Inspiration

I've been caught up in Kid President's inspiring speeches. Some of my absolute favorite quotes are:

"Do something every day to give someone a reason to dance!" - Kid President

"You're made from love, to be loved, to spread love!" Kid President

So I've decided to embark on a project of sorts.... For the month of February, I am going to find one thing every day to dance about. Happy dance, victory dance, silly dance, whatever. At least once a day I'm going to dance about something. Hopefully it'll help give me a more positive outlook on my life and give perspective on the small things that drive me insane.

During this project, I will try to get pictures or videos of my silliness. If I don't, it's because there was no one to see it or no one but my 4 year old!

Unfortunately my blog is often neglected but that's because I'm too busy rocking my college classes! Hah! I'm also a club president, full-time supplemental instructor at the college and a part time tutor. I've got a lot on my plate right now. Even my kid asks me not to go to work half the time.

We all do what we have to in order to make the world more awesome. I'm going to dance. Maybe other people will make fun of me but maybe some will see how much fun I'm having and will join in!

I'd love it if you joined in!

The Meaning of Life

     The last year and half of high school, I didn’t live with my dad and step-mom, I’d moved out. I lived in an apartment paid for by my best friend Linda’s mother. It was her 17^th birthday present and just my luck, her mom needed help paying the rent on it. Using money from my retail job, I got to live cheaply in a nice place that was not ruled by parents. Linda and I were inseparable. We played soccer together on the junior varsity team, our friends were friends and she had a car. We spent many nights in that apartment doing what teenage girls do: baring our souls and hearts with the utmost trust in each other.

     This night began like so many others. We played Mario Kart on her Nintendo 64, listened to the same sad Matthew Good Band song on the radio, ate Ramen and talked boys. Suddenly, however, things turned scary fast. Linda was upset about her current interest, I knew that, but we’d discussed his worthlessness so many times that I couldn’t believe just how upset she still was. Linda brought me a pillow she’d been hiding from me. It was covered in words and pictures drawn in Sharpie. She was and is a talented artist but her choice of expression was so bizarre to me in that moment. She told me about each word, line, quote and image. I started to realize how deep her emotions ran and how much she needed me.

     As I began to use the same words I’d used before, she got angry. Linda was afraid of being alone; afraid of being unloved and afraid people would find out just how much she didn’t love herself. Everything happened so suddenly, I don’t remember how she managed to get the large kitchen knife in her hand. One minute we’re standing in the living room fighting and the next minute she’s backed up against the wall in the kitchen brandishing a huge knife in my face. I distinctly remember thinking, “Don’t be afraid. It’s not you she wants to hurt. Don’t be afraid. Don’t let her turn that around on herself. Don’t be afraid.” In that vein, I started yelling at her.

     “Go ahead! You’re really that mad? You really want to use that thing? Well do it, then! I’m standing right here and I’m not stopping you. Cut me if you want, but who else will bother to tell you the truth when you need it and lie to you when you don’t?” She really started to cry then, let me take the knife and balled up on the floor, defeated and defended at the same time.

     After my mother’s death when I was 8, I’ve done all I can for those around me who try to choose death over life. I know what it’s like to be the one left behind and I refuse to be that again when there’s something to be done about it. Linda is now in a loving, happy and committed relationship and following her own dreams of art. I’ve taken my friend Lynn, 30, with Type 1 diabetes to the hospital many times when she’s let her blood sugar get so out of control her doctor said she would have died if I hadn’t brought her. She used to get that way after thinking about her unfair life of pills and shots since she was seven, her inability to get pregnant and give birth and wondering if she’ll find someone who doesn’t care about all that. She’s now taking good care of herself and living her life happily. I’ve prevented another suicide in the form of an ex-boyfriend Alex, 38, who is currently a father-to-be again after 20 years, a grandpa-to-be and an uncle-to-be, all within the next three months. He is also pursuing a degree in nursing to be able to better provide for his new daughter the way he couldn’t provide for his first two children.

