We are All Superstars and Heroes

I had an unusually bad week. My furnace broke, toilet broke, gas leak, tree growing out of the foundation, A BATHROOM GARBAGE CAN MOUSE!!!!!!!!!!!, and finished it off with someone doing a hit-and-run on my luxury sedan Thanksgiving Day complete with a police officer so mean I wondered to myself if, unbeknownst to me, we had some kind of beef. Oy vey! Sometimes when things don't run smoothly, I think I have a more difficult time handling it than your average person. Maybe it has something to do with being the youngest child for 13 years. Maybe it has something to do with a lifetime of the attitude to let the guy handle it. I want to analyze the way I react to the situations I find challenging and modify it immediately. Because, as my wise older brother says- this is life and these are the things I'm going to have to deal with. These are the things that EVERYONE has to deal with. Sometimes I feel like I'm not capable enough to handle it all on my own and I think that is why I cry. I want to be, but, I am not. The truth is NOBODY can handle it all on their own. It is probably not a garbage can mouse for other people, but, everyone has their tough times that they fall on and when this happens everyone needs support and love and.. help. With that said, I think that has something to do with why I struggle so badly in dealing with "life stuff". I didn't know if I had support and that hits ya! It hits ya hard in the gut. I mean, of course, I have my friends/fam but I'm sick and tired of putting them out. I gotta ask them for help again.....gosh dang it why can't I just be self sufficient!! Sucks! But, then something really great happened. My friends Kelly and Gary offered to let me stay at their luxurious house until my heat got fixed. They are the sweetest sweet potatoes in the whole sweet potato casserole. My brother dealt with the horror in the bathroom trashcan and then helped my HVAC-certified pal fix the furnace and also fixed a plumbing leak that I didn't even ask them to fix or bring up at all. Then my pal refused to accept payment. He did let me give him a blueberry banana bread I made from scratch and behaved as though he was the one who made out in this deal. I cried again (in private!). This time not out of helplessness. I cried out of gratefulness and awe and how fundamentally good the people in my life are. I am lucky. I don't take that kind of thing for granted or lightly. People don't realize the nice things they do can make such a big impact on someone else. So ANYWAY..! Have you ever seen that movie, Gone with the Wind? (SPOILER ALERT) There's a part in it where Scarlett is riding with Rhett back to Tara through the war and fires and explosions and Rhett (I don't even like Rhett at all. I know I'm supposed to not like Scarlett but I don't like Rhett. Team Scarlett.) leaves her halfway through and when she makes it home, her mom is dead, the house is in shambles, her dad's lost his mind, her sisters are sick, and the fields are burned and they have no food (so not QUITE as harrowing as a bathroom trashcan mouse, but, close). So anyway she's in the field clutching at burned up turnips or some such thing and she says, "As God as my witness, I will never be hungry again!!" SO GOOD..WATCH: (God as my witness) My point is, I can't fix a furnace(I tried, I youtubed it and googled and tried and tried)... or fix really anything at all..but, what I am going to do is save up a million zillion dollars in an emergency fund so next time "life stuff" happens, I am ready. Last year my new year's resolution was to pay off all my debt- and I DID IT. This year I'm going to squirrel up enough money to bail me out of emergencies. If I have to lie, steal, cheat or kill. As God is my witness, I'll never be reliant on somebody else again. (Financially. I'm still going to need hugs and stuff. xoxoxo)

Hang Man

I was just absolutely terrible at dating when I was fresh out of the gate. I had very little search criteria at first. I didn't know any red flags. It was basically- am I attracted to him? Sa-weet, let's hang. This laissez faire approach did not work out too well for me. If a guy ever asks you to "hang out" my suggestion is to decline, politely. (Unless you are not looking for a relationship in which case do whatever the f you want. I'm not your mom.) Anywaysies- Why does a grown adult man want to "hang out" with me? It's ludicrous if you think it through. A guy asked me to hang the other day and it happens so often and irks me so much that I may have snapped at the poor boy a bit because..I dunno..it's just so annoying. I said, "Are you asking me if I want to hang out with you as platonic friends?". He explained that he was just trying to start a conversation. I politely declined the weak, flimsy invitation. It's kind of insulting if you think about it. Asking to hang says to me that this person is thinking, "Hmmm I'm really not that sure about you or excited about you and I want to put as little effort into this as possible and I don't think you're deserving of an actual date where my intention is crystal clear that I am romantically interested in you. Fingers crossed you sleep with me though." Am I right or am I right? Is there another side to it that I am missing? Am I being bitchy? I can't help it, that's how I feel. I've always had trouble putting into words why that bothers me so much. So, I am happy I was able to now. Admittedly, I am a 35 year old woman and perhaps someone younger would be completely cool with the dreaded hang out. But, it seems like the acceptance could stem from naivety. If I could go back in time and tell a young Skippy not to waste even one second with someone who didn't treat her decent - really fucking decent- I would. I'd shake young Skippy by the shoulders too and maybe slap her around a little bit like you do when you're trying to get someone to snap out of it. Hang out. Pshhhhh. P.S. Maybe say "Want to grab a drink?". That changes everything and who doesn't want a drink?