my mom's not sure which. She won't walk on her own. Then again, she's old and has had walking problems for awhile, so it's probably no big deal.

She's eating, though, and drinking. Which are all good things.

One of the lovely things about being off all the time, though, is that I can just hop a bus up north for the hell of it and go see her. So I'm doing that. I get a day cuddling with my first puppy love.

negotiation and priorities.

Bunny and I just had an interesting talk about our living situation and whether there were going to be upcoming changes to that. We were supposed to spend tomorrow scoping out some new apartments. That's been scrubbed from the agenda. The discussion is still ongoing, and I have a final veto card right now on how long our current situation is ok for.

You see, Bunny has this idea that if we stayed with my mom for a year we would in a position to buy a house at the end of it. He's probably right. I've had this thought myself, and I've run the numbers. He has some money in a retirement account that he is determined to use for a house and I've been beefing up our E Fund to start to include closing costs. His freelance gig brings in some very good money, even though both of our day jobs are on the lower ends of the pay scale. It's not unreasonable to think that we could save upwards of $20,000 in a year. We've done it before, albiet with very different income sources, and with the lack of housing expenses we can easily pull this out of the hat.

Given the commuter town we live in and the housing prices here we could potentially have a 20% down payment in a year's time. (20% is the minimum I feel comfortable with, and that's nonnegotiable. I won't buy a house I don't feel I can afford, and if we can't get our downpayment up there I don't have confidence that we can pay it off long term.)
We have a lot to think about with this. Whether it makes sense. How it fits in with our other prioritites, because some of those don't fit well with living at my mom's. Does the financial sense also make emotional sense? Are we going to go crazy without having our own space? Are we ok with giving up the independence of living alone? Are we rushing into too many fast decisions this year with all the bullshit that's gone down?

We're leaving this as a "to discuss later" issue. We decided that we'd cool our heels on the apartment search for now, because we can always start again if there's a pressing need. We'll re-evaluate this is a couple of months.

It's got me thinking about the nature of a long term committed relationship. (I'd love to say about the nature of marriage, but we haven't quite finalized that yet). Long term relationships are an exercise in negotiation. In checking in with your partner and making sure your values and priorities still line up, trying to adjust things so that if things favoured one person for a period of time that the other person's needs are put first later. In standing up for your needs and desires and compromising on them.

Priorities don't always line up. Bunny puts a very high priority on his hunt trips; I could care less about hunting and I'm not interested in vacation that's essentially time away from me. What I do prioritize, though, is Bunny's happiness and ability to explore his independent hobbies which means that sometimes, I need to say "Ok, go drive up north and roll around in deer urine". He has to compromise too, sometimes by spending less time up there on a trip, or by cutting out a visit entirely, or even just (just!) by making an 8 hour drive to pick me up so I can spend a couple days with him while he's being all manly man.

Right now, Bunny's feeling like home ownership is a big priority for him - he's looking at the long term independence and the comfort and stability of setting up our own home. My priorities are skewing a little differently: I want to make sure our living situation doesn't damage my relationship with my mother (we don't historically live well together, although we're doing well right now), I want the independence of living on our own, and there's some things I really want to do to grow our baby family. The priorities all work together - we're both thinking about a future that makes us happy, having our own space and independence. The specifics just don't all line up. So we have to figure out a way to align our priorities for that.
Life in a relationship in general may be one big long, ongoing negotiation. Checking in to see where the other lies on one aspect of life that hasn't been discussed recently, recalibrating things when they've gone off course, and letting each other know when our internal priorities move. (We are all human, we can change our minds and our priorities.)

My question for you: what have been your biggest points of negotiation and compromise in your relationship? How do you make seemingly opposite values line up?

life, and letting things settle

I seem to be very slowly, very steadily acclimating to my recent big emotional disaster. In fact, I may almost be ready to talk about it more directly - I'm just not sure if I should or not. Which bothers me, because there isn't really a should and should not when talking about life issues. But this is a bit of a taboo topic, even if it's a pretty common experience and I'm not 100% sure yet whether I'm comfortable opening up those floodgates and starting that discussion. I'm also unsure if I have any business starting that conversation. What I do know is that when this all started, I needed a place to talk about it and they all existed on secret corners of the internet; the support group type pages. Which was just not what I needed. I didn't need a place that was dedicated to the issue, I just needed to be able to not feel alone and being surrounded by people who had all been there was overwhelming.

I'm trudging along the road to improvement. It's been awhile since I've cried, or felt like I needed to cry about it and even those moments are more passing. My confidence in myself is slowly starting to reappear, though it's still pretty shaken. I don't feel like I need to shout to the world that I just went through this terrible thing and give me a d*mn break already, anymore.

