two women + strong emotional bond + separation = blubbering

my daughter and i spent the better part of the last two days packing boxes, moving them three doors down, and unpacking them. our nerves have been frayed beyond belief. we just spent the last hour or so packing the car to take her to college and not everything fit and she had to call her dad who came over and got some of the stuff. tomorrow will be a difficult day if today's emotional breakdowns r any indication ... who's idea was this college thing anyhow. surely tearing children away from their parents at such a tender age is not a good thing -- well, probably not for the parents. i'm a mess ... and just to be sure -- i'm taking a box of kleenex with me in the car because i know the ride home tomorrow will be very hard ...

a state of flux ....

so today i went to the housing office and asked if the new apt. was done and could i have the key so we could move in the daughter's things and as much other stuff as we could. it was and i ended up with key in hand. my daughter starting moving her things and a couple of neighbors and their children helped me with some of the other things. we managed to get quite a bit of stuff moved -- although there is still a lot more to go.

it was hard though coz all i kept thinking was, i don't get to spend the time with my daughter and its sad coz she goes off to college on sunday and then who knows how long it will be till i get to see her. idk. i guess i should be happy because she got so much done today and its stuff i won't have to try and "guess" at (which books go where, etc.). but still ....

the old apt. looks weird and the new one doesn't seem quite 'right' yet coz it doesn't have all its pieces. plus, all the preplanning i did for where the furniture would go at the icovia space planner site didn't quite work out the way i had planned so we had to make some adjustments already. i don't know what this means for the rest of the stuff that gets moved this week ... so keep ur fingers crossed that it goes well. i just want to be settled so i can "get on with my life" ...

cha cha cha changes ....

i've decided that this blog is becoming less about my business and more about my transitions ... so i've changed the name of the blog and a few other things and i hope u'll bear with me in this venture. i'll still have the ads for the business (although right now my artfire and etsy shops are on vacation till i get settled again). so yeah .... thanks to the faithful who keep hanging in there with me ....

skirt folds ....

its almost 8 am. i've been up since just a few minutes before 5 when the "stay overnight boyfriend" of one of the neighbors down the complex fired up his motorcycle -- which is probably the loudest motorcycle on the planet if u were to have asked me at 5am.

i should be packing up the apartment. they have started to clean the other one that i'm moving into -- which means it won't be long now. but i'm waiting on my daughter to finish packing up her room and using the boxes she wants before i start the rest of it because i know it will be hard to find boxes in the sizes she needs in the short time we have left together.

i'm also procrastinating a bit in the hope that some deserving person who needs only a 2 bdrm will come along and they will move them in rather than me. that's wishful thinking on my part, but whatever. my neighbors (in this particular building) don't want me to move. we were all comrades in arms when the issue of renovations came up so there is this bond that they feel is being torn apart because i'm moving into the next building over (where most of the ppl were content to let the renovations happen without much argument -- although it didn't stop them from riding our coat tails to the hotel).

i'm still trying to adjust to the fact that my daughter is going away to college and i'll be alone while living in a new apartment. i don't mind the new apartment so much -- its an opportunity to rearrange furniture -- but doing it on the heels of sending the child away is just too much stress for one person. then there is the issue with the ex. he was making noises that my vacation ends with her today and that he should have her tonight and tomorrow -- even though she isn't finished packing. i basically said he'd had 17 days with her and if i got 17 days with her that takes us right up to when she leaves and that he hadn't given me this same opportunity when the son had left for college. he didn't respond. he doesn't know what to say when confronted with his own goofy vacation math. of course, i'm letting him have her because quite frankly, i'm tired of the fighting and glad that after this i won't have to any more. she can make her own choices and verbalize them just fine ...

i also need to find a regular job, with regular hours, and regular pay, and hopefully benefits. but i think this won't materialize until after the move because there is just too much on my plate right now. and i'm ever thankful that papa god is carrying me through all of this because i would probably be a real mess (institutionalization comes to mind) if he didn't. and its wonderful to be able to keep coming back to that when the messies come running at me. its like a little child who is at once curious and frightened and will take a step forward and then run back to hide behind the safety of their mother's skirt folds. idk what i'd do without papa god in my life ... i don't even want to think about it ...

leaning on the everlasting arms ....

so the daughter is leaving for college on sunday and she's in the midst of packing up stuff to take. then she has to pack up the rest of her belongings because at some point after i drop her at college, the housing authority is moving me to a smaller (2bdrm vs 3bdrm) apartment.

there's a lot going on in my life right now and i have to keep telling myself that papa god has me in the palm of his hand. if i don't do this, i will surely fall apart and i can't have that.

the last week or so things have not been great. i had these expectations for the vacation with son and daughter and of course, most of them were not fulfilled. as a matter of fact, a lot of stuff fell apart royally that i'm not sure can be mended, unless papa god takes control of it.

then we come back (and that's a whole other story in itself that i would prefer not to delve too deeply into), and i have to deal with not only packing up and moving my daughter to college, but packing up my entire apartment to downsize. its not without some really weighty emotions.

see my daughter has only ever lived two places in her lifetime. one was the apartment where her father and i moved into when i was pregnant with her and where he still resides, and the apartment that we currently live in where i moved after the divorce 6 years ago. so for her its like, "i'm going to college and when i come home it will be to some place i don't recognize". for me its like, "u go away to college and while ur gone, i'm left in an unfamiliar apartment all by myself". i become an empty nester in a new nest -- and its not even of my choosing -- either of them ....

at the end of the month i lose child support and will be living on the $75 a week i make doing respite care with an autistic boy. obviously, that will have to change and i'll have to find a real job -- something i have been seeking for a while and which has been unsuccessful.

