So, what are your skills, Napoleon?

Whatever I want them to be, GOSH!

I am not an incompetent person. But the fact is, balancing and maintaining a checkbook seems to be beyond my skills.

Oh, I can do math. I can add, subtract, reason, and occasionally, calculate. But it seems to be beyond my skills to balance and maintain that sucker. Even when I try, even when I seemingly succeed. It's all a sham. The Checkbook Karma Gods are out to get me.

I am now in the position of having to trust my husband with that last great vulnerabilty--allowing him to help me, habitually and regularly, balance and maintain my checkbook.

It's hard for me, in part, because it's the last great vestige of control issues I have--it has come to symbolize, for me, my last stronghold of total and complete (albeit abortive) autonomy. How pathetic is that? I'd almost rather pay the fees imposed when I fail (amounts to between $60-$100 yearly) than allow this man, whom I love and trust, to balance the damned thing on a regular basis.

I worry that he will nag me. I worry that he will judge me. This is a man who doesn't judge and only occasionally nags. This is a man who loves me, cares for me, and trusts me. And I can't bear the thought that he will have weekly (at least) access to my checkbook.

Man, the Nutguy was right--nobody in their right mind would touch my control issues.

Woman to Woman

Well, I missed the announcement, and since I had already written in in preparation, I posted it anyway.

ON BEING SOMETHING/SOMEONE YOU ARE NOT

My whole life I have been a square peg being edged, cajoled, poked, prodded, begged, ignored, and forced in a round hole. My whole freaking life!

I was never pretty enough, smart enough, good enough, quiet enough, loud enough, tall enough, athletic enough, happy enough, lady-like enough…pick anything that *everyone else* is, and it was NEVER me. If I tried to be like *everyone else*, I failed miserably. I was frustrated and miserable and, in all honesty, mean.

One bad ending to a relationship once I hit 30--old maid status, after years of listening to my mother (and practically everyone else, too) go on and on about how I *needed to find a good man and settle down*...WTF was wrong with JUST BEING ME?... and I had great big sobbing pieces coming off me daily.

It’s convoluted and confusing to me even now, almost 10 years later.

At the time when I fell apart after this (even though I was the one to break it off), I started seeing a counsellor, hereafter known as the "the Nut Guy." btw, he kinda liked that I referred to him as such.

One of the things the Nut Guy helped me to discover is that I was, indeed, a square peg being jammed into a round hole. And that I had hitched my little red wagon to a fairy tale star that defined who I was supposed to be.

He taught me to realign my thinking. He taught me to twist my point-of-view away from what *everyone else* seemed to be, or what they told me I was to be. He taught me to carve my own square hole. One just for me.

If the world doesn’t have a place for you--and you’re right, it doesn’t--then it’s up to you to make a place in the world for yourself. Be who you are and don’t worry about every body else; they aren’t worried about you. You make them uncomfortable because you don’t fit who they are.

If I never remember anything else he ever said to me, THAT’s what I remember, and that’s what got me to the point where I say what I think, regardless of language (I swear like a sailor in RL--actually, sailors swear less than I do), or idea, or emotion. It’s why I don’t have the time, patience, or inclination to deal with bleeting hearts, I don’t play *nice* (I play fair, but not nice), why I make up my own rules about who and what I will be.

It’s also why I wear comfortable shoes, clothing if I like the way it fits and feels, and why I color my hair what my aunt and mother deem “hussy red.”

It’s why I am a happier person--still tough to live with and to work with, still determined, and why my mistakes in life have been more bloody than most people’s.

I won’t go through life being what’s safe--what’s comfortable--for someone else. I won’t mince words, I won’t tell you what you want to hear. I’ll be brutally honest--and I expect it (and respect it) from others. I will not accept that being a woman makes me *less* than anyone else--whatever I am, it’s because I AM, not because someone else thinks, feels, or allows it.

It comes across as vain, and I suppose on some level it is. I am smart. I am funny. I am clearly and wholly defined as myself--no one thing about me is any greater than any other thing. Wife, mother, woman, friend, lover, thinker, writer, farter. It’s all me, and it’s all real. And not one tick of it is on someone else’s terms. I won’t be bullied into being anything that isn’t me. I won’t be manipulated into thinking, feeling, or being anything that isn’t what I choose--on my terms, and by my terms only.

I did that gig--and damned near lost pieces of myself for it. There’s no thing, and I mean flat out, no-holds-barred NO thing on this planet that’s worth it.

If that offends you, if it bothers you, if it makes you angry, that’s your deal, and since I have a clearly defined self-image, no amount of your bile and rant and spew will stick--like teflon, it’ll slide right off, usually onto your own shoes.

And the next time I see the Nut Guy (remember, I work retail, and even the Nut Guy has home improvement needs on occasion, I suppose), remind me to just say, “Thank you. You did more than save my life.”

Toad on Road

Theo finally got his learner's permit. Yep, the boy is driving. Mostly in parking lots, and not over 35 miles an hour, but he's driving.

God help me.

I've managed, so far, in the little time we've spent with him behind the wheel, to not turn into my mother. It's not easy.

He's actually not doing that badly, but I remind myself, "it's early yet."

The worst thing I've shouted so far is "BRAKE!!!!!" and I think I've only grabbed the dashboard twice. That's pretty good; I've got issues.

Great big fat control issues. Even the Nut Guy wouldn't touch them. Smart man. Anyway, I do have control issues. I like to be in control. I like to be the one deciding whether or not I'm going to go headfirst through the windshield and I like knowing that if I do end up embedded in a hillside, it's because I put me there.

Luckily, after 17 years, The Toad has figured this out. He can't figure out how to do homework and pass English, but he has managed to figure out that I like to be in control. And that I can only take so much of his tromping on the brake (even at 1o mph it can be rough on you) and he's been understanding of that.

He's also been nicer to be around.

I hope it lasts--his nicer attitude, my nerve, and the brakes on my van.