     Regardless of my seeming optimism, I’ve never been one to say that life isn’t hard. My own experiences aren’t rare but they have shown me how easy it really is to decide to take your own life. Barely hanging on at the end of your rope with no one to turn to and nowhere to go is a scary place. Even if you only feel like that’s where you are. Suicidal thoughts and tendencies don’t only affect hormonal teenagers like my first experience. They claw their way into the brains and hearts of educated adults with loving families like Lynn. They creep in and settle into the hearts and minds of fathers who feel like they’re not good enough for their kids and don’t know how to change themselves for the better like Alex.

     I’ve learned how to deal with these situations through trial but thankfully without error. I know that I was given those chances with those people for a reason and not just to be there for them. I’ve also been the one contemplating fatal actions. However, these experiences have taught me that no matter how futile we think our lives are, or unloved we think we may be, someone does care and our lives do have meaning. I’ve managed to find my meaning in pursuing a degree to be a teacher. I want to change the lives of children. I want to be the teacher they remember years later as their own kids start school. I want to be the voice in their heads that prevents them from becoming the ignorant youth I see myself surrounded by today. I’ve also found meaning in the eyes of my toddler son. Everything I do, I do for him. No matter how difficult my life gets, I know that when he grins at me and calls me “Mama” I am the entire world even for one small person. Each life has its own personal meaning and only by living will we find it.

Final note: If you find yourself thinking suicidal thoughts or feeling totally alone, please call 1-800-273-8255 to talk to a volunteer who chooses to be there for you. PostSecret is also a wonderful resource for hope and finding others who feel the way you do. Or you can talk to me. I’m always willing give advice or just lend an ear. You can find me at mamapoodle09@gmail.com and @MamaPoodle on Twitter.

HomeHer11: Acceptance At Last

Note of warning: I imbedded a lot of links. I hope you'll click on them as they lead to wonderful blogs and their amazing authors. I hope you enjoy the videos as much as I did! I did, however, refrain myself from linking everyone's Twitter account to their usernames. You'll just have to find them yourself!
 

Just over a year ago, I joined Twitter with the name @MamaPoodle. Just for fun, just to see who would follow me and who I could possibly find whose daily mini-updates would actually interest me. I tweeted a few times with a couple of hashtags (“Whattags?” I thought) in the hopes of finding others in my situation (never realizing I could find others using said hashtags). I gave up for a while returning to the comfort of Facebook and my real-life friends, coworkers, family and fellow high school graduates.

Only recently did I find out about BlogHer. I’ve read Free Range Lenore and If Mama Ain’t Happy both found through ParentDish (now Huffpost Parents), and followed both on Twitter which led to a few others. I noticed their massive amounts of followers and much smaller number of who they follow. I replied to some tweets and was never acknowledged. So many times I felt just as invisible as I do in my real life. So, as I saw them talking more and more about BlogHer11, I noticed this cute little hashtag: #HomeHer11.

I thought to myself: Now that sounds like something I could be a part of. I had absolutely no idea what I was getting myself into! I opened a new tab in my browser with the search for #HomeHer11 in it and just jumped in. I noticed some witty remarks from some ladies and a few dudes and decided to try my hand. I gained four times the number of followers and followed twice as many “Tweeps” as I did before! I’ve discovered hundreds of blogs, links, and random internet fun this last week. I even secured a position in the HomeHer11 court (Poodle: Good at making Kitten [aka @MagandMoo] jealous) and a mention in someone else’s blog! Whaaat?!

More than networking, chatting and a pretty cool start-up score from Klout (40!), I found support. I found laughter (@NanyaDub), love (@sthrnfairytale), tears (@WhyIsDaddyCryin), mamas (@MayhemMatriarch), and dads (@MrMomWorld).

I’m so socially awkward and shy. I’m terrified of that horrible silence when I say something that I think is witty and apparently no one else does. In social settings, I blend in and try not to feel too bad. HomeHer11 gave me a bit of hope when I found people responding to my tweets and enjoying what I had to say.

As I’m sitting here, there are flashes of videos, pictures and blogs running through my head. All I can think about is the emotional connection that has been made. It’s been made between me and others that I chat with. It’s been made between me and people who don’t even know I exist. Knowing so many others go through the same things I do on a daily basis is enormously relieving. I’m having a hard time getting out what I want to say because I’m a little overwhelmed right now. Excuse me…

Pee break out of the way and now I’m armed with a big ol’ glass of sweet tea! Where was I…?

