Boozer or Prozac Goddess

A couple of years ago my best friend hosted our monthly Bunco group. For those of you who don't know, this is a group of 12 women, usually Moms, who sit around each other's houses drinking wine, eating, and playing a mindless dice game. I have since dropped out of the group because I have found other things that I enjoy more and quite frankly, most of these women were getting on my nerves with their boring lives. But I digress...

Where was I? O yeah...for most of these Moms, Bunco is their only escape from the husbands, children, pets, etc., and so it's usually a long bitch session about their insensitive and lazy husbands, their unruly and spoiled children, and how did we end up here questions. These conversations never get too serious. And if you try to talk to these women about other things like books, movies, lives other than their children, even TV, you reach a brick wall, a robotic brick wall called, "I'm a good Mommy, and I don't have a life of my own any more because I give it all to my children. And I'm happy to do it."

Anyway, during my friend's get together the topic of Prozac came up. Apparently one woman is married to a man who insists upon sex daily whether she wants to or not (but compared to her last husband, he's a treat...get my drift?), and to get through it she takes Prozac. Next thing you know several other women confessed to their taking of Prozac as well. By the time the conversation ended 6 of the 12 women confessed to this fact. For those of you not getting this, 1/2 of the women in this house were on anti-depressants.

OK one more time, 50% of these women take drugs to get through the day.

My friend Tina and I, who are a little sadistic, I admit, almost died laughing. But then we thought about it. Aren't we equally obsessed with our weekly glass or two of wine?

And then the question popped up...to be a true and happy Stay at Home Mom in Oklahoma, does it take a little something extra to get through the day? Is that the secret?

You see, until this moment, Tina and I thought we were the shameful one's with our need to escape once a week from the family for a nice glass of wine and grown-up conversation. After all, we were the only one's we had met in our town that did this regularly. And we had gotten so many judging looks and comments like, "No, my husband doesn't like me to drink without him" when we had invited other women to join us. We were starting to feel like the worst Mothers in the world with our need to occasionally escape the reality we had created.

And so we laughed at all of these Prozac takers. Sure, they may spend every waking moment catering to their children’s needs. And they may cook like Martha Stewart and have a house kept like June Cleaver and look like a perfect Stepford Wife. And they may never express the need for a, gasp, glass of wine. But they are in denial, a denial called Prozac.

So I have one last question...which one are you? Prozac Goddess? or Boozer?

For all you Boozers out there, welcome! And for all you Prozac takers, join us...it’s fun on the dark side.

**Originally Posted June 2006

Fat

So today I meet my Mother for lunch. She had called me earlier because she had found some dishes at Ross that she thought I would like. Here's the call,

"Hello?"

HUGE PAUSE

"Hello?"

HUGE PAUSE

"Hello?"

Another HUGE PAUSE. I hang up.

The phone rings again.

"Hello?"

"Can you hear me?"

"Yes Mom. I can hear you."

"What?"

"I can hear you..."

"Wait, let me move to another part of the store...OK, can you hear me?"

"Yes Mom, I can hear you."

"OK, I'm at Ross..." This is no surprise. On Tuesdays Ross has the "If you're over 55 you get 10% off day" every Tuesday. Mom is there every Tuesday. "and I found some dishes that I thought would work with the red dishes you have that really didn't hold up. I can't believe it because they were not cheap. Anyway, these are really nice, and I thought I could buy them for you and give them to you for your b-day (which is in January) or Christmas. What do you think?"

Now this topic is always very common...especially on Tuesdays. Mom is always buying things and saving them for me or my children for b-days or Christmas. Half the time she forgets she has them. I bet when we clean out her house we'll find tons of amazing stuff hidden all over.

It's at this point I guess I should mention that I'm with my son at another local discount store. Here's that end of the conversation happening while I'm talking to my Mom, and he's "not" trying to run over my foot with a grocery cart,
"Who is it?"
"Is it Grandma?"
"What does she want?"
"Does she want to meet us for lunch?"
"Mom....MOM....MOOOOOOOOMMMMMMMM?"

Me, "Yes?"

"Can we go to Wendy's with Grandma?"

Me, "Mom, the dishes sound good. Do you want to go to Wendy's with B and I?"

Mom, "I don't know...you know I can't eat anything over there any more because they have soy in everything..." I start to cringe at this point. Here comes the I can't eat anywhere because my health is a great big piece of crap commentary. I walked right into this one.

So stupidly I say, "How about Olive Garden?"

"I don't know. I can't eat the pasta there. And they have soy in their salad dressing as well. You know I can't really eat anywhere any more. The whole thing has just been ruined for me."

"Well you don't have to go, Mom. I was just asking. Ben and I will go by..."

"Well I want to go...I guess we can go to Wendy's. I don't know what I could eat there. I suppose I could just have a baked potato."

"Would you rather go to Olive Garden? Or somewhere else? Where would you like to go Mom?"

"I don't know. You know with the whole soy allergy and I'm trying to stay off of carbs because when I eat carbs I feel bad. On the other hand in I eat fried food I feel bad too. So I guess Olive Garden is OK."

Hurriedly I say, "OK. I'm going to check out and we'll meet you there." And I hang up.

I turn to my son, and he says in a excited tone, "Are we going to Wendy's?"

"No, Olive Garden..."

"OOOOOOOOOhhhhhh. I don't want to go there...."

So that brings me to lunch. B & I drive over to the Olive Garden. We go inside, and my Mom comes in after we are seated. The first thing she says to me is, "GEEZ. You are really looking FAT!"

