Chasing the Bus

My friend Judi picks me and the kids up on the mornings they are with me. She drives me to the bus stop and then takes the boys to her house, where they have second breakfast with her son. Then they all walk to school together. W once told her, "Judi, you're the center of the earth." And indeed she is.

Often we're late. Sometimes she's late. This puts us in a situation that has come to be known as Chasing the Bus. As in,"Hurry up, Judi's going to be here soon, and we don't want to Chase the Bus."

Judi's learned a tricky maneuver of cutting right in front of the bus if it's about to drive away without me. The bus driver once asked me if she was a cop because she cut him off so elegantly.

If we round the corner and see that the bus has taken off, the kids yell, "Oh no, we're chasing the bus!" Judi bravely chases it to one of the four remaining stops before it gets on the freeway. We always make it.

Other Things You Don't Want to Happen if You Can't Drive A Car

Someone (and I'm not naming names, but it's one of the two people who are shorter than I in my household) left the back gate open on Saturday. Mariah, the dog who doesn't eat everything, but is unfortunately fond of her own feces, decided to go on a little adventure.

I didn't realize she was gone for awhile, and by then it was dark and while I wandered around the neighborhood for some time calling for her, I couldn't find her. We made up some lost dog posters and I put up a listing on craig's list. Then I checked the County Animal Shelter website, and there she was, smiling up at me, quite pleased with herself. They were closed through Monday, I couldn't get away from work on Tuesday, so she remained incarcerated for three and a half days.

This is what it took to spring her: I took a trolley to a stop near the shelter. My friend Kymberli picked me up there. We drove over to the shelter, where I paid an impound fee, a renewed license fee, another renewed license fee FOR MY OTHER DOG!! (Don't ever tell them you have another dog) and a daily boarding fee. Total cost: $98. Time away from work--3 hours.

They brought her out to me and she showed no remorse, no shame. Indeed, she was quite jaunty about the whole thing. Boomer was thrilled to see her, and when I released her into the backyard, she headed over to the gate, as if hoping it were still open.

I took the bus back to work, worked a couple more hours and took the bus home.

Four weeks and two days.

In Which I Survive A Family Vacation. Totally Sober.

The kids and I just got back from a week in Lake Tahoe. With my parents. And my aunt. We drove, or rather, my father drove all of us. 9 hours up there. About 11 back. All in one car. My first vacation sober in memory.

The last time we went on a "family vacation" was about two years ago. We took the kids and joined my husband's family at a place we used to frequent on the coast of South Carolina. I made sure we stocked plenty of wine and vodka and while I wasn't drunk all day, every day, I observed a four o'clock happy hour and kept it up until about midnight.

My own family, like most people's, is a cast of characters. My 77-year old aunt has worn an Elizabeth Taylor-style wig since before I was born. When I was young, she was the only one who understood why I HAD TO HAVE THE RED MARY JANE SHOES even though they hurt my feet. We share an interest in sparkly jewelry and celebrity news. She has become a bit forgetful, though, and tends to talk about people and places in vague pronouns, which can make it difficult to have a conversation with her.

This exchange happened in the car on the ride back after we identified the song on the radio as written by Janis Joplin,

Aunt: "You know, she was with that actor who played in that movie with Barbra Streisand."

Me: "Kris Kristofferson?"

Aunt: "Yes. They were all set to get married."

My father: "I thought she was a lesbian?"

My aunt" "That's right."

(At this point, Dad and I pause, not sure where this is going)

My aunt, clearly comfortable with the way this is going: "They were both schoolteachers."

(My father and I exchange a glance in the rearview mirror that says we don't believe this is true, but really, you're going to question the woman who knows more about celebrity gossip than E! ?)

My father becomes the Great Santini on a road trip. I was instructed that the children and I should be ready at 5 a.m. SHARP, or we'd be left behind. We were ready. Let the record reflect that they were late, although I'm sure that had more to do with the foot-dragging of my stepmom and my aunt. On the way home, he grumbled to me when I said I needed to use the bathroom, "Just like when you were a kid--always had to go to the bathroom." "Dad, our last stop was THREE HOURS AGO!" He was unswayed. Apparently he has a bladder of steel.

