Friday, April 22, 2011

a sucker born every fucking minute

So that was me, a sucker born on March 28, 1959 at 11:36 am.  Nathan ended up being born on April 21, 2001 at like 12:44 pm.  Amber only had to give it four pushes and out comes kid number seven.  Otis got to cut the cord.  He called me about two hours later, and I realize that it wasn't so much that he cared enough to tell me but that he was hungry and wanted some Chick-a-Loes, and a way to get home, and maybe some fucking money to get the bus pass back to AMC for the evening festivities with the family and the queen of baby production.  And me, always the fucking love sick fool.  I mean, like, he calls me and says, where are you?  Hey fucker, where do you think I am?  I'm at home.  But he just expected me to drop everything to come, because guess what, that's exactly what I did, and would do.  And me, always, always trying to buy his love.  Everywhere we go he knows half of south Atlanta, so we went to Chick-a-Loes, where they do have the most awesome chicken sandwiches I have ever tasted.  But two young boys went by and he was afraid they might know Jordyn, so he said go back to the car and wait, so I did.  I told him flowers would be nice for Amber and so he said okay,  So I went into Kroger on Old National Hwy, and he said, yeah I would love some Blue Moon, and yeah, get a pack of Newports.  So I went in and picked out some pretty pink and white roses for $25 dollars, the beer and cigarettes.  He asked me how much the flowers were and I told him.  He said $25!  Amber is gonna kill me if she thinks I spent that much on flowers.  So he called his dad and said, the flowers are from you, okay,?  10-4?  He turned to me, ---see this is what i hate---this lying.  I felt like saying, this whole fucking relationship is a lie and you're worried about the flowers?  Why can't you just lie and tell her you saved a little money to buy these flowers ---it kind of blows the whole point of the flowers if they come from your dad.  What would he want to give her flowers for.  But there you have it.  So I dropped him off near his house and he was talking on the phone and hell, I didn't know we were right there by Farris Ave.  and he said, whoa, what are you doing, trying to get me killed.  I swear you're trying to get me killed.  He wasn't mad but hey, get off the phone and tell me where I should drop you. 

Dear God.  So oh yeah, he was talking about maybe Tim would give him a couple bucks to catch the bus back to the hospital and I realized by now that that was just a hint that he would like for me to give him some money to take the bus back.  I opened my ash tray where I keep some money and I said, here, take this, these are the last dollars that I have to my name.  He said, no, no, don't give me all that, and I said, they're just singles anyway (and one five dollar bill).  So that was all the spare cash and inside of four days I pretty much spent all my fifty bucks on him.  And so now it's Friday night and I was just burning to see him, even tho I saw him yesterday, but he must have called out, or maybe they gave him time off for the baby, or he had already planned to take it off, but do you think he could have toldme about that.  No. I come in here looking for him and I feel so immediately lonesome for himand missing him so bad, and so fucking angry, with him ,and myself.  I know he is home with Amber and helping with the baby and everything---and I can just picture it all.  But he could have at least told me he wasn't going to be here.  And so tonight we probably won't do shit, and tomorrow, when he does come, I'll probably fucking work allnight long  That's just par for this course.  And Dear Lord, dear Lord, how is it that I could allow myself to be used.  I'm so sad about that lord. 

Just talked to Boone and she told me she thought he was on leave, but he did not bother to tell me that, so I guess I will not bother to tell him when I am going to be out, and that I will be in Savannah, and I hope he finds some other sucka to support his habits, she will probably have  to be w hite, because only white women are that stupid.  Maybe another fat black woman like Tammy cook.  But a beautiful hippy black woman ain't gonna be buying no shit for this man, and I feel like I'll be damned if I buy him one more fucking thing in this life time.  Though I know that I will.

Wednesday, April 20, 2011

Nathan Manuel Logan

So tonight is the night.  Tonight is the night Otis gets to watch his Amber bring forth the fruit of their passion for each other into this world.  One steaming night in July, he said.  Otis will watch his beloved writhe in pain and watch the contractions on the monitor and he will worry about Amber and be so sad that she is in such pain----a pain she has been through six times before.  He will watch her push that baby out into this world and marvel at this miracle and the miracle his woman has produced---his son, with her.  His and her son.  hE  will worry about her blood pressure which is sky high, he will fret  and worry and be so sad----and it all just fucking eats me up.  He called me at about six pm and told me where he was and that was so kind of him and I really think he genuinely cares for me, knows how much this bothers me, for I have told him how jealous I am of /amber, how much I would like to have his baby, how hard it is for me cuz I can't have kids anymore----or maybe he called me because he was more worried about her and needed reassuring.  He did tell me he was hungry and he wanted a Wendy's and I guess the twenty I handed him this morning to get a Marta pass with, (so far I've given him money three times for a Marta pass and three times he hasn't gotten a Marta pass.  On Saturday he had to go buy a screw driver a special one, so that his dad could get to the engine on his van.  Yesterday he bought himself some kind of sandwich and I would't doubt if he bought Amber one but I don't know----he said, I got it for myself!  And today, I guess it's going for a Wendy's, maby some for him and maybe for Jordyn, who is with him, i know, cuz she put it on facebook. 

