The Grass is always greener on other people`s husbands

The grass is always greener on other people’s husbands. Did you ever notice that? I cannot tell you how many people, friends, relatives, acquaintances would come up to me over the years, telling me what a great guy my second husband was; so helpful and sweet. I would look at these people like they had ten heads, and this was before he became a drug addict. Are you kidding? It takes me two months just to get him to mow the lawn. We lived in our home for ten years and he still couldn’t remember which night the garbage went out without me telling him. The entire time I was married to him, I think he replaced the toilet paper roll correctly twice, and that might even be an exaggeration. Sure, he would open a new one, although only out of necessity, but he would place the new roll on top of the old empty one and walk out of the room. Apparently, taking the other one off, throwing it in the garbage pail and putting on the new one would have taken too much time out of his busy schedule of not mowing the lawn or taking out the garbage.

I bring this up of course, because I am just as guilty over the grass is always greener on other people’s husband’s phenomenon. I have told my girlfriends plenty of times in the past how great their husband is, or isn’t he nice to do this or that, when in reality I know from talking with my girlfriends that they are just as annoying and incompetent in their own ways as my husbands were. Yet, I say it anyway, and why, because the things that they did that drove their wives nuts didn’t really bother me, and of course the things that my husband’s did that bothered me were things that really didn’t irk my girlfriends. So I guess my point is like hair, women always want what other women have.

Of course being divorced now again, I have to say, although I enjoy men’s company in many facets, I actually have been enjoying being without one more than I can even tell you. It’s nice to wake up and not roll over to the pillow next to you which is so covered in sweat you would swear you were in that scene in Airplane where the “sweat” is pouring off the pilots head. Then you get up disgusted and feeling gross to find someone’s underwear hanging your bedroom doorknob.

It’s fantastic to ask my son to take out the garbage and miracle upon miracles he actually does it, and on the first time I ask him too! Of course to be honest, I lived with those small annoyances, we all do, it was the big things like the drug use, stolen money and no job that I couldn’t live with; how unreasonable of me.

One of my friend’s husbands is very obsessive compulsive, and she hates it, it drives her insane. I would take that in a heartbeat over the “Yeah, yeah I know the ceiling is caving in, don’t worry I will get to it soon” attitude my last husband had, or the, “I’ll call the repair man to come glue that corner of wallpaper that is falling off on the kitchen wall, because I have never seen a tool in my life” attitude my first husband had. But she would take a little laziness and nonchalant attitude over problems in the house over what she lives with any day of the week. Perhaps we women could get together and rotate husbands every once in a while, give us a chance to see it from the other side.

I know I say his obsessive-compulsive behavior would be a welcome new breeze, but after awhile, I would probably hate it to, after all we are women, we do tend to change our minds. Perhaps like wife swap we could do a month to month rotation, this could be a good thing for the men as well. After all, after a month with another husband, when you get yours back you will most likely be glad to see him....most likely.  Maybe I should have married Obi-Wan. Of course, if I lived in an alternate reality where Star Wars characters were real, I would marry Han Solo hands down. After all Princess Leia is a tiny little thing, I could so take her.

I want to be Carrie Fisher

I am a star wars fan. I wanted to get that out of the way first so that my kindred spirits out there can feel comfortable and the rest of you can start making fun of me as you read this. I am a geek, a freak, a fangirl, whatever label you want to give me, I am one. I have never stalked the actors or anything, unless you count the vivid dream life Harrison Ford and I have together. But I have seen the movies, yes the prequels too, more times than there are numbers to count. I use lines from the movies in my day to day life as often as I can, and even named my son after a character in the movie. I have also been known to dress up like the characters, in and out of bed (we will get to that later.) All in all Star Wars has been a big part of my life. From teaching me how to be creative as a child as I made up stories with my action figures, which I must confess did seem to have the recurring theme of Han Solo boinking Princess Leia, to becoming a mirror of what would transpire in my life, although some of that part I could have done without, Star Wars connections or not.