Sweetest HomeHer11 attendee!

Right, the sob fest. Honestly, as I was following the #HomeHer11 tweets I laughed and had an amazing time. Being new to the whole blogging world (only now forcing myself into regular updates), I never wanted/expected/thought about going to BlogHer11 so I’m not upset about not getting swag, not meeting “blogging celebrities,” and not attending parties and conferences and sessions. And anyway, I got to attend laundry parties, “Changing Diapers on a Screaming Toddler” and “Popcorn and Blogging” sessions and many more. I even got swag. Mary (@marybeauty) started a fun game called “Go Look Under the Washer and In Your Couch Cushions” to see what you could find. I got Oreo crumbs, a toy truck and even a nickel! I was feeling sick (still am, a bit) and stopped by the Medicine Cabinet booth (credit to Mary again for that one!) to snag some NyQuil. There was fun to be had by all, actual contests and new friends to be made. There are videos, even!

 

 #HomeHer (featuring @theaumsmama and @sixyearitch)

~and~

 HomeHer11 (@NanyaDub)

~and~

 HomeHer11 Welcomes Home BlogHer - Verseo.com Picture Contest (@marybeauty)

One year I’d like to attend BlogHer, even if only to say that I’ve gone and done that whole thing. I’d also love a chance to meet the fabulous folks I’ve been chatting with. (God bless social media, I must say.) For now, I am pleased and touched to be a part of something so large in its scope and reach: across numerous time zones and right into our hearts.

Thank you to everyone who replied, retweeted or silently enjoyed my contributions. Thank you for widening my world of Twitter and social media. Thank you for the laughs, the blogs, the pictures. Most of all, thank you for sharing your life, even the not so happy moments of fear and self-doubt. You give encouragement to so many, even if you don’t realize it. That weak moment gave others the courage to keep going because we find that we are not alone in our mistakes in life, parenting or whatever. That happy day gave hope to us in dark times and a chance to share our own happy memories.

HomeHer11 wasn’t just a pity party about who couldn’t or just didn’t go to BlogHer11. It was a connection of real people and it was wildly successful on so many levels. I hope that I’m able to touch lives the way mine was at HomeHer11.

See you at HomeHer12!

Timeless Words From My Past

Here is a journal entry I wrote on November 8th, 2004. It was titled, "If you think I don't love you well then you're just wrong." I was listening to Counting Crows and Sister Hazel while writing it. I love this and always have and felt it was time to once again show it the light of day and pull it out of the dungeon that is Live Journal. :P

I hope tomorrow is like today. It was a thick golden liquid warming my skin while I sat in a chair and read a book. When I went outside the sun was warming the chilled air that caressed my skin but did nothing to warm my toes that felt the cold dirt and grass as I walked aimlessly around the backyard. My heart beating in my chest with the childish certainty that my life could be and is as poetic as the book I had just read. It beat with an irrational knowledge that everything that happened to me and because of me was important and perfect and full of golden life, real and beautiful. Even mundane talk with [boyfriend at the time] was full, ripe, and juicy with life and my living body. I felt that way for the better part of today and most acutely for the hour or so after I finished reading that book. I was constantly on the verge of tears, constantly wondering if my life was as beautiful as my heart felt that it was. I felt in my skin and my clothes and my self as beautiful as my heart felt. No amount of weight or lack of self-esteem could change that feeling. I want to feel like that all the time. I want to feel limber and lithe and smooth and soft and girlish. I don't want to feel heavy, drained, pained or pessimistically mortal. I want that sharp ... juiciness (what other way is there to describe it?) that makes me understand that this time is temporary and that there's no use dragging it down and being angry about big things, much less petty things. I can't get past that word, "juicy," ha-ha... What other word could I use? Plump, pregnant, full, round, PRESENT. It's hard describing how I felt because it has faded and I'm desperately trying to catch it and pull it back. I'm afraid that if I read the book again too soon or too many times it will lose its magic and be unable to make me feel that way again.