now things seem at their worst -- i mean, i've possibly lost one child (son) through miscommunication and clashing of personalities and i'm about to "lose" another to college life -- i suddenly feel like the old spinster lady -- childless and alone. and i'm about to become poorer than dirt -- if that's possible and i'm going to have to pack and move my stuff to a new place. my ex husband is taking some of my vacation time -- the last before she goes away --with my daughter because he thinks he can even though he's already had more than his fair share of vacation with her earlier this summer and once again, i'm letting him. so its now when i need papa god's grace and comforting arms to hold me.

last night my neighbor came over and was basically trying the "snap the heck out of it" tactics on me and i finally said to her, "u know, i'm allowed to grieve -- a lot of this stuff just happened in the last week. i'm pretty sure papa god would allow me time to grieve. its not a prerequisite of being a christian that we're supposed to be 'holding it together' 24/7." i'm sure it didn't make her very happy, but that's the reality of it. just because we're christians doesn't mean that things will be wonderful all the time -- as a matter of fact it might be worse since the enemy will do all he can to turn us away from god. but we don't have to pretend that we're "fine" when we're not and we don't have to wear a smiling mask to cover up whatever pain is inside us. god loves us through all of it and the more real and genuine we can be the less surprises others will have when things don't seem to be going wonderful for them.

so yeah, i'm leaning big time on papa god right now and i'll keep leaning on him. because we're in a relationship -- he knows me and loves me and wants to take care of me. and i'm going to let him. there's not a whole lot i can do on my own -- and right now, i don't want to do any of this without him.

Charm City Cakes and Baltimore ...

so yesterday was not a good day. it started off with me getting into my son's new car and accidently hitting his arm and spilling some soda in the cup holder. then the kids and i drove to baltimore to go to the baltimore museum of art. i have to admit that part of what happened was my fault for not double checking to see when the museum was actually open. it is, just for general info, not open on mondays or tuesdays -- but who would think that it would be closed both days. but i digress.

because it was tuesday the museum was closed. which we didn't find out until after we'd parked and gone in -- and unfortunately, when u park in their lot, u get a ticket and then u have to pay to get out of their lot. so $6 later we decided to walk the .4 mile to Charm City Cakes -- which is, if ur not familiar, the place chronicled in the TV show Ace of Cakes. its a favorite of mine. we didn't see anyone from the show and couldn't look in the windows even because they were covered in black plastic (boo hiss), but we did manage to take photos of us standing outside of it.

of course it was hotter than blazes and the walk basically took a lot out of this 54 yo woman and when we got back to the car, the son got on his iphone to see what other things we might do. see the museum was free -- and since i don't have a lot of money and will have even less come sept. 1, it seemed like a good idea, which it would have been had the museum been open or i had done my homework.

at any rate, son said that most of the free or inexpensive things to do looked boring or stupid. so we called my dad (who didn't answer the phone) to see if he had any other suggestions. then we went to the nearest wendy's for lunch -- which happened to be in a really crummy part of baltimore -- so the kids got to see places that maybe they wouldn't have ordinarily. and then dad called and he said that other than inner harbor he couldn't think of anything.

so we went to inner harbor -- where the parking was outrageous (and tiny little spots) and walked to the actual harbor. we had dissed the idea of going to the aquarium (at $30 a pop -- well, i said i would pay it but the kids nixed the idea since they know i have no money) and walked around to this funky art museum -- which costs half as much to get in. however, at this point, i was too exhausted from the heat to make it the whole way and crashed on the bench. the kids (who, let's face it -- rn't really kids anymore at 22 and 18) decided they really didn't want to see the museum and so we walked back around to urban outfitters (which is where my daughter wanted to stop at).

it was cooler in the mall and i was able to buy three bottles of water at $1.60 a pop (and that didn't include tax) and talk to the nice guy about the fact that he should put an "a" in Donte's special since it was as hot as hell outside. he laughed and said that was a good one. i also got to sit on the marble edging to the stairs -- which was nice and cold. we went to a store that had charm city cakes mugs, etc. and other cheesy baltimore memorabilia and purchased some stuff to bring home and then walked back to parking lot, paid $13 for the parking and left to come home.

of course, we got stuck in some going home from work traffic. that makes for an interesting drive when ur tired and hot. and none of this would have been smooth had it not been for the navigation capabilities of my son's iphone -- so for that i'm very grateful. no getting lost -- like we did when we went to philly years ago. but i tried to make the best of a really crummy situation and failed miserably. i'm sure my kids will remember this as probably one of the worst (if not the worst) vacations they ever had with me. and the son will probably forego vacationing with me ever again.

the thing is that when i go on vacation i don't HAVE to do anything or go anywhere special. i could be content just sitting and relaxing and enjoying whoever else happens to be there. there was a time (when the kids were smaller) when we felt this need to take them to all sorts of places and do all sorts of things. but i don't have the money for that any more -- haven't for a while -- and so i can't keep it up. perhaps its my fault for setting a precedence with them for the need to go and do all those years before the divorce. i try to make the time happy, but frankly, they want to go and do and r bored otherwise. sitting and talking with their grandfather and hearing his stories of growing up don't hold the attention like say shopping or sight-seeing would.

i'm not perfect in this vacation planning stuff. sometimes i just run out of ideas -- esp. when the issue of money is concerned. i'd love to take them to ireland or disney world or whatever, but i know its not gonna happen. i just don't have it. and the fact of the matter is that as i get older, its getting harder and harder to keep up with them physically when we do go places. i thought i was going to pass out yesterday from the heat and the distance, etc. so yeah .... i just don't know. perfect vacations r becoming a thing of the past... and maybe its time for that because they r both going in their own directions now and soon won't want to do the joint vacation thing. it was nice while it lasted ...