Partners

Julie's at work tonight, her third twelve-hour shift of the week. That's what she is supposed to work, but for the first seven months she's been at this hospital it never worked out that way. Either she was in too much pain from the lingering effects of her surgery and had to call in sick, or there weren't enough patients and she would get put on call. But last month, for whatever reason, the patient load finally picked up enough to match the staffing level, and she hasn't been called off once. This is putting demands on her she hasn't had to meet since before her diagnosis, but she is handling it.

Julie is taking a heavy class load at Austin Community College - eighteen hours. This year she has started working towards earning a bachelors degree in nursing, to open up career options that aren't available with just a two-year degree. Possibilities like becoming a nurse anaesthetist, with great pay and regular hours and no muscle-pulling labor. She had intended to do this a couple of years ago, but then some guy came into her life and thoughtlessly disrupted everything. And then the cancer disrupted things more. But she is stronger now, the strongest she has been in over a year. And she thought she was ready to take on both work and school. It was hard at first, and she was afraid that maybe the cancer and the chemo had damaged her brain. That she might not be as smart as she once was. But after a couple weeks, the rust got knocked off, and her brain remembered how to learn new material and take tests and write papers, and she currently has an "A" average in all five classes. This is putting further demands on her, but she is handling it.

At home, there is much to do. Cooking and cleaning and laundry and grocery shopping and managing the animals and harassing the teenagers to at least make token gestures toward living like civilized human beings. It isn't fun, it isn't very rewarding, but it is so important to me that these things are covered, that Julie not feel like she needs to worry about anything more than what she has to. This is putting demands on me, but I am handling it.

I am very, very proud of Julie. Her ambition, her strength, her determination. She has made it clear that she loves me more than ever for stepping up and supporting her. You know what this feels like?

It feels like we are partners.

For so many years I wanted to feel like Brett and I were partners. Like we were working together to make a better life for both of us. But it never worked out that way. The more I tried to make it happen, the more she focused on herself. But now, with Julie, I finally have that. And it feels wonderful.

One. Million. Coconuts.

'Cause I's fuhggin' worth every one of'em.

Vader vs Goats

Because there is no such thing as too much Darth Vader. I should make him a weekly feature or something....

Atheist Vader

This

Cutting the Umbilical Cord

It's been nearly two-and-a-half years since Brett and I separated. Nearly two years since I filed for divorce. Fifteen months since the divorce was finalized. In all this time, Brett has made no move towards finding a job so she can support herself. Instead she continues to life off of the $1600 a month I give her (on top of the child support payments). Nor has she gone back to school, which she had talked about doing and I had said I was willing to extend the support for. Much of this money is probably going to support her livestock hobby (cows, goats, whatever) which she pretends is a business but is really a hobby.

Well, I'm done waiting for her to get her shit together and become an adult. I'm not going to cut her off cold turkey, but I need to make it clear she does not have unlimited time. So I e-mailed her this:

About spousal support. These payments are intended to give you time to find employment so that you can support yourself. As I said several times during the divorce process, I was also willing to continue this support for up to three years so that you could go back to school. Now, it is your life and I have no interest in telling you what to do. However, at this point  I feel no further moral obligation (nor do I have one legally) to continue making payments to you while you do neither of these....I will keep the payments at their current level through September and then stop them. (This does not include the mortgage payments, which I will continue to make until the September following Taylor's 18th birthday.)

So how did she take it?

This is not something which you get to decide unilaterally....Well I guess we will go back to court only this time I will show up. I am still seeing a therapist and on medication, but am no longer clinically depressed to the point of only marginally functioning. So I won't be such a pushover. Agian, you have rationalized that you are "the good guy" and don't have to be "generous". Well, we disagree about what is fair, about what is legal, about what you get to unilaterally decide.

Well, guess what Brett? If you check the divorce decree, it says I only have to pay you $1000 a month through last September. What I am paying you now is entirely my choice. The law is completely on my side. I can be as unilateral with my money as I want. You've got eight months to become enough of an adult to at least attempt to support yourself. Get cracking.

She's Trying To Kill Me

A lot of people sometimes bring home stuff from work. Pens, a stapler, maybe a tzotchke with the company logo on it. But what does my Julie the ICU nurse bring home?

She swears it's just melted ice she used to keep her cokes cold, but I know the truth:

She's trying to kill me.

As Happy As The Pope In The Woods

I hope y'all had a very merry christmas this year, or whichever winter solstice holiday you observe (as a Unitarian, I feel free to borrow whatever holiday traditions appeal without asking permission. Doesn't quite make up for when they use to burn us at the stake, but you take what you can get. Anywho.)