And me, in pain again because the whole situation is just totally ridiculous===there is no where to go with it, if only because of our difference in ages.  God, so stupid!  Welcome to the world, baby Nate.  It is a fucked up world---I'm so sorry for it. 

Sunday, April 17, 2011

Proverbs 7

Dear Lord in your infinite mercy have pity on me---a repeat sinner and an old fool.  Lord, there really is nothing worse and more pitiful in this world than an old fool. 

So what happened was, Otis needed money for a Marta pass for the week.  Even though I swear this guy always has cash in his pocket.  There was enough that he was going to buy some chinese food Friday night, without of course, offering to buy me anything.  But I always want in on this action and i always want to buy his love, so desperately.  So I threw down my fifteen dollars and then I was happy later on when Joseph called him and asked if I was his girlfirend, because I want everyone to know, and I have no pride at all.  I'm a shameless harlot, just like in the Psalms, the one who leads a young man astray.  So Otis wanted that money, and I don't know what happened.  He was going to wait for me in the morning again but then he told me Amber was waiting outside and then the next thing I know he said "She just left"  and I'm like what the hell is going on.  And now thinking back the only thing i can think of is that he did not answer his cell phone when she called and so she got pissed and left.  So he waited for me and we left and I asked him if he was hungry and he said yes and by his own admission once he said he was greedy and then I said, why don't you call your daddy and he can go out to eat with us too.  He liked that idea and I think somehow likes to show off in front of his dad----like, look dad, I got me a white sugar mama. 

Things started to unravel for me when the waitress, a black girl in her late 20's, early 30s, named Takela, started to hit so hard on Otis, and to a lesser degree, his dad, that I almost couldn't believe my eyes and ears.  The hits were so blatant and disgusting and disrespectful that I was completely ---shocked.  I realize that she may not have even considered that Otis could be with me, or mine.  Maybe she thought her was my son and his dad my husband.  If she thought we were together and still continued with her shameless behavior.  but I realized with a devastatingly sad jolt was that he was NOT my man, my territory, to defend, and that he never would be.

Later that night I was talking to this with Yonnie, my new friend from Housekeeping, and Jimmy heard it and he told me in a phrase that I didn't understand exactly what he was trying to tell me---but he told me firstly.  You're married.  You have a husband.  And HE is not your man.  I haven't said anything until now but I'm telling you now, and then he said the phrase, which i forget, but the best I can interpret it was "WAtch yourself" or shape up, or get smarter, or quit being a fool, maybe that unique phrase meant all of it.  I don't know.  I know that Jimmy has not been lliking what he hAS been seeing, and I can only attribute it to one of several reasons, or all of them, or some combination of them.  One---he is morally opposed to a black and white combination,  Two---he expects better from me (though he never stayed faithful in his own marriages, or to his current girlfriend, so I don''t understand this hypocrisy coming from him), three, he is jealous and wishes he had hit me up himself.   four--that I'm making a huge fool of myself and to watch my behavior because my reputation was about to blow up, and maybe five, that I am an old fucking fool and making a fool out of myself.  Like I said, I really think Jimmy's feelings run to a mixture of all of these, and so here I am, feeling just what I am, an old, fucking fool who should have known better.  Should have, should have, should have.

And so this morning, in an agony of guilt and remorse, my conscience just eating me up (and what did my mother always say, as long as you've got a conscience, that little voice tearing you up, you can still be saved,.  And now my Lord, convict me, save me, forgive me.

What part of me actually loves Amber too?  I don't know why, but I do.  Because when I get obsessed with  a man, I like get obsessed with everyone in his whole life and this time that includes the wife.  But I like her, cuz she is one tough black bitch, and she knows how to get a man and not have to buy his love.  I want a man who buys me shit.  I realize how very much I was just literally buying Otis' love, and he took it, took it all.  so for him, he can't feel like a real man as far as I'm concerned, because he can't take care of me like he takes care of her, all of her needs.  he does all of the housework, did loads and loads of laundry because he doesn't want her to tire herself (she's so fat now with the kid that she huffs and puffs with little exertion) he buys her everything, takes care of his woman.  And me, I do not feel like a woman when I buy him things.  I just feel like a pathetic example of a female who will do anything for love.  Otis' dad was telling a story about a brother or friend who had just gotten out of jail after 27 years, and women were still running after him---said how back in the day women would come by and he would tell them, I need 2000 dollars, and the stupid bitch would pull up with 2 grand and the guy would tell Otis' dad, count tht money, make sure it's all there.  And then a second woman would pull up with 3 grand, and the brother told Otis' dad, count the money, make sure it's all there.  "And this went on with a woman bringing four grand and five grand.  I'm llike, what the hell, where they getting this money?  And I realize that I am these women, buying love, only on a smaller scale. And Otis' dad said how this man would say to a woman, i want these shoes or that coat, and the woman would say, but they're 600 hundred dollars !  And the guy would say, /buy 'em.