OCD runs strong in my family, my grandmother has it, my father has it, my sister has it, and I have it, all to one degree or another. See what I mean about using lines from Star Wars in my real life? Anyway, I have always felt my Star Wars obsession is probably part of my OCD. I truly go through withdrawal symptoms if I do not see it, or hear it, or read it in one form or another at least once a week. Luckily for me, I have my own real life action figure living at home, so it makes finding Star Wars references or lines, easy to come by. I named my son Luke Skywalker, Luke John Skywalker to be exact. Well, the Luke John part is on his birth certificate, the Skywalker part isn't. I wanted to add it as another middle name; however my husband at the time, although a big Star Wars fan himself, wouldn't let me. Maybe that should have been my first clue that things weren't going to go so well with him, who knows.

Anyway, with Luke in the house it is easy to get my Star Wars fix every time I say his name, and lucky for me, he turned out to be a fan too, although in all honesty I am not really sure he would have had a choice. In later years my Anakin Skywalker, Luke’s father, would slowly turn into Darth Vader before my eyes, until the dark side consumed him completely, the temptation to the dark side in this case being drugs, not an old wrinkly Sith Lord. I guess that part of my life would be one of those be careful what you wish for things huh?


So my point, I know I had one, Oh yeah, my question for the day. Is it sad that even with all of her mental health issues, relationship disasters and drug problems I would still give my right arm to be Carrie Fisher? Let’s look at the objective facts shall we, and then you can all tell me that I may be as mentally unbalanced as Carrie has tended to be from time to time.

First and foremost, I know for a fact she slept with Harrison Ford. Ok, well not for a fact per se, but from enough gossip, innuendo, and Carrie’s own witty mouth, and that should be enough to prove it in a court of law. Of course there is also the proof I have in my own Star Wars riddled geek brain that says they did, because I have pictured it and daydreamed about it numerous times, with numerous scenarios and of course numerous positions. Harrison is nothing if not flexible; at least he is when I fantasize it. So it happened. That alone should be enough of a reason to want to be Carrie Fisher. If not let me repeat that one more time....SHE SLEPT WITH HARRISON FORD, and in case you haven't noticed, Harrison Ford is a god. Actually he could be the god, who knows, as an atheist, I think I am entitled to name my own god, and I have decided it shall be Harrison. After all I would have absolutely no problem getting on my knees before bed every night for him.

Ok, for those men who think I need to give more reasons other than Carrie sleeping with God, here goes number two. She was in Star Wars, not just in it, she was Princess Fuckin Leia. Her fictional character gets to bonk Harrison`s fictional character, and make little Han Solo babies! She also looks damn good in a gold bikini (and yes women are allowed to notice that) and although I have been everything from severely overweight, to sleek and sexy skinny, I have never been that skinny so I am allowed to use it as a reason to want to be Carrie.

Third, she is probably one of the funniest women on the planet. From her interviews to her books and her hilarious speeches and roasts at various award ceremonies, her wit and jokes never miss. She is simply brilliant. She is also, and I know she hates this word, a survivor. Despite or maybe even because of all she has done and gone through, she is still standing, something I admire since with all I have been through it is nice to see someone else make it through the haze of bullshit to come out clean on the other side.

I could go on with more like her parents are famous and she was fortunate enough to be brought up in Hollywood around some of the most talented people in the world, around wealth and privilege. But that would sound materialistic of me, and although I wouldn't mind some of her Star wars money, that’s not really one of the big reasons why I would want to be Carrie Fisher, after all there is more to me than money. Which is good, since I don’t have any.

Of course I could say I envy her being able to have electro-shock therapy every now and again, giving her the ability to wipe out huge chunks of her past, which if you had some of my past you would understand why that sounds so appealing to me. Then there is that little part of me that envies the fact that occasionally in her life she was able to go and have a nice, long quiet vacation in a mental institution. I know, I know it doesn't sound like something we should be jealous of, but just the thought of my own private room where no friends, ex-husbands, neighbors or co-workers or even kids would be able to bother me, is just too good to be true.