I worked hard to instill an appreciation for reading in Taylor when she was young, and refused to let myself freak out when she wasn't already reading Russian novelists or "The Monster at the End of This Book" when she was three. Or four. Or five. And now, at thirteen, she reads like a maniac. Whenever she goes anywhere, she has to lug around several books to read, and she usually finished them all before she gets home. I worry that she's going to give herself a hernia the next time she is packing for a two-week vacation.

So, for christmas this year, Julie and I bought her a Kindle. Her reaction when she opened it? "This is good. This is very good," whispered over and over in a hushed awe. "I can carry all my books with me everywhere..." We got her set up and downloaded the latest Harry Dresden book, and she's been curled up on the couch with it all afternoon. Now that she's a teenager, I have no doubt that there will be plenty of times when her parents are clueless dweebs who just don't understand anything. But this year we got it right, and I am happy.

I Don't Think The Grocery Store Carries Those....

Saturday morning I'm at the grocery store to get some rations to see us through the weekend. Night before, Julie had texted me a shopping list because she knows I won't remember what she tells me we need, and she certainly doesn't want me to call and ask her when she's sleeping. So I pull out my phone and check the list:

sodas
milk
eggs
cat food
cat litter
puppy numbing
bitch
fuckerhead
sonofabitch
dammit
damn
prostitution whore!

In The Spirit Of International Goodwill

To any non-US readers:

Okay, so, you didn't grow up with a heavily sanitized version of the tale of a bunch of snotty religious fanatics leaving England for a land they were so unequipped to survive in that they damn near had to eat their own dead to survive. Zealots who were pretty much rescued by the native tribes whom they re-paid by giving them smallpox and stealing their land, paving the way for hysterical persecutions of single women for witchcraft a couple of generations later. And you probably have to go to work today, because for you it's just another Thursday.

Nevertheless, Happy Thanksgiving!

Sneak Preview

Did a little photo editing this weekend, and I feel like showing it off. This will end up in a Need More Rage post, probably sometime this week.

Click to embiggen

"Get off my city, or Ima gonna break your iron frickin' jaw!"

He's The Best There Is At What He Does

But what he does isn't very nice....

Thoughts On The Upcoming WoW Expansion

Two years ago I was looking forward to the upcoming Wrath expansion with the expectation that things would pick up where they left off. I had been raiding quite successfully the previous spring and summer with Aetherial Circle, but that had come to an end as summer doldrums, pre-expansion doldrums, and general burn-out took a toll on the roster until the GM called a halt. But with the expansion, everything was going to go back to how it had been before. Right? Eh....

There were tensions that I had not been fully aware of. Tensions between people who wanted to go farther, faster, and people who were in it for the sense of being part of a team. There was a struggle for the soul of the guild in the early days of Wrath, and my side lost. At the time it seemed like a really huge deal, and I was hurt and frustrated. Then came the bizarre, twisted destruction of Sidhe Devils, which had been my place to go chill out. Again, I was hurt and frustrated.

Now, going into Cataclysm, my expectations are a lot lower, and I think that is a good thing. Part of that is a better understanding that guilds do break up and die. Part of it is the experience I had with The Left Claw, where I was able to gear up, join an existing raid, and be a contributing member even as we did the hardest fights in the game. Part of it is the dungeon finder tool, and the freedom it offers to join a group and reap the rewards whenever I feel like it. And part of it is having a real life family I can play with.

So, I go into Cataclysm with some vague plans. I will level to 85 and raid some. I will level some new alts. I will play with people I like. But I don't have any concerns about the lack of specificity. I don't needto be driven. I don't need to reach the point I can raid before day X, or risk losing it all. I am free to do a little of this, and a little of that. So, I am looking forward to this expansion too, but in a very, very different way.

Terms Of Endearment

Her: Come over here. I want cuddles.

:: cuddling ::

Her: Aiyeeee! Your foot is freezing!

Me: Yeah, it was sticking out from under the blanket.

Her: You cannot do that! Crazy motherfucker.

Me: ... I'm your husband. You cannot call me a "motherfucker."

Her: I just did. Bitch.

Me: This is so going on the blog.

New Rules

Rule 1: Oatmeal raison cookies from Tiff's Treats are a legitimate substitute for the planned evening meal.

Rule 2: Dogs are no longer allowed to pull the insole out of my sneakers and bite holes in them.

Rule 3: In all future residences, the television where the teenaged offspring tend to congregate on Friday and Saturday evenings will not be located right outside of our bedroom door.

Rule 4: No one will talk about Rule 4. Ever.