There are basically two kinds of women in this world---those that have to buy a man's love, and those that do not, and they somehow get the man to buy them everything,  Amber is the latter kind, and  I am the former kind. i ADMIRE HER.  Of course, she also had several baby daddys who beat the hell out of her, and I have never had anyone ever hit me, ---nor would I ever accept that---being hit.  Maybe "God just decided to send her a good one, for once.  And here he is, cheating on her---but I almost think he can separate that in his mind  I almost think that it's not so much that he's cheating on her, but getting something extra and free for himself.  Little prizes, little gifts, from me, that make him good----but that the real prize is at home---his woman, his amber, the woman he kills himself to please.  "And it makes me so angry and so sad because I can see this rather clearly now---And I love him so much and need to extricate myself from this very bad situation, bad for me, that is,  because I'm the only one not getting anything out of this---just more broke. 

The other thing that bothered me was Amber texted him and she wrote, What's good for you, Otis, is what's gonna be good for me!  In other words, if he;s cheating, and I'm not sure who she thinks he's cheating with, cuz she doesn't seem to think it's me, if he's cheating, she's gonna cheat. And nothing strikes more fear in him than to have her threaten him that she's gonna cheat.  I don't know what kind of hold this woman has on him, but Goddam it this fat black bitch has him twisted around her little finger so tight that he would jump through a ring of fire for her.  I don't what she has, but he has it for her, bad, and I am so jealous of her It eats me alive---she has some sort of charisma----the X factor-==she does. she commands respect,  she is  fearsome black woman.  A force to be reckoned with, and he just loves her.  I feel it.  I am so jealous of it.

Also, he has called her ghetto before, basically when she goes back to ghetto behavior when she has to set the situation to rights---but this is what i learned just from having a black woman hit on MY man (well, hell she didn't know he WASNT mine,  the definition of ghetto is this:  a woman, any woman of any race, who has been wronged and scorned and who is now going to set that situation right"  that's ghetto.  And I have myself gone ghetto before---when one Karen Agan was messing with Joe, baby I went fucking ghetto on her.  Told her I would cut her kids fucking ear off and mail it to her in a box, told her all kinds of shit, on her answering machine.  I went ghetto on Joe too.   Screamed at him for sending her roses, after their break-up.  GHETTO is what a woman has to stoop to to get her point across, because that's all the fuck-up hoe is gonna understand who is trying to steal her man,  I don't blame Amber for going ghetto---because I saw first-hand that a woman will steal your man right out from under your damn nose, while you're looking her in the face, and her without shame, if you don't set that bitch straight from the get-go.  I asked Otis what would have happened if Takela had been hitting on him in front of her.  He said oh hell, she would have gone all ghetto on her, there would have been screaming, a big scene, we would have been kicked out of here before we got our food.

I went to Kroger and got Otis a six pack of blue moon beer, and his daddy two packs of Archway oatmeal cookies, because he said he couldn't find them anywhere at the two grocery stores he visited, and he was hinting so blatantly in the back seat that I knew I needed to get him his cookies.  I got forty dollars cash back from my debit card, came back to the car and handed over the goods, and a twenty to Otis for his marta pass.  I took them back to Springdale Street and dropped them off.  Neither one said thank you and neither one looked back as I drove away.  And I realize that for them to thank me would then be an indication that me paying for their meals was an acknowledgement that they couldn't afford it and couldn't treat me, a lady, to breakfast.  No, me paying for their breakfast showed the daddy that he still had the gift, and the son had the gift, of getting a desperate woman (and how much better because I am white?) to buy their shit, give them shit, buy their love and acceptance, and to take it because they thought they deserved it---took it as their due, just took it.  Just took it without thanks, as being perfectly acceptable and natural.  And why not?  If a woman is willing to do it, then they are more than willing to let that foolish, desperate woman buy her way in.  Oh Amber.  Amber.  Show me how you do it. 
Teach me your ways.  I want to be the other kind of woman.  I want to take, and not look back . Accept it.  Feel entitled to it.  Show me how, Amber.  I do not know how.  Your man and his daddy. they good and goddam know NEVER, never, to put their hands out to you, and expect you to pay.  Girl, you got it all right, and girl, I've got it so so so so so so wrong!