**Originally Posted May 2006

The Definition of a Woman

This morning I was watching Good Morning America and a story came up called Widow Finds Unexpected Love on Safari. Basically it was a story about what happened to a woman who lives in Nairobi and was traumatized by the death of a philandering husband who is killed while on his way to visit his lover. In the aftermath that followed she said, "You know I think that I had one life until that point, and then I have another life from that point," she said. "I feel like one of my lives ended there, and something completely different has started." So what two lives was she talking about? She was talking about the life with one husband vs. a life with her a new husband that she met recently on safari. So my question is, if this highly successful adventurous clothing designer does it, do all women define their lives and themselves by the relationships with the men in their lives?

Lot’s of women I know would define their lives this way. I have one friend who says that a woman’s attractiveness ends at forty. After all, “what would a man want with a woman after forty?” Other women I’ve encountered in Oklahoma follow their men around like puppies because of some skewed sense of moral obligation. Their entire lives are defined by the decisions that their husbands make. And other women I know were so traumatized by a divorce that they only see their lives as before and after the divorce. Certainly all of these women define themselves by the men in their lives. But do all?

I don’t think so. Personally, I see my life very differently than a lot of women. But I always have been a little bit of an oddball. If I would have to segment my life, I would divide it into thirds, the “bumbling around stage,” the “beginning of self-awareness,” and “the maturation.” The “bumbling around stage” is birth all the way up to my early 20’s. The “beginning of self-awareness” is the time in which I finally gained some self-confidence and began to recognize who I was and what I loved. The “maturation” came after the birth of my children and will probably continue on to death, unless of course I lose my mind and enter the “crazy” stage; but I digress. None of these stages were entirely defined by the men in my life.

However, looking at my stages, I cannot deny that the men in my life didn’t have some influence upon them. Obviously my father had some part in the creation of my beginning, the beginning the “bumbling around stage.” And the “maturation” was indeed started by the birth of a son. But they do not define the stages of my life. They do not define who I am. Perhaps instead they influence how I developed, just as the women in my life influenced how I developed, the traveling I experienced influenced how I developed, the education I had influenced how I developed, etc.

So that brings me to one final question. If not all of the woman in the world define their lives by the men in them, why is that all we seem to see from others? Perhaps it is time to tell the whole story of the woman in Africa, the mother, the designer, the adventurer, the friend, and the role model. Perhaps it is time to find new segment dividers for the story of our lives. Perhaps we need to define our lives and not let others do it for us.

**Originally Posted in April 2006

Church and State: Can they be separate?

I recently saw a news story concerning All Saints Episcopal Church in Pasadena. During the 2004 election the sermon from the pulpit during one Sunday criticized the war in Iraq and cited complaints against both Bush’s and Kerry’s campaigns. Because of this sermon said church is now under investigation by the IRS because they are at risk for losing their exempt status. For "the federal tax code prohibits tax-exempt organizations, including churches, from intervening in political campaigns and elections."

My first thought when I heard this story was the, “Wow…they certainly haven’t been to church in Oklahoma, have they?” Every service that I’ve ever been too during election time certainly espouses their, all be it non-partisan, viewpoint of what we should expect from our government officials. And every service during this wartime offers out prayers to our elected officials wishing them to make wise and Christian decisions for our country.

My second thought then was then, “Well these churches are finally getting their dues.” Forever the religious right has been trying to force their view points down the non-religious peoples' view points by shoving religion into our government funded facilities. For example, prayer in school, having to swear on the Bible in court, putting the 10 Commandments in front of our government buildings, etc. So why shouldn’t they have to pay their taxes like the rest of us? They obviously aren’t too interested in the separation of church and state. Perhaps they are only interested when it hurts their cause.

And then I had a third thought. I thought about all of the government officials who used their religion as a stepping-stone to get them elected during their individual campaigns. It was a well-known tactic of Bush’s team to use the gay marriage debates to get the right wing extremists to vote for them during the last presidential election. And I can’t watch a campaign advertisement from any side in Oklahoma without hearing about what a good Christian man or woman the candidate in the commercial is. And in thinking about this, my opinion became more and more foggy. For if government officials can use religion and churches for their purposes, why can’t these same religious institutions promote their own political viewpoints in church? And should they have to then lose their tax-exempt status in doing so?

I don’t know. I do know that the issue of separation between church and state has become so cloudy that I can’t tell where government has ended and church has begun. I can’t tell what’s an American value vs. a Christian value. And I can’t stand being this confused all of the time. What to do? I don’t know. Perhaps I should just stop watching the news.

**Originally Posted September 2006

Writing: Pre Twitter Style

So I'm going to be really busy for the next week, and I decided that it might be a good idea to pull up and re-post some of my older posts that I wrote when I had zero readers. I was at the newbie stage. Remember that stage? You thought very carefully about everything you were going to say. You proofread your posts before you posted them. You posts were long, and you tried very, very hard to write something truly great. You knew nothing about S.E.O. or networking, and you innocently thought that a blog's popularity was all about the writing. Also, and this part may be hard to believe, but there was no Twitter (though it was very close to launching).

I know.

I barely remember a time with no Twitter.

I know.

I'm starting to sound like one of those "back in my day" old people.

As I read over pre-Twitter posts I noticed that my writing pre-Twitter was a lot better than it seems to be lately. I actually talk about things that I feel are important. I actually talk about them more than in just than 140 characters.

I know.

A blog post with bonafied paragraphs and a beginning, middle, and an end?

Who was this person?

I don't know, but I miss her.

So this is what I've decided. I'm going to work on finding her again. Oh, not now while the kids are home interrupting me every second, but when they go back to school and the only thing I have to worry about is whether a whole bag of marshmallows eaten by my dog might actually kill him.