I know there are a few things that are coming up that are going to remind me of how much this sucks. I know that there are certain events and happenings coming up in my extended community that are really happy, overall, but are going to make me feel very sad just because they remind me very strongly of this. But you know what? That's ok. I don't have to be "better" all at once. That takes some time.

take your cliches and shove em

So, I've got this big thing going on that I'm not quite ready to talk about, if you remember. I'm slowly easing my way into it, I've talked a little with a few friends and it went a little viral with a very small group of girls at work who knew or figured out what was going on. I'm still nowhere near ready to open that up here, and I don't know if I will ever really, fully want to go into it (which makes me sad, because it's an issue that I think we should discuss more freely, but it's very loaded and emotional and still raw) but one thing that just keeps jumping into my head is how much I have been hating lately when people ask one of two particular questions.

If I never again hear "Are you ok?" or "How are you doing?" again, it may be too soon.

Now, when these questions come from people who don't know what happened it's not a big deal. I put on my big girl pants and smile and remember that I haven't given them a reason to think I might not be ok, or that the question would bother me.

As far as people who do know? From them, these questions absolutely enrage me. They make me angrier than I can say. Because when someone who knows asks me if I'm ok I just want to put my angry-temper-tantrum pants on and scream at them. "Of course I'm not ok! I'm sitting here right now going through XYZ/XYZ just happened. How in the hell could you think I'm ok???? I am miserable." Which, is a little bit of an overreaction. And these are people who are trying to show me that they care and are concerned for me and worried that I've got a lot of crazy sh*t to deal with right now. The "how are you doing" question has the benefit of being open ended and allowing me to actually be not ok and express my frustration. Unfortunately, it tends to come at places such as work where I really can't go into things and give an honest answer and have to revert to the default socially acceptable responses, even if it's just "I'm hanging in there."

Yeah, I am hanging in there. But that doesn't really describe at all how I'm doing. I'm plowing through things, getting through the day, so stressed out that I'm having trouble eating and am fighting to maintain my weight (imagine that, I'm trying to keep my weight up), and I have never cried so much or so hard in my life. (Sidenote: one day I actually cried so hard I threw my back out. Although it wasn't funny at the time, I'm finding that pretty hilarious right now. Who knew that crying could be such a physically energetic task that you could injure yourself? You can also take the fact that I'm laughing about this to be a sign of sure improvement and a step on the road to doing better.)

The other thing that's been driving me nuts are all the platitudes. I know that people mean well, but I don't want to hear how "everything will be ok in the end" (or all the other variations on that which would be dead giveaways to exactly what's going on so I'm going to let them be). I know the statistics. I know the facts. I know that this is not the end of the world, that there's nothing I can do to control this and that in the end I will get through the emotional aftermath in one piece. I don't need my friends to tell me that. In fact, I flat out don't want to hear it. It's a little bit insulting, in a way. It makes me feel like I should just pick up and be 100% back to normal because, well yeah the situation sucks hard but it will be ok. It doesn't give me the space for my emotions. For my grief.

Now, let's be clear. "I'm so sorry to hear that" or "my heart goes out to you" and all variations thereof? Those are completely fine and very appreciated. It's good to hear that the people I surround myself with can sympathize with my difficulties. That they can recognize I'm having a hard time. It's the bit that, inevitably, comes next where they tell me how everything will be ok, or it was all meant to be, or whatever it is that makes them feel better about reassuring me that really gets me going.

It comes from a good place. I know that, and I understand that. I've probably done the same thing myself, with different situations. I have the good sense to (mostly) let it slide when people say these things to me, since I don't really have a better suggestion for them. If there was something that people could do to help me deal with things, I'd tell them something along the lines of "Thanks for the sentiment, and I know you mean well but I'm a little extra sensitive right now and hearing that it will all be ok is difficult for me. I know you're just trying to comfort me. If you want to do anything, I'd really appreciate it if you could come visit/go shopping to take my mind off things/etc." But the only thing I want is to be left with the space to process this.

When you're going through a difficult time, are there any innocent sayings that push your buttons more than they should? What do you find is the most helpful way to deal with them?

life, and musings in general

This has been a hard year for me, so far. (And for Bunny, too.) A really, incredibly difficult year. A lot of things that have happened since 2012 began I really could have done without. Deaths, moves that I wasn't excited about (but have since come to terms with), six long months of unemployment and a fruitless job search while Bunny was in school, difficulties finding Bunny the job he needed in the career he loves.

With all the avalanche of just plain bad and flat out difficult and general struggle that the past seven months have been absolutely brutal in some ways. Painful, uncomfortable, disheartening; I could easily describe this year with any of those adjectives. So far, 2012 has had a lot of the suck going on. In fact, in some ways it is shaping up to be the worst year of my life, and that right there is a big statement. I've never had so much of the hard stuff in one little bitty time frame. I really just can't wrap my head around all the sh*t that's gone down in the past seven months.