Friday, April 15, 2011

roll up

If I could roll up and die right now I think I would,  And that's sad,  because I have two really good kids---my daughter is about to graduate from law school,.  She is beautiful and smart and sensible,  Always has been my pride and joy.  My son has made me proud too.  He works hard and steady. He is a good man---both of my kids, so sensible, steady and upright,  So what the hell happened to me?  God forgive me for this weakness in me.  Obsessed with a man I can't have---obsessed.  Feel suicidal over a man who doesn't give me a second thought all day, I bet.  He says he does, but I doubt it.  How can you have time to think of anyone else when you've got six kids under foot and one on the way and a wife who is always with you, and who you have also described as your best friend, alternating with ghetto, bad bitch, etc, etc,  The pain and the obsession is killing me.  Killing me,  Lord take away this ;pain,.  Take him from my brain,  I want him to love me but I can't take it anymore. Get him another job somewhere Lord,.  Take him from my sight,.  I can't look at him anymore I want him so bad to be mine  Why oh why oh why did you put him in my life, Lord. I'm so sorry that I failed the temptation test.  Failed again. Failed again.  And why always a man who takes and takes, gives me NOTHING in return, not even a text, not nothing but the random night time call when I'm so fucking tired  God WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY.  i JUsst want to be free from this pain.  It wasn't worth it, Lord, knowing him.  Even though he woke me from my grave, Lord, It seems I was better off dead.  I was happy dead.  Now I can't even make it through the front page of the newspaper my mind wonders away so bad.  Wonders away, and thinks only of him.  I am so restless Lord,  NOthing worse than feeling so restless that you could just float away---your mind, wish  you just float away and then pop somewhere over the ocean into oblivion.  Jesus Lord, take this pain from me.    Lord please take this pain and obsession from me,  Put me in  a good place with him Lord,  A healthy place,.  I hate being just his friend---because that opens the door for him to find someone else----how that will hurt.  Oh my Lord, take my pain from me,  heal me, Lord  Heal my pain.  Let me love him in a healthy way---in a caring way,.  Forgive me.

Thursday, April 14, 2011

Where you at? Where you at? (In my Jennifer Hudson voice)

If Otis has asked me or promised me something, a hundred times he wasn't able to keep his word on that promise.  One hundred percent of the time he has let me down,  One time he told me he would call me back and I said "When"? and he said thirty minutes.  And it turned into never.  He never did call me back.  Why tell me specifically thirty minutes and not do it.  It shows me that I am so not worth it to him.  So unworthy that he doesn't need to keep his word to me,.  I am so far down on the worthy scale  I have no hold on him, nothing,  Denise says, Of course he isn't going to let you go that easy---with you he has a lot to lose, look at all the stuff he gets out of you.

One reason why I love the guy though, is because he stays dedicated to all those kids,  Any man can make a kid, but not any man can make a father.---be a father.  He is as good a dad as he can be.  And it's true what
Troy says----he loves those kids because he loves her.  and I love those kids because I love him.

I beg God now to take away the pain---take away the obsession. Loving him brought be back to life,  And I want him,  God help me I want him so bad.  I want him to want me,  Love me like he loves Amber.  Be a man for me and take me to buy me an outfit, pedicures.  Take care of me;  I want someone to fucking take care of me.  I've been taking care of my own shit forever.  Joe never had to buy any thing for me,. Yeah he worked for ten years when I didn't.  B ut I was working at home, and raising the kids,  No pay for that  But I was a better mother than this Amber.  Hate that Goddam lazy bitch.  bitch has someone, a handsome someone, to do her bidding,  buy her shit  Mother fuckerrrrrrrrr.  I know that kid is either born or being born right now,  If that kid comes tomorrow night while we're at work and I see him leave all in an excited tizzy I think I might throw up.  I'll puke on myself.  Otis you son of a bitch, you should have left me alone,  Leave fat, needy, dying old women alone, you bastard,  I hate you.  I love you and I hate you.  Why, oh why did I have to meet you>  You're everything I'm not.  Young,  Black.  Come on man,  What were you thinking?  What was I thinking.?  God, I know you don't cause anyone temptation, but Lord, meeting him was no accident,  We were meant to meet---but why, Lord,  He has changed my life, once again,  altered the landscape of my existence,  This has been a hard one Lord.  Why?

Otis

Otis, why don't you love me?  Why doesn't anyone love me?  Why will no one take my good love?  I see it all the time on Facebook.  So many good women who just want to love a man,  and what does a man want?  Why of all the women in this world does that undeserving bitch named Amber get a man like Otis.  A rare black man, and I'm not kidding, who was willing to  commit to a woman, put a ring on her finger.  And marry her.  And raise her four kids even before they had their own, together,  Was it her pussy, calling him.  I always have felt so inadequate with that---I guess my pussy can't call like that.  yes, I have been married for thirty years, but it wasn't my pussy calling Joe back.  It was family, the sense of family---the kids.  But with Otis and Amber, or Otis for Amber, it is more than this, AND I AM SO FUCKING JEALOUS.  She isn't even  a pretty woman,  She is huge. Fat.  But then I guess he likes fat women because I was fat when he came up to me and gave me his sexy eyes. And he did do that.  Gave me languid, sexual looks.  And me so hungry.  And him, so beautiful.