Rule 5: When inviting relatives for the weekend, make sure they understand this does not mean "show up on Tuesday."

C Is For Cookie

That's good enough for me.

(Shamelessly lifted from the comments on this post.)

The One Where I Talk About My Sex Life

 Back when I was still with Brett, I used to be pretty unhappy about my sex life. Year after year, the frequency would decline, and while sometimes it could be very good, sometimes it could be not good, sometimes even to the point of being downright bad. The six months or so that she would break out in hives at the end was particularly memorable, but often things were more mundane. "You've been really sweet and kind and attentive and helpful today, but I'd just rather stay up and watch this thirty-year-old sitcom than go to bed with you." "OMFG. You guys were like roommates. I think I would kill myself," was Hydra's response when I told her what it had been like. Looking back, I can see that a lot of what I thought was love and affection was really just her hormones kicking into overdrive for a few days. When that had happened to her in college, she'd go on a tear and sleep with a different guy every night. But then I came along, and I was safe and reliable and dependable, so we would be romantic and passionate until her itch was done being scratched. I would take it as a sign she really did love me, and cling to it through the following dry spell. But when the dry spells grew to be multiple months long, even I caught a clue.

Then, Julie entered my life. She not only enjoyed sex as much as I did, she really did love me. (And, yeah, it was a brand new, exciting relationship. That never hurts.) We made love whenever could, in person during our too-infrequent visits together, over the phone or on-line when we had to be apart. For eight months, it was wonderful.

Then came the cancer diagnosis.

We tried to keep the passion going, we both did. But when you don't know if you're going to live or die, when you're being cut into and poisoned and irradiated, when you throw up after every meal and your hair falls out and your breasts are removed, it's pretty damn hard to feel sexy. And I was far too scared I'd lose her, and concerned about her health, and focused on trying everything I could to make life easier for her to be much of a horndog either. But, there was always affection, always a desire to be close to each other as much and as often as possible. I never, ever felt alone the way I did with Brett.

So now, four months after the treatments ended, where are we? In a lot of ways, Julie is recovered from the ordeal. Much of her physical strength is back, and she (and I) aren't fighting a constant battle with fear anymore. (The fear is still there, for me at least, but it's down to a quiet background hum.) Unfortunately, though, her interest in sex hasn't come back. As she said to me the other night,

"I miss wanting sex. I know that sounds weird, but it's like my sex drive took off. I want it back."

It's not that she objects to sex, it's just not something on her radar anymore. Combined with the facts that she works 3-4 nights a week so we often only see each other for a few minutes in the morning and the evening, and we now have her son (and on weekends, my daughter) living with us so there's a lot less privacy, it just doesn't happen all that often. Like, about the same frequency I had with Brett. She's apologized to me, a couple of times, about the irony of it all, that I'm still not getting any. But it's not the same.

For one thing, there's still a lot of physical affection. Cuddling, backrubs, and tickling - I never was particularly ticklish as an adult, but Julie can get me to shriek hysterically. For another, there's still some pain, as her body struggles to adapt to having several lymph nodes removed. This will get better with time. I know she's having to deal with body image issues. I still find her sexy as hell, but it's hard for her, after years of having big magnificent knockers, to accept a pair of small, uneven lumps of fat and scar tissue. This will get easier with time, particularly next year when things have healed enough to get cosmetic surgery. And someday, in a few years, the kids will go off to college - Whoo hoo!

So, yeah, the era of frequent, easy sex is gone. And I miss it, sometimes. But I am loved, and I get to give and receive affection, and I know it'll get easier with time, instead of the slow steady decline I had before. So, I'm okay with it. Gods know, there's a lot worse things that could happen.

I used to write her erotic stories, back in the pre-cancer days. Sometimes featuring us, sometimes our warcraft characters. They could get her (and me) very excited, and add some very enjoyable spice. But I stopped doing that when things got grim a year ago. This week, I started writing a new one. I'll show it to her this weekend, when we both have some time, and we shall see what happens.

Things I Have Learned Watching Television

Towing an expensive car and needing to go to the bathroom really really bad is a dangerous combination.

You should not wear $1600 shoes if you are going to be marooned on a tropical island.

It is hard to keep a secret from your wife if you have a camera crew following you around.

If your "learning disability" is causing you to flunk out of law school and you are petitioning for "special consideration", that may be a sign that you aren't cut out to be a lawyer.

Bringing your mistress to a first date does not go over well.

Happy Monday

An oldie, but a goodie. Pretty much says it all....

Any Day Now....

....gonna start exercising. Really. I mean it. Just need to find the right motivation.