My food would be cooked for me, served to me and my room cleaned for me. I could smoke whenever and wherever I wanted, since for some ungodly reason smoking is always allowed in mental institutions and drug rehabs, but on the outside I have to wait for every other Tuesday under a full moon, at one of three pre-approved locations for up to one hour. I joke, although with the way the laws have been going, that scenario might not be that far off. Let me remind you folks who are groaning about me being a smoker, its still legal folks! LEGAL! Look up the word if you are unsure of its meaning. At this rate, we may end up with hoards of people in rehabs and mental hospitals who are only there because they want to still be able to smoke when they please and where they please. That should make an interesting dent in the health care system.

Anyway, as I was saying a little mental health break from the world really doesn't sound all that bad. After all sanity isn't all its cracked up to be, in fact I think it is highly over rated. Holding onto my sanity by the small string it is still perilously clinging too hasn't really done much of anything for me that I can see. As we can tell it hasn’t helped at all with my somewhat unstable devotion to all things Star Wars, and it certainly hasn’t helped me with my borderline OCD rituals (don’t worry I’ll get to those later), and it certainly has done nothing to help me deal with the destruction of my last marriage to none other than Long Island’s own Darth Vader (and yes I know that is a Star Wars reference but trust me in this case it fits.) As a matter of fact so far although I know it is still there, it hasn't really done a thing for me, so maybe, just maybe I am better off without it.

As Norman Bates so eloquently put it, we all go a little crazy sometimes and maybe we need to. So yes, after all the evidence is in, I wouldn't mind being Carrie Fisher for a day, a week, a month. I think it would be a nice change of pace from my life, a little out-of-body experience vacation. Sounds nice.

Well I am off to bed to sleep with Harrison, goodnight.

Mom, kids, dogs and cats living together; Mass Hysteria.

I have a dog that marks the furniture if you leave him alone for two seconds, and by alone I mean you turned your back to pick something up off the floor, or god forbid need to use the bathroom. The same aforementioned dog can also get out of a locked cage, without busting through the bars while actually leaving the door closed and padlocked. As if aliens hovered over the house in their UFO, beamed him up for tests (which would explain a lot since I always thought he was a little off) and then beamed him back down, but their GPS got stuck and they beamed him back a little outside of the cage instead of in the cage. How he manages this I don't know, but it happened more than once, so either he is Houdini reincarnated, which seems a waste of Houdini’s talents if that is true, or I should worry that Steven Spielberg has been filming his new movie in my house when I am not home.

On a side note believe it or not while searching online for a new alien proof cage, I found a site that actually deals with what they call cages for “Houdini Dogs”, I swear I am not making that up, look it up yourself when you have a few minutes and nothing to do. It`s worth the laugh, and if anything it at least made me feel like I was not alone, then again I already felt that way when I thought aliens were beaming him out of his cage, just in a different more terrifying way.

Anyway, the same dog who by the way is black and weighs over 125 pounds, seems to think he may be invisible to humans. So, if you are in the room with him and get up to walk towards the backdoor, he will jump and bark at you in circles, sometimes jumping ahead of you onto a piece of furniture so that he can leap in front of you as you walk by, just to be sure you know he is there and would like to go out. Of course this method tends to not work for him when he knocks you over in midstride and you break some important bone you need in order to make it to the door, but he seems oblivious to this particular weakness in his plan.

Besides thinking he becomes invisible to the naked eye like he is wearing Harry Potter’s cloak, he also thinks that when humans sleep at night you somehow forget he exists by morning. This causes him to panic that he will never be walked or fed again. So, exactly one tenth of a second after my alarm goes off in the morning, and I know it is one tenth because I actually used a stop watch to time it once, and we will leave the fact that I obviously have too much time on my hands out of this for now, he begins to bark from his cage loudly and continuously. The cage by the way is now padlocked with my son’s industrial strength bike lock, which so far the aliens have not figured out, so as you can imagine that is a big relief.