Fuck you, asshole.  Fuck you for doing that to me.  Fuck you. My dogs are dead and there is no Mollie to jump up on the table and steal the cat's food or lick out the tuna can,.  Gracie's little bed is empty and cold.  I've got no dogs and can't have babies and the doctor wants to give me Femara and dry up my pussy even more and make my hair fall out and I thought I dodged that bullet by not having to have chemo.  And Otis is waiting for his fucking baby to be born, his namesake, his Nathan.  And he is going to look at Amber like she is the fucking Madonna, all because the bitch got pregnant, with her seventh child, and she is barely thirty.  Bitch I could have had a hundred kids.  I could have had eight kids.  But I wanted to take care of the ones I had,  To pay for things with my own money, not governmenet money.  Bitch I'm paying for your fucking kids.  You get food stamps, and bitch, you couldn't even keep a box of cereal on the shelves for your kids.  The twins woke up and said, Daddy, we're hungry, and there wasn't shit on the shelves to feed them, but there were steaks in the freezer, and you and Otis spent thirty bucks on crab legs and eat out every fucking day,  So I took your man to Kroger and bought $130 worth of groceries and got forty bucks cash back and gave it to him,  He probably then took you to get your toenails done, or Adidas shorts for jasmine, or more lottery tickets.  You all have a 64 inch big screen that you paid two hundred dollars for, and what Chili's or Applebee's did the thugs steal that from, so that you could buy it cheap, so that Applebee's could raise their prices, to cover the cost of stolen goods, so that you could sit on your fat ass and watch BET,  And guess what, your old man has me so obsessed with everything black that I now prefer BET to TBS, I know what's going on on The Game, and Girlfriends, and Meet the Browns. And I just watched for the first time, BabyGirl, and all I could think of was Otis and Amber.  What does the male lead say right off in the very beginning---I make pretty babies. And what did Otis sat to me---we make calm, peaceful babies. 
Good for you mothafuckas good for you, for making eight fucking peaceful babies.  Jasmine is bipolar and smokes weed, has an ankle monitor on.  Shes fifteen, has been to jail a few times, one of them was when Jordyn called the cops on her for beating her up.  Jordyn is fourteen,  She has been suspended from school several times, the last one was whenshe was fightying a hater hoe and a teacher intervened and she bit the teacher,  DJ (Dikim) was caught throwing bricks over the Overpass onto I-85.  Blesshawn, Otis' first, lives with his mom in Riverdale, and Amber doesnt allow Otis to see him much, and Otis never has any money to give to the baby mama.  One time she needed forty dollars so i met her and gave her forty dollars, my own money.  Otis offered to  pay me back, but I said forget it, because I know money is tight,  But he got a pedicure with amber and brought in thirty dollars worth of crab legs, though he only had to pay two dollars in actual cold cash, the rest was paid for with food stamps.  Jaythan is a sweet little boy and Otis is the only dad he has ever known, but Jaythan is starting to imitate big bro, DJ, cutting up in school, and so Otis must discipline him with the belt.  Jordyn, by the way, got a bad beat down the other day, for having a hickey on her neck and don't know what else,  but Amber doesn't want her to repeat the cycle, so beating the urge to have sex out of her must be the only way to prevent Jordyn from getting pregnant, right?  I got news for her, Jordyn ain't gonna stop having sex now,  You get a taste of it, you want it.  But I guess there is no other way to prevent her from getting pregnant, or having sex, right?  Maybe if Amber stayed her ass at home, or had another adult come in during the times she had to leave, like, for instance, when she's in the hospital cranking out another kid, which is when Jordyn got the hickey, maybe options like that would keep her daughter from being a teenn mother, but you can bet your ass a beatdown with an extensiob cord ain't gonna stop Jordyn,  the twins, oh my god, the twins.  the sweetest little girls I ever met, but left, like the others, to entertain themselves for hours on end while daddy and mommy sleep, or fuck, do both, but God forbid Amber couldget her lazy ass up and take care of them while Otis tries to sleep. So once again, beat them into submission so that they learn to be quiet while the parents sleep (even though Amber has all night to sleep, if she only would)--make them be quiet, teach them how to do things all quiet and sneaky-like. Show them that they are not worth the attention, at age four, or ever.

Otis

Otis, I love you so much and I am so angry that you came up to me that day, wish I could remember the exact day, that you came up to me and started talking to me.  Told me about your wife.  How she was horny and how you would be asleep and she would just jump on you and get your dick up and jump on that and how you felt like you were being raped in your sleep.  It was a stunning thing for a man to say---my husband would give a hell  of a lot if I had ever done that to him---even once.  He would have enjoyed me raping him once in his life!  I thought it was a rather sensitive and rare thing for a man to admit---that he would rather be left to get some sleep and would  much rather be awake and involved in sex, rather than be used as a sex toy.  I got a kick out of it, myself.  I had never heard a man complain of this before---like I said, found this an intriguing turn of events. A man, a man! feeling used and frustrated and wanting to be involved in the sex act---not peripheral to it.