There's been a lot of good in the year, too. Really reaffirming that my relationship with Bunny is strong, and flexible, and can grow. Knowing that we are both capable of being each other's rock when we need it. Realizing that Bunny completely knows about my bullsh*t need to yell at people who are mostly blameless when I'm mad at the world and doesn't take it personally, and me myself catching myself and stopping myself and apologizing in the moment as opposed to only being able to do damage control after the fact. (Hopefully that means I'm on track to stop myself before that even starts, next time.) Seeing how clearly our goals line up for the big important and long term stuff, and noting how we're both willing to give a little when it's necessary. Having proof positive that Bunny's willing to make the same sort of personal sacrifices for my happiness that I've made for his in the past few years. Realizing that I am, in fact, capable of pulling my shit together and being professional at work even when my life is falling apart. That came as a really big surprise, actually. Making big life changes that are uncomfortable and make me angry but end up feeling just plain right once I give them time to settle in.

2012 is also the year that Bunny and I are going to get married. (Just don't ask us for details or dates, we've given up trying to plan this thing and are just going to do it on the fly.) That one act? That is enough to almost completely balance out all the cr*p that 2012 has thrown at me.

This has been a year of learning how to have some sort of grace in the face of loss and general life crappiness. It's been learning how to assert my needs when I'm down and out, which is something I'm historically terrible at. I'm still not very good at it, but at least I'm not so awful at it either. It's been backing up and recognizing that my way isn't always the right way, and certainly isn't the only way. It's been staring down some of my biggest life dreams and finding out a way to be ok when the floor falls out from under me. Pulling myself together, at least on the surface, because I have a life I need to live and I can't always just stop everything because I want to stay home and cry. It's knowing that some things I can bail on for no other reason than to stay home and cry, and that even when I can't bail that there's always time to cry later. It's recognizing that when things are, in fact, that bad that I can cry like a banshee .... but I don't have to be alone for that. It's been learning to recognize my limits for rational thought when things aren't going well, and accepting the fact that I am incapable of making a trivial decision like what to eat or where to sit down when things are going really, really badly. It's knowing that even though the minutiae paralyze me in those moments that I can handle the important decisions, and the hard ones.

There's been a lot of snuggling lately. A lot of emotionally drained napping. A lot of sitting around and staring at nothing, because sometimes just being conscious and living through a sh*tty moment is already more than I can take. There hasn't been any cooking, really for most of the last two weeks. I've come to terms with the fact that there is such a thing, for me, as too upset to cook and that it comes with being too upset to eat. There's been a lot of eating just because it makes Bunny happy to see me eat lately. (Which, for now, is as good a reason as any to eat. Soon I'll hopefully start actually enjoying food again.)

It`s been a damn hard year, thus far. And that`s ok, hard years happen. But even when life sucks, there are bright spots and it`s all the more important to hold on to your silver linings. Right now? I'm just glad that 2012 is more than halfway over.

life, and settling and announcements

Two months ago, my world was something of a fog. Like someone had pressed the pause button, or turned on the slow-motion effect.

Today things couldn't be more different. I mean, yeah, I'm still living in my mom's basement (weird). Yeah, we're still in a very impermanent situation.

But there have been big changes. Things are starting to become "normal" now, if that's what you want to call this. There's a rhythm to my day, and it's quite predictable. There's a cadence to how things move about, how I interact with myself, and the world and all of that. Some of those changes are, most definitely, attitude. There's a sense of releasing and letting go some of the anger at the world for doing this to my life, and having me in a position I didn't want to be in. Some of them are attitude, in reaction to other things (good things) that are going on.

Some of them are just cool. Like the fact that I started a new job three weeks ago. Yeah, I've kept that one under wraps for awhile, but I wanted to get through the bulk of training before I said anything. I still have plenty more training. Here's the thing: the job is a bit of an off-limits topic on the internet. I don't really think I have any business telling the world the specifics of who I work for and what I do and how I like it. So don't expect too much more in the way of updates .... but hey! Regular money! Sweet! Having things to do during the day! Sweet!

Life, being life, is intent on teetering along full steam ahead. We're busy around here, and it's just going to be getting busier.

life, and inheritance

Growing up, I would always pay attention to the way Bunny's family would head up north to the trailer. In November, I would note that Bunny and his father went on vacation together and often as not would come home with a deer.

The summer after Bunny and I became an item, we went on our first real vacation. A camping trip way up north with some of the most miserable weather imaginable. So bad that one day I ended up hiding in the truck, with the heat blasting and about five layers on. We ended up calling it quits and heading up to his parents' trailer for the last few days, the weather was no nasty.