That's why I hope tomorrow is like today. I hope the sun shines as warmly, the breeze swirls as coolly. I want to walk as far as my legs will take me and sit down wherever I am to enjoy the human fullness of the city (or suburb, whatever the case may be). I want to cram a life into a day and enjoy every bit of it. I want to sit on my bed in my room alone and write tortured but hopeful poetry while listening to songs written and sung by scarred poets who had lived through something painful that I wanted for myself. I want to fall in love, I want to be in love, I want to be with the one I love, I want to be with my children, I want to play with my friends, I want to be with my family (all of them), I want everything all at once. I want the learning of school, the harshness of growing up, the uncertainty of parenthood, the joy of love, the pain of longing, the comfort of an embrace with my lover. I want to experience an entire life and then come back to mine

Someone is bound to say, "Not everything has to be prominent, purposeful, meaningful, or ripe with life." But it does! EVERYTHING has to be golden and ripe and meaningful. If it isn't, you'll toss it out without thinking about it. The memory of the day you went driving around aimlessly with no goal or destination while your best friend sat beside you will fade away and you'll never realize it. The long talks about nothing as the sun turned orange and turned the day to melting riches will be forgotten. The laughter you shared will fade from your memory because it was a mundane day that you took for granted. You have to understand that every day is full and ready for the picking. Even if you're angry, if you're crying or dancing, the day is plump with life, ripe with mortality that lasts less than a hundred years while the afterlife lasts for the rest of eternity.

I wish I had the motivation to live life like every second was a grape that I had to pick and eat and enjoy before it shriveled into an inedible raisin, devoid of emotion or the pulse of life. I can only hope that I will be able to get rid of the always lingering bad mood/bad attitude that haunts me at work. I want to be nice to people, to the managers. I want to be sweet and liked and alive.

I want to live. I want everything that life has to offer and I want to take it and know that my experiences and emotions and motivations are my own and no one else's

Just because I want to live and pulse with bubbling life, doesn't mean I'll never be sad. It doesn't mean I won't allow myself to be sad. I don’t mean I don't want to be sad. Because pain is a part of life and it, as well as laughter, is proof that you are alive and feeling. As long as you feel the pain and then let it go. You have to feel it, for growing numb takes away the laughter of life, not just the pain. After feeling the pain and not allowing it to numb you, let it go. If you hold on to it, it will embitter you. The pain will become your life and everything will be an affront to you and your 'precious,' your pain and suffering. The center of your life should always be yourself, your loved one(s) or your God (religions say your God comes first). That way you always have something to take care of. If you let the center of your life be pain or loss then your entire life will be nothing but pain and loss, you'll never see the sun turn molten as it sets in the nest of the earth, crowned with blues, purples and oranges... You'll only see the death of the day, the birth of the cold, mean, lonely night.

I think this is what they mean by "turning over a new leaf" except that I'll wait until it actually happens before I say it. I've found the leaf that I want to claim as my own but I don't know if I can turn it. It's like an old car on a cold morning. I have to nurse it along, encourage the feeling, pet it and sweet talk it into taking hold. And when it does, I'll hold onto it like a mother to a child: With all the gentleness of fragile care, but with the tenacity and forcefulness of love.

"Rapture in the Fall"

On the streets in August

When the leaves are gold and green

The breezes and warmth still flowing through

As I sit down on a swing…

Liquid gold caressing my skin

The cold encompassing my feet.

I’m drinking in the coming fall

And my heart has just begun to beat.

The sun is setting behind houses and trees

Into the nest of the earth

Crowned with colors not yet named

The night waiting to give birth.

                                                                ~Kathryn, 21

Almost seven years later, I read this and was still astounded. This is one of my absolute favorite journal entries and poems that have ever come out of my brain. Did I ever turn over that new leaf? No, I did not. But God sort of turned it for me when I had my son almost two years ago. I’m much more aware of passing time and holding on to moments as they go by. Yes I’m still guilty of wishing days away and saying I “can’t wait” until this or that day. Sometimes I rush my son through our bedtime “routine” (me playing with him in his room for a while) so that I can get online or just plain go to sleep. It’s all about being human, being forgiving and loving. My life isn’t perfect nor would I expect anyone to believe my life is horrible. It’s just pretty average. All the same, I find myself sitting in a moment thinking, “I wish I could live in this moment for years and years.” The book I was referring to is The LovelyBones by Alice Sebold. She is an amazing writer and has inspired me to not only make a millionth attempt at writing (something I’ve been doing since I was about 10), but to live my life in a much more meaningful way. I recommend this book (but not the movie) to anyone, male or female, teenager to senior citizen. The movie, as tends to happen, lessens the passion and emotion of the book and leaves out so much that makes the book as inspiring as it was to me.