It was in August sometime that we started talking.  He was with Environmental Services, and that is a nice way of saying Housekeeping.  He was not an employee of "Emory at all, but rather a contract worker from Goodwill Services.  I don't want to say that his was like a charity type of job, but in a way, it was.  We had mentally challenged, deaf, autistic, some highly functioning Downs people, all being mainstreamed into different positions at Emory.  In positions of more responsibility I guess we had people coming out of drug rehab, and as I was later to find out, people who had been homeless and were coming out of shelters.

Otis, it is 7:19 am in the morning and you are anxiously awaiting the birth of your son,  your own fourth child, but with hers, your eighth.  And you love them all---and you are the rare black man who has embraced them all and trying so hard to keep it all together and give them all you know kids need.  Otis, goddam it I am so mad at you for approaching me and hitting on me.  I was sitting there minding my own business, fat and fifty and reading my little books.  I didn't want to talk to you.  You came up to me,  You talked to me about your chihuahua, your kids, your wife raping you.  Your wife frustrating you, throwing cans of Raid at you and telling you that the twins weren't yours.  and making  you go out with friends and staying out when you were dead tired and her hitting you, and you hitting her back, and her chasing you down with the van and almost running over you.  And Otis, how you went down and filed for divorce, but you didn't mean it, cuz you love that fat, fuckng bitch for some goddam reason that defies logic.  Because love can never be explained----the workings of the human heart and the human mind---inexplicable.  Why we love the people that we do----why we keep loving people who don't appreciate us, treat us like shit, whty we keep going back, keep hoping, hoping that someday they will love us, like we love them.

Cuz Otis, I love you like that.  Like you love her.  Hoping that you would love me like that.  Like anyone would love me like that.  did Joe, ever,  maybe.  But once again, the inequality of love.  Why can't the two halves ever match up, come together, meld perfectly.  No.  So rare to have the two halves love in perfect unison. 

Otis goddam you.  I didn't ask for you to come up to me and say, I want to take you out on a date, Just come back in the bACK.  Just give me one kiss.  I skeet all over the bathroom door jacking off thinking about you,  Do you do that too?   I didn't ask for any of it.  And then you reeled me in---with your beautiful eyes and your beautiful face and your happy laugh and happy personality.  And then you casually inform me that "she's expecting a baby in the spring, she's four weeks along already." 

And now, Otis, it is spring,  The baby is coming any day, and hour.  And I feel sick about it  Knowing what it is for a black man to make a child,  It is to them like an act of God.  They feel like the kings of the world,  Look at this world, I made a kid.  And according to what I read off Facebook, they all absolutely love the babies.  Otis loves babies.  I love the way babies smell, he said.  And he was obsessed about getting one of those baby slings and carrying his baby around strapped to the front of him,  and the image of that almost killed me  Because I want that to be my baby, his and my baby.  And I can't have any more babies,  And the doctor wants to give me a pill to take away all my estrogen and take away all my woman, too.  And Otis loves his baby, his baby that he made with Amber.  He has never seen one of his chidren be born,and this one, he will see,  And he will love watching this miracle, and it will tie him to that fat, evil black bitch named "Amber---tie her to him even tighter. Bind them. 

Otis, goddam YOU.  You made me love you.  Reeled me in.  Let me spend money on you, even while you had fifteen hundred dollars in your shoe in the closet, and every time you empty your pockets I see some money----and you spend money on lottery tickets and drop a twenty every now and then for cocaine---yet you never ever ever think to treat me to anything,  No, you let me be the sugar mama.  Let me spend my money---so I don' feel like a woman even now,  I don't feel lke your woman,  Your woman you take to Ahley Stewart and buy outfits for,.  Your woman you take to get pedicures and manicures and her hair donem and Jordyn's hair. and me, you just take.  And you tell me we will get together, tomorrow, or
Saturday, or call me in 30 minutes.  And 20 times out of 20, you break your word. 

Love don't love nobody.

Wednesday, April 13, 2011

goodbye Gracie and Mollie

It's hard for people in their 50's.  So much is changing.  Once again our bodies are changing, our needs are changing, we're losing our mojo but desperately trying to hang onto it, too.   For a lot of us, the kids have gone off to college, graduated, moved away---we got through that hurdle, survived it, figured out what to do with each other if we're still married---and a lot of time we're left to finish raising the pets, the pets that the kids begged for when they were seven or eight--So the pets are themselves about seven or eight by the time the kids go off to college or out into the big world, and then another seven or so years pass and there are the beloved family pets---old, infirm, blind, deaf, tumor-riddled, hip-displaced, dying.  By this time they have in many ways replaced the children as the objects of all that attention and tender-loving care which just doesn't end the day the parents drop the kids off at college- in truth we were made to nurture and love from beginning to end, so, no children, no problem---give all that love to the family dog.