His parents' trailer. Well, that's not it anymore. That's our trailer now. Everything up north is Bunny and mine, now. I have a hard time wrapping my head around this. It feels awkward and uncomfortable. I love that trailer, but I don't want it to be ours. I don't want to be anyone else's, really, I just don't feel right about it being ours.

Inheritance is like a shitty consolation prize. The things that are left to you might be wonderful, and generous and amazing. They might be life changing, or more hassle than they are worth. But for the immediate family, and anyone close enough to the dead to inherit something, inheritance doesn't feel so good. At least not for me. It's like someone saying "hey I'm sorry you can't have the strongest male role model you've ever had in your life, but here, have these things instead". As if that makes it better. As if that makes it ok that someone you love is gone.

There are some great things about having the trailer. It's one of the places that Bunny and his dad had a lot of quality bonding time, and it's a place that we rarely went without his parents. It's surrounded with awesome neighbours. It's a beautiful trailer, and it has everything you might need in a trailer. In my mind, though, it's still a place that belongs completely to Momma and Poppa Bunny. I would just rather have Poppa Bunny back.

Have you ever inherited something? How did you feel about that? Was it awkward?

life, at the moms'

Living with my mom again is strange, but for the most part I like it. Really, it's made even better by the fact that not only is Momma Bunny right next door but Bunny and I have also turned the basement into our bedroom/hangout. It works really well. If I want to be alone, I have a place to go. If I want to be with people but not my mom, I have a place to go. If I just want to chill with my mom, I can do that too.

The hardest part is sharing Bunny. I'm used to having him all to myself, and not only does he work more now (between the mechanic job and the freelance) but the time he does have gets shared around more. Because I don't sleep well I tend to stay in bed until after he's gone, and now he goes and spends his morning with his momma. After work, we sometimes spend some time by ourselves, but just as often we go and hang out with his mom. And his childhood best friend lives twenty minutes away, and is by to see Momma Bunny on a daily basis, and spends time here with Bunny as well.

We've figured out our own routine, a much earlier "bed time" than we used to have, that's really just "go downstairs and be together and alone time". We spend time with our families, but generally together. Although when it gets really funny is some nights I go visit his mom while he stays here and hangs out with my mom. Figure that one out!

The thing that surprises me is how much fun this is. How much I enjoy hanging out with parents. I get to laugh at Bunny and his neice being complete goofballs together, and join in. Some evenings are spent sitting on porches with his family and my mom just talking and laughing. During the day, I can creep over to Momma Bunny's house and spend time with her and the kids she babysits. There's nothing quite as sweet as hugs from toddlers, and my days are filled with those.

It's just fun. I like it.

life, wherein I ramble

The shape of our lives has changed, a lot, since we've moved. It's something strange that I'm still trying to wrap my head around. Luckily, we got proper mattresses here yesterday, so at least our sleep can return to normal a little.

With Bunny working in a garage, it's not like I can stop up in his office with a cup of espresso for forced coffee breaks. Since my mom won't let us pay for groceries or anything, really (we've argued about this, and eventually agreed to accept her decision and pay her in free labour around the house and yard and told her that if she wants or needs to change her mind she can), Bunny and I don't have our Tuesday night grocery shopping date. Instead, grocery shopping means driving to every grocery store in the city with my mom on Sundays, while leaving Bunny to spend time with his family, or freelancing. Because there are people everywhere, always, Bunny and I don't spend the bulk of our evening on our own in our underwear cuddling and talking and chilling out.

The changes aren't bad, they're just odd. The shape of our lives is more social now, and we've had to bend to accomodate other people and their preference, which is new. And let's be honest, I'm selfish about my time and getting enough alone time with Bunny, so I don't always want to accomodate - but I do, and it is good.

We spend time every day with my mother, and his momma, and his sister and brother in law, and our (well, almost our) neice. It's interesting seeing how this social time works into our lives, and how it's not quite as draining as normal socializing can be. I don't feel guilty when I bring a book with me to read during the day, and I pull out my cross stitch at night because it's easier to talk and stitch than talk and read. It reminds me of weekends at the cottage growing up, surrounded by my aunts and uncles and cousins and grandparents. The desire to connect, but the recognition that everyone wants to do a little bit of their own thing at the same time.

One thing I've noticed, though, is that Bunny is eager to sneak off to our basement earlier in the evening, the better to watch the weekend's MotoGP races in privacy and to chill out together. I think we're right now trying to negotiate the family time with the us time, and I think we're doing ok. We also get a pocket of time after he gets home from work but before either my mom or his sister is home that we try to spend alone.

And hey, I've been enjoying doing the laundry. What?