My stepmother is the family's beloved control freak. She is the glue that keeps us all together, the planner, the one who makes family meals and family vacations happen. She is a stunning force of nature. She told me once that if everyone would just live the way she told them to do, we would all be much happier. On a regular basis, she pushes us all a little too far and we snap at her. Bless her, she is unfazed, and retreats to fight another day.

By the time we all arrived in the Sierras, I was pooped, cranky. Stepmom sidles up to me and whispers, "I have a xanax, do you want it?" Apparently recovery from alcoholism doesn't preclude a little light pill abuse in her book.

I can't say it was a relaxing vacation, and I kind of wish I'd hunted down an AA meeting, just to see what sobriety looked like in Lake Tahoe, but I'm proud to say I got my kids up on a snowboard and skis, respectively, and we had some good solid family fun.

Countdown

In eight weeks and one day, I can go to the DMV and get a new driver's license. I have to take the written test. I get a new picture. And then I'm going to pick up my kids and take them on a roadtrip.

Alone Together

I'm on the bus. The local because it's a holiday. Meeting the Boyfriend so we can hit a few golf balls. I have two clubs and a putter. And a bag with my bike seat in it. Another guy just got off carrying a guitar. Everyone is looking at their phone, texting or listening to music. No one's reading a paper or a book. No one is talking. I've erred by failing to get coffee.

Happy Birthday to Me

A year ago today, I walked into my first AA meeting. I wasn't convinced at the time that it was the thing for me, but since heavy drinking didn't seem to be solving any problems and had landed me in jail, I thought I'd better give it a try.

I guess it's different in different places, but the AA meeting I go to on Sundays celebrates annual "birthdays." And there's cake. My kids have gotten wind of the cake. I had to promise to save them some.

They sing a version of the birthday song to you, and my sponsor gave me two tokens--one of hers from when she reached one year, and another one that reminds me that when I have tried everything else, I can be still be sure that I will step forward and the earth will support me or that I will be given wings.

I cried. And then I did what was expected, which is to tell the story of how I got there, or as we say in AA, what it was like then and what it's like now.

I talked about being a good girl from the suburbs. How I'd only had a few drinks before I went to college, where I met the delicious wine cooler Bartles & James. I reminisced about how alcohol removed all anxiety and fear. How I became a heavy drinker, but not all the time, which gave me the illusion that I had it "under control." And then I talked about a bad year, where I had to put the Greatest Dog in the World to sleep, suffered a major professional setback, had a miscarriage and stopped communicating with my husband. And how it all fell apart. And how I know I can't go back now, because it isn't something that gets better. I crossed some kind of invisible line.

Sometimes I feel guilty because nothing truly bad happened. Mine is not the scariest story I've heard. It makes me feel like I don't deserve to feel good about the progress I've made. But then I say that out loud, and it sounds kind of fucked up, so I figure that's just part of the disease of alcoholism.

I don't feel like drinking anymore. In fact, I can say that by some miracle I now think of drinking as something other people do, but not me. What remains is the inability to know how to live life without drinking. Without meaning to sound pathetic, I seem to be a bit deficient in the coping arena, and learning to cope without liquid courage turns out to be quite a project.

Another favorite AA cliche, "One day at a time."

I invited my stepmother to the meeting. She brought me flowers and took me grocery shopping afterwards. Then she brought me to her and my dad's house for Sunday chicken dinner. Happy Birthday to me.

It's the little things

I read once that it isn't the big traumas in life that make people unhappy, but the small, everyday annoyances that wear away at a person's serenity. A squeaky door for example. A leaking faucet. The idea is that if you deal with the small things that bug you, the satisfaction you will feel far exceeds whatever effort you put out to fix the thing.

I'm pretty sure this happens in reverse, too. A lot of small things conspired against me in November and December and I got stuck. The weather was a problem--it was colder and rainier than usual, which made getting around without a car a bigger headache than usual. Then my bike seat was stolen. My debit card number was pirated somehow, too, so I had to cancel my card and wait for a new one. Don't even ask about switching health insurance and getting my prescriptions filled.

I know I sound like a big whiner, but it was too much. I got stuck. I took to my bed when the kids were with their dad, unable to do much of anything.

And then I got unstuck. Right after Christmas, I went into cleanse mode and started cleaning out the house, closet by closet. I'm throwing stuff out, stacking it for donation. It's been psychically cleansing too. I bought a new bike seat. And it's still light when I get off the bus now. So ends the winter of our discontent.