Today we put down our Mollie and Gracie.  Gracie came to us 14 years ago via a friend of Joe's.  She gave birth to six puppies four weeks after we got her.  We kept the one pup that we thought would not be adopted easily---Mollie.  I saw Mollie come into this world on February 3rd, 1998.  I raised her.  Me and Gracie.  I walked those dogs every single day for 13 years, until they could walk no more.  Gracie could no longer see, and Mollie could barely walk.  I got up every morning at five am to feed them and let them out.  I worried about them when we went on vacation.  Every move you make in a house is always a move around the dog---because they were always right there beside me.  They licked out every can and pot and pan I had.  I never had to rinse anything.  You are never alone in a house when you have a dog in it.

So Joe had to do the dirty work---he took them to the vet,  watched them get a sedative and lay their old gray heads down, and then get the IV and THE drug, and watched as they slowly stopped breathing.  And he cried and cried, I know he did.  Joe has become a crier in his 50s.  So tonight the house is so quiet--once again, the parents sending their second set of kids off---off and never coming back. 

Sunday, April 10, 2011

touch me in the morning, and then just walk away

The other day,  on the way home from my Friday night shift, Diana Ross came on the radio, singing Touch Me in the Morning.  I loved that song as a young, romantically idealistic girl lost somewhere in the cornfields of Illinois, and I realized with a tremendous wrench to my heart, that I loved it even now, and it resonated even more with me now.  Somewhere inside I am still that lovesick, fresh-faced midwestern girl yearning for a love so real, so pure, so deep, so MUTUAL, that to find such a love would be the ultimate for me in this life----it would be the pinnacle, besides my children, who I consider to be my greatest treasures and gifts from God, but a love like this would be completely apart from that---it seems to me that all I've ever wanted was to love a man with all my heart, my soul, more than myself, more than my life, more than ANYTHING, ---A SIN TO SAY, but more than God, even.  Such a sin, to make such a blasphemous statement.  But to love someone like that wouldn't be good enough for me----I would want that man to love me with the exact same passion, need, and all consuming desire to own, as his and HIS alone.  I realize that this is what all women want, regardless of age, race or nationality.  Women want to love and be loved, protected and claimed. 

On September 26. 2011, I will be married for 30 years, and I will have known my husband for 35 years.  I realized when I was 32 years old that I had known him by that time for half my life.  I have been with him basically all my life---all the life that mattered.  But I never loved him the way I wanted to love a man.  I married him for reasons that were known only to me, and reasons that were common to the era.  What did you do after graduating from college, if you even did that, in 1981?  You got married, usually.  All of my friends did,---all of them.  I was the only one in my small inner circle to get a college degree, and after that I knew I couldn't put it off any longer.  I was never taught to think beyond home and family---to have any ambitions beyond that.  I didn't know you could dare to go out into the big world and find a bigger life with bigger things in it.  If I had known, I was too afraid to do it. 

Well, after September 1981, I felt keenly and immediately the loss of my freedom and my options, and so began a pattern of small affairs---they say it is rampant today,  That women cheat as much as men, maybe more so.  Back then, it was unknown and unspoken of---but it was thought that only men were the cheaters.  I sometimes think I was a pioneer in that regard----a bad, evil pioneer.  But in every affair I like to think I was still looking for that love that I yearned for---something real, deep, mutual.  My soul mate.  My best friend,  how I wanted that with all my heart.   Joe was not my best friend,  Sometimes I regarded him as the enemy---he was an angry man.  His dad was an angry man---a smart, intelligent professor of political science, type A and verbally abusive to his wife and family,  Probably physically and verbally abusive to Joe.  All that anger came into the marriage, and I was blind-sided by this angry man.  I came from a totally passive family.  No one ever yelled at anyone in my family.  My parents never fought.

Thirty years came and went---thirty years of fighting the good fight, hanging together through the good and the bad times, raising the kids, ---it all went by so fast, so fast.  And before I knew it, the kids were grown and there I was, fat---conceding to old age, rudderless, and still longing for that great love that I was convinced was not ever to be, for me.

about that day, February 23, 2011

Because I am an employee at the hospital where my mammogram was done, I was able to walk in that day with a call from Dr. P and repeat my mammogram right away.  Then I had to sit and wait while a radiologist read it and would come to tell me that it was a false alarm, that it was nothing, that suspicious spot, and that I could get on back to work.  Instead, Perlotta came back with the "what are ya gonna do" look on her face.  Come on girl, they want a couple more views.  She took me back to the screening room and smashed my boob ten different ways to hell, and I mean, damn, they really apply the pressure.  This time I did not get escorted back to the main waiting room where the innocents get to sit.  I was ushered back to the "we think you're in deep shit" room.  In figure skating they have the kiss and cry room---in breast imaging they have the "sit and feel your guts turn into jelly and pray that someone slaps you awake from this bad dream" room.