The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold

Is there a book you would recommend that moved you?

Parenting on Minimum Wage

I am a part-time clerk at a drug store. I'm not in the position I want (full time with more pay as a Pharmacy Technician) and that I'm trained for, but I am working. I'm attempting to blog every week to see what I can do to make a difference in someone's life (a good one, I'm hoping!). I'll be starting school in the fall to pursue a Doctorate of Pharmacy so I can make good money and afford more things. But right now, I'm parenting on minimum wage - well, close to it.

I recently tweeted (yup, I do that too: MamaPoodle), "99% of the time my bills are late notices. Sometimes we eat plain pasta and use discount diapers. But I sure do love my life. #happy" And that, my friends, is the God's honest truth. I am usually stressed out about one bill or another that I can't pay, some high-stress relationship or situation with my co-workers, how I don't make enough money per hour, or that I'm not being the best parent I can be.

If I could be a SAHM (stay at home mother), I would. In a New York minute! But since I am a single parent, I must work. I have to be away from my son as many hours as I can bear so that I can take care of him and myself. I choose to work only 4 days a week but have told my employers that I'm willing to work ten hour days if they want to schedule me for that. I struggle with knowing my son is at home with his NaNa (his Aunt Angelique) or at his paternal grandparents' house playing, eating, bathing, growing and learning without me. Working with the general public does distract me, but in just about every free minute I'm thinking of my little Ick. This stress alone is enough to drive me to drinkin'.

But I also have to worry about that electric/internet/phone/water bill that's due in 3 days and I just don't earn enough to pay it? Even if I worked full time?

Some of you may ask, "Why don't you get some assistance? Aren't there government programs to help people like you?" Yup. There are. I'm semi-ashamed to admit that, yes, I get food stamps. However, I earn too much for any "cash" assistance. And no, I don't get child support. Why? Well, technically, Ick's dad and I have "shared physical and legal custody" even though I am the sole financial responsible party for our little bundle of joy. We've been to court twice to change that and both times he has fought it and won. Ridiculous. The Family Supreme Court of New York has some issues that need to be worked out. But this isn't about that.

This is about how many, many parents out there are barely getting by and are doing everything they can. This isn't about the ones who play the system and refuse to work just because they "don't want to." I may get some government assistance (like millions), but I do have a job and I work very hard at it. I still struggle every month to pay my bills and they don't always get paid. I have to leave my child behind four days a week in order to make what little money I can.

As much as I struggle with all of this, the one thing I keep reminding myself is this: I am a good parent. I do what I have to in order to make sure my child is fed, clothed and is being taught everything he needs to know, whether it's by me, his NaNa or another caregiver. My son is loved, disciplined, and well taken care of. I am doing the best I know how at this point in my life.

Soon (as in a few years), even though I'll be a pharmacist, I'll be able to take real, paid time off, family vacations, make my own hours and my pay will be sufficient to give little baby Ick the right education and childhood. While nothing can make up for me being gone 40 hours a week, I can at least make sure he is getting top notch child care (hopefully from family) and a great education.

Soon, I won't be parenting on minimum wage, and I won't have to worry about how I'm going to pay that pile of bills or buy a whole new wardrobe because the clothes I bought 3 months ago don't fit him anymore. I look forward to that and every day I look forward to the time I do get to spend with Ick.



If you are like me and live paycheck to mouth, just remember that there is a way to make your life better. You can get the education and training you need to get a better paying job. And as long as you are "doing what you're able, putting food there on the table ... that's something to be proud of." (Montgomery Gentry, "That's Something to be Proud Of"). Don't let others put you down for getting assistance, or because your baby wears garage-sale clothes.

Make a change and prove that you are the best parent there is, because you know that there's always room to improve yourself to make a better life for your family. There's no bigger love than that.