Needless to say, I don’t even get a chance to pee. I have to run to his cage and let him out before he wakes everyone else up in the house. I then have to stand by the back door in my pajamas and do the pee-pee dance, hoping beyond hope he is quick this morning since I am a woman who has had two kids, and holding in pee is not an easy thing to do anymore, since some things aren’t as, how shall I put this nicely, elasticized as they used to be. Like a rubber band my ass, I haven’t sneezed without peeing on myself in 17 years. Remind me to find that gynecologist and smack the shit out of him.

Anyway, sorry I digressed. This same dog also thinks that any noise coming from my bedroom indicates that the night is over and it is time to bark for his morning pee. So, if my nose is stuffed, or I have a cold and I wake up in the middle of the night to cough or need some nose spray, which unfortunately happens often as I am hopelessly addicted to it, I have to slowly and quietly close my bedroom door, then grab a pillow and cover my face with it and as gently as possible cough and or squeeze my nose spray so he doesn’t hear me. Sometimes this works, sometimes it doesn’t.  If it doesn’t, I am up now up at 3am, walking the dog to shut him up. Wish you were me yet? No, keep reading then.

I have a cat who uses his litter box to poop but sometimes can't seem to find it when he needs to pee,  but can apparently find counter tops, table tops, and spots on the kitchen floor without the help of bifocals. Both of the aforementioned animals above also have fleas that apparently have never read the side of the box of the Advantix, because they continue to have a party on my cat and dog, sometimes even laughing at us with party hats on their heads, as we put the medicine on.

I have an oil burner that was purchased around the time Lincoln was giving the Gettysburg address that no matter how many parts are replaced or fixed seems to go out just when you need to start using it again, but seems to work just fine in the summertime. This leads to weeks of cold showers for my son and I as I save the money to have it fixed yet again. You may have noticed I did not say cold showers for my daughter, because she doesn't take them, but instead opts to go to friend's homes or my parent's house to shower instead, cold showers and my princess do not mix.

I have a deck that has been slowly falling apart over the years, which as of today no longer has any railings around it at all, and a fence around my property that is falling apart in different places, some pickets from age, some from some violent storms we have had, and some I think are doing it just to taunt me.
I can only afford to pay my lawn guy twice a month instead of weekly, so now at night (because my son doesn't want the neighborhood watching him doing this, not that I can blame him), my son goes out there and using pruning shears to cut the tall grass before it starts to look like a scene from Little House on the Prairie.

I have no car. I share my daughter's car, and what an experience that is. When you allow your kid’s to use something of yours, they are all over it and take it over as if it is their own, and look at you cross eyed when you remind them that it is YOURS and they should treat it as such. But wow, when the shoe is on the other foot, and they have something that you need to borrow, suddenly it is all about making sure you know IT IS THEIR`s and they are only letting you use it out of the kindness of their hearts. You better not change the seat, mirrors or radio stations, even if that means, you have to lean down until your head is in your rib cage to check the side mirrors when changing lanes. (My daughter and I are 1 foot apart in height)

My son, who's DNA has been found to match that of Bigfoots, goes through his sneakers about every two months, what he does to tear through them so quickly I will never know, and honestly am afraid to find out. That in and of itself wouldn't be that bad, except for the fact that he is a size 15, which isn't sold at the cheapy stores like Payless. No, I have to order from Reebok or Nike themselves, which means $100.00 minimum per pair, four times a year. He is damn lucky the sex was worth it to make him; the marriage on the other hand is another story!

I have a first ex husband who thinks having a child means have sex and hope someone else does all the work and a second estranged husband who disappeared over 2 years ago, who in a haze of drug abuse, lost himself and destroyed us and our family in the process. He hasn’t worked in years, doesn't pay child support and thinks the world owes him something.

My washer and dryer were broken years ago by my aforementioned missing second husband, whose idea of trying to fix it at the time meant taking all the parts out and leaving them strewn across my basement floor. So I wash everything by hand in the bathtub. My vacuum broke a few weeks ago, and since my property taxes went up again I am stretched thin, so instead of buying one with money I don't have, I use industrial strength packing tape on my hands and knees to clean the carpet, thank god we have wood floors in most of the rooms.

