Peace and tranquility? Aisle 7

I had quiet moment of clarity the other day. One of those things that sneaks up on you. Not like an Oprah A-HA moment, those kind of hit you over the head. See, I'm shopping a lot.

I know, you'll be thinking to yourself Heather, you've always shopped a lot.

And you'd be right because I do like to shop.

But this feeling, this is different. This is shopping for something I can't find in a store. I've been here before. A long time ago, so long ago I can say it was in my twenties. Before Y2K. I put it away for a long time, and now I think it's crept back into my life.

Luckily, I can quickly brush through the crap and ask the real question - why am I shopping so much right now? What's bothering me? And that's the harder part. There's just such a plethora of choices, I'm having a hard time narrowing the field.

• Neil [for the record, since I stopped writing lo those many years ago, this is now my go-to question for all issues that arise with me or my children or my extended family or strangers or new neighbors or new neighbors' children or garbage men]
• Nanny [Is it that she's on another date tonight with yet another new guy she's met online?]
• Work
• Children

It could be Neil. I told my therapist I will be happy to get to a place when an entire hour can go by where I don't think about him. It hasn't happened yet.

But I think I'm just lonely. I think that's how I felt in my twenties, too, the last time I found myself wookin pa nub in the aisles of Target. Here we've moved to a wonderful new home in a wonderful new neighborhood with a school that makes my son (the one with PTSD now, thanks Neil) feel warm and comfortable and safe 95% of the time, and I'm still lonely. I still don't fit in. Next month we'll have been here a year! It's hard to believe.

When I'm lonely, I start watching QVC. That's embarrassing to admit out loud. I do, I watch it at night when I'm in bed and then this week I ordered some stupid conditioning shampoo that doesn't lather but is supposed to turn your hair from fried to luxe. Hey, you know what? My hair isn't fried! And I like lather! That's how crazy my relationship with QVC is.

Hey you know what?? Maybe that's why I want to have my boobs fixed, too! Maybe it's just another form of shopping! Holy shit. That's an A-HA moment.

Or it could just be that it's February. And I want it to be April. And all the other aforementioned items on bulleted list above.

Well, hells bells. So glad we had this hour together (surely you read faster than that) that didn't cost me $200. Very successful therapy session, thank you.

- H

I'm writing a book. So there's that.

I'm a-gonna write a book.

So that's why I'm writing this here blog post instead. Cause writing a book is HARD.

And before you're all like "oh, Heather, you must be writing about how whacked you and your crazy family are" NO, it's not that. I'm writing a children's book. Sort of.

See, you may have noticed, I have boys. And boys like boy things. And guess what? Now that my oldest is reading (or really trying hard to become a reader), there aren't a lot of cool books for him to read for his age. There are short stories about sports and there are "baby books" (his term, not mine) but there aren't cool, intriguing stories written for a boy in first or second grade.

Enter his mother, stage left. I had this moment the other night, not aided by wine or anything, where I decided I wanted to write a story that he would love to read. And then his brother, in a few years. And then maybe another story, and another, and then pretty soon I was totally the guy who wrote Diary of a Wimpy Kid and made it into three movies. Which of course means we're millionaires and all that. But first, the story is the most important thing.

So I'm working on it. I took myself to lunch today and outlined my idea for the first book.

I also need an illustrator.

And I might need a new laptop.

I have a feeling this "book" is going to be very expensive.

- H

I am resolute.

I spent some time this freezing afternoon reading through old posts. I want to come back, I really really do. But it's hard to find my words some days. Anyway, I read something I wrote three years ago, at New Year's 2010:

In putting together that post, I got to read a lot of my old posts. A lot. And that's when I realized, that's what this blog is good for.

If you're a blogger, you've undoubtedly had one of Those Moments. The moment when you think "why am I doing this? What is this all about anyway?" You start to get bogged down in the popularity contest instead of just enjoying what you're doing, and why you started doing it in the first place. It starts to feel like a chore instead of a joy. 

That's why I'm back, why I like doing this. Because in reading all those old posts and walking down memory lane I felt warm and cozy. Even when they weren't warm and cozy posts and even though we lost Neil. I can't tell you why, but it's good to have my words reminding me what life was like when Griffin was a baby, when Cooper was a toddler, when Neil was with us.

I wasn't going to make resolutions this year. Because yeah. Everything changed this year, so much so that I don't actually have habits I need changing. For the last sixteen months I've been in a modified survival mode, every month better than the last. Plus, I already started Pilates again last fall. My posture is so much better, my back doesn't hurt every minute of every day anymore. I don't need no stinking resolutions! I thought.

And then when I was sucking down the large Pepsi from Taco Bell, the one that helped me wash down the Chicken Burrito with sour cream (highly recommend if you're at Taco Bell), I thought yeah, maybe I should get off the sugar sauce again. So that's my first one. No more large Pepsis for lunch, unless I like the bloated belly that sticks out farther than my boobs these days.

And then I have another one, The Big One. I'm gonna go do something drastic to myself. Something I've wanted to do for a long time, since I was in my twenties. I'm gonna go do some mammary sculpting (please refer to previous resolution). I don't need a second career as a stripper. I just want to look like I used to, back before I had kids. Before gravity did her awful thing to me. I'll keep you posted, I'm still in research stages of this thing.

- H

My fingers itch.

Blogger has changed. A lot. It's symbolic, really. I stepped away for my life while it spun and Blogger did too. I've missed writing, and having a way of seeing how we grow. So much has changed since I last read this blog, let alone wrote anything. I love it, though. I came back tonight and love every word of it, even if it's hard to read. Here's a quick update, and then maybe I can get on with it. We moved. We have new friends. We have some of our old friends. We lost some. I look a lot older. So do my kids. This is like physical therapy. The first session is always bad. -H

On talking to Neil. Again.

I am still talking to Neil. I've had some friends email me wondering why it disappeared.

I wanted that conversation to be as anonymous as possible, which is laughable. At the time, I was worried about protecting Neil's legacy.

Now, I'm not so worried. I've come to terms with the truth and I know that others will have to as well.

- H