Twice more, Perlotta came back for me.  Gurrrrlllllll----this really is just so small.  I can't think that it could be anything,.  And then, the third time, gurrrrrrllllll, this is so small I just don't think it could be MUCH!  Then  a tech told me Dr. P was going to call me, and she did.  She started by saying, "Now don't freak out on me ...."  She came in to see me between surgeries, probably lumpectomies and mastectomies, and said she had to do a quick breast exam on me.  We went into an empty exam room and she did a full breast exam.  I can't feel a thing, she said.  But we need to do a breast biopsy to be sure.  I really don't think this is anything---the area we are looking at is so small.  I've had six breast biopsies myself, so I really think you're gonna be fine, but we need a biopsy.

I'm going with that, I thought.  What she said, about having six negative biopsies herself.  I'm going with that.  It's probably nothing. 

There were two other ladies in the deep shit room with me, both black.  When they saw the doctor come and take me out, and then escort me back, they knew instinctively that I was in deep shit.  They immediately spoke up to comfort me, as women are so good at doing,  Girl, you're gonna be fine.  Girl, have faith in the Lord, he will see you through.  Whatever this is, you have the strength to get through it.  I was really touched at the swiftness of their response to what must have been my visible alarm.

Two radiologists, a nurse and an ultrasound tech, all women, surrounded me in the biopsy room.  These were my angels:  women helping another woman deal with one of the worst things a woman can deal with. 

Dr. P had told me that I could just call the office the next day and get the results, but as the day wore on, she seemed to realize that things just weren't going to turn out and so she said, Listen, just swing by my office tomorrow after you get off---the results should be back by then.  It seemed to me to be too hard to explain that tomorrow was my off day, so in my mind I just decided that she wouldn't mind if I called, either.  The next day I managed to convince myself that it wasn't anything and maybe I would just put off the task of calling her until Monday.  But at 4:45 pm , Carey, from Dr. P's office, called and asked me if I was on my way.  Oh, I said, Ummmmm, Dr. P had at first told me I could just call so I was going to just, call, I guess .....I finished weakly.  "Oh, I'm sorry if there was a misunderstanding, Carey said.  But Dr. P sees all her patients in person after biopsies, whatever the results are, to check the dressing and the site, ---standard protocol, you know."  Oh, it must be bad, I said, it's bad, I know, because she would tell me on the phone if it was good and gladly save me a trip into the city.  Oh no, Carey insisted.  Really, it's protocol.  umm hmmmmm I said, sure.  Okay,  I'll be there in an hour or so.  I was dirty, hot and sweaty from my walk but there was no time for a shower.  I knew I had to get to Atlanta by six.  And I already knew that on this day, February 23, 2011, I was going to hear that I had breast cancer, and become a statistic.

Friday, April 8, 2011

last day of radiation and missing him

For my 52nd birthday I received the gift of a diagnosis of a very small type of cancer in my left breast.  T"his blog is not about cancer or surviving it.  It's about all the things you face when you hit that fifty mark..  Your  body is gonna start telling on you---telling your age, giving it away.  Your health, your beauty, your vigor---yeah, everything you took for granted is now like a precious and non-renewable commodity.

So after eight years I decided to go get another mammogram.  Why?  I don't know why.  I have been in a true mid-life crisis.  Started walking again, started losing weight.  Was approached at work by a handsome, 32 year old black man who said to me, I can't wait until next weekend.  I said why?  He said, so I can see you again.   I'm like what?  What?  Back that up, back that up!  What are you talkin about?  I can't stop thinking about you, he said.  And left. 

That was back in September.  By October I was in deep, in deep with him.  Otis.  So as any woman who has ever been in love can attest---that weight  just started falling off.  The sparkle came back in my eye.  I was alive again, because I was dead.  Dead, for 15 years.  I just let myself go to hell for 15 years.  I was good for 15 years, because I am married.  I haven't messed around for 15 years.  And I was dead, too.  Dead and settling, dead and conceding.  Just dead.

So I went to the GYN.  Got cleared on the PAP--check.  Hell, I've lived such a clean life that I don't even have HPV.  I thought everyone has that.  So next up, I thought, Mammogram.  Went down to the breas center to make an appointment in person (I am a nurse so I just thought I would go down and make an appointment.  Turns out you can't make an appointment in person.  You have to go through the call center.  Waited a few weeks.  Called.  Made the appointment.  Went down after work.  Got my boob smashed by Perlotta, or whatever the boob-smashing experts name was.  Three days later, got a lettr from the radiologist stating that there were some abnormalities noted and that I needed to come back for further testing.  Oh Goddammit, what NOW?  couldn't I just have it easy for once?  Consulted my friend Pam, at work, who said she got the same letter.  Went back for further testing and found nothing.  So I'm thinking, OK, probably same deal for me.  Not to worry.  Still, I felt anxious, and went in search of Dr. Phillips, a general surgeon whose passion is the breast.  I am an OR nurse, and I found her down in outpatient surgery on February 23rd.  She told me to proceed directly to breast imaging and they would shoot me through the system, so I could get back upstairs to work in my own OR room.  And I was already thinking about saving that letter from radiology for my scrapbook of life experiences.