Oh, did I mention my kitchen ceiling is now leaking and almost ready to come down in some spots? So the money I was slowly saving to put the front fence back in so my dog can run around in the backyard without getting out, although that seems pointless since he can manage to get out of a locked cage, will now have to pay to patch the ceiling instead.

On top of this my daughter needs $200 dollars in December to apply for graduation from her college. Now I know I quit High School and academically I am probably not the sharpest knife in the drawer, but am I the only one who is wondering why I have to pay to graduate college? Haven't I been doing that this whole time with tuition and books and extras? Hasn’t she been earning that by attending, studying and getting good grades? Now I have to pay $200.00 or all of that goes out the window and she doesn't graduate? WTF?

On top of the ridiculous pay to graduate fee that is due, it will be $200.00 for her yearbook, and another $400.00 for her senior picture package, something of course I can bitch to high heaven about in here, but we all know I will pay, because no one wants their kid to be the only one who didn't get what all the others got. Parent Peer pressure is a bitch. That is all on top of the $325.00 I paid last year for yet another class ring. I bought my son’s High School class ring this year at the low sale price of $425.00 (thank you to my husband for passing on his abnormally large size 13 finger genes, (although in another essay, I will explain why I never complained about that trait on him, but that’s a story for another time entirely....and for those using their imaginations, yes it is what you are thinking of!)

My son will also need his senior class photos, which we bought for my daughter when she was graduating High School, so of course he must have them to, those are $500.00 for the ultimate package with clothes changes, different backgrounds, and you can even bring in props. My son better be ready for me to hand him his trusty light saber, because if I’m paying $500.00, he is taking a graduation picture in his Jedi robes, light saber and all! Then of course there will be the Junior Prom this year, and after that I am sure they will find many other ways to suck every last penny out of my hand before it even gets into my hand. My paychecks are spent so quickly, I haven't touched my own money in so long I don't even remember what it looks like anymore.

Oh, wait, did I mention my daughter suffers from Lupus, Lupus Nephritis, Fibromyalgia, Anti-Phospholipid Antibody Syndrome, Raynaud`s, Vasculitis and Sjogren`s? Knew I forgot something. By the way want to have some fun with Microsoft Word spell check? Try putting those diseases in any article, they not only come up spelled wrong, but Microsoft doesn't even have some of them in their dictionary, guess I should tell my daughter they don’t exist! These lovely autoimmune diseases choose any inopportune moment to strike and cause my daughter scores of hospital visits, chemotherapy treatments and more. They can always be counted upon to throw a monkey wrench into our already interesting lives when we least expect it.

My second husband the disappearing magician, is off living with some woman who apparently doesn’t mind paying for him since he applied for welfare recently and had the nerve to take me to court and try to get spousal support from me. That was a joke and a colossal waste of tax payer money since he obviously didn’t get anything from me, I have nothing to give, and would quit before I handed over the few dollars I have. He doesn’t even pay child support and the court thought, " let's bring them in for a hearing anyway on whether the good law abiding citizen who works two jobs and struggles alone to take care of two kids, should give the law breaker, the 15 times arrested drug addict, who is on 3 years probation, who left his family with all the bills and pays no support a chance to tell us why she should pay him some money". WTF is all I have to say to that one.

So what was my reason for this post you ask? No, it wasn’t to depress you all, at least I think it wasn't. Hopefully, it was to make you close your computer screen, after reading it of course and say to yourself, "shit at least I don’t have it that bad." Glad I could be of service.

I have done my part to uplift the community around me, so now I’m off to take  cold shower, go to bed in a blanket I washed by hand and get up at the crack of dawn to go to work in clothes I have had for over three years. Have a good night! You know for some fun on my part perhaps I will put this whole post as an ad in the personals on craigslist, I would love to see the responses I will get.  I’ll be sure to post them as they come in! After all, I might as well get a good laugh at my own expense, what else do I have left? Besides it’s free, which is good, since that is about all I could afford! It is amazing I haven't committed myself by now, although honestly the only reason I haven't is because I don't think they would let me bring my life-size Han Solo in Carbonite cardboard cutout with me, and what point is there of living without that?