Smelling like the homeless, a rose by any other name.

Ive said it to my girlfriend a thousand times.
I have the confidence of a much more attractive woman.

Which is true. I make direct eye contact, I smile broadly, I laugh readily, I lean forward, I may even touch your arm. I find something to admire, not to cheat or to be false, but because I truly find something admirable in everyone. Like a beacon, or a shiny penny. Not to say I see the good in people. I see all sorts of bad shit. Im just saying, every person to me, generally, is gorgeous. For some reason or another.

And I mean it.

Since the birth of the boys I have gone forth looking atrocious. Not makeup, not hair, not clothing, not nice. At all. And it’s not truly lack of time, because a shower is a shower, and toothbrushing is a scant step away from lip gloss. I have the time to look better. I just don't.

I look awful because – simply – I look awful.

My skin is coarse, my hair brittle. My skin puckered with the fat of gaining 70 plus pounds and taking hormone shots as well. Nothing shines. Nothing is glossy. I look older. Much. Tired too. This from a woman who “passed” for 28 long into her 30’s and still passed – at times – for mid-thirties in her rapidly accumulating 40s.

I now look, in a word, haggard.
No playing "guess my age" with bartenders. No thank you. Not for me.

My sons, at 15 months, had never slept through the night. Waking up not once, but 2, 3 times. Each. Staggered. So six wake-ups a night, in a 6 hour period. My husbands blood pressure is too high, my metabolism too low. We look like ass. And not firm juicy ass. Like nursing home ass.

It aint pretty.

We moved.
I bitched.
I wailed.
I whined.
It's definitely a "first world problem" as the jokes say.
Truth is, this house is hard to live in. Things are old, broken, breaking. It's magnificent and surreally damaged. It's beautiful in some respects and scares the shit out of me in others.
But it's where we live.

My kids?
Never do I have them dressed properly. Thank god or global warming for the mildest winter to date, where I can get all four of us out sans coat or socks, each day a gift to my lack of organization. A nod from God to get my shit together because this is not going to last much longer and I've had enough time now, dear, and get it done. Get your shit by the door already.

I cant stand myself.
Truly.
I went from funny, articulate, motivated to simple, trite, dullwitted, and fat.

Yet I plow on.
Plod on.
Go on.
waiting waiting for each new day, as if somehow its going to be different.
Smiling. Grinning manically. Laughing loudly. Driving that shit home.

I keep thinking that I'm building a foundation.
That to the naked eye my house is in shambles but that someday I'm going to turn around and we'll be living in a sturdy ass manse.
Metaphorically and maybe even literally. If I can ever finfd that f*cking contractors number.

So as I plod, I'm cocky.
Arrogant.
Confident.
Driving a 10 year old Honda in a pair of pants so old I actually wrote with a Sharpie DO NOT WEAR OUT...then summarily wore them out when the sharpie marks faded.
I am a bad ass in flip flops on a winter day.
I have coarse hair and even coarser heals.
My trash is outside because I CANT BE BOTHERED TO WALK TO THE FUCKING BARREL.
All because we thought "meh, lets have one more"

I may look like shit.
I may live in a house of cards.
My clothes may look like who did it and ran.

But it's all part of a master plan.
Just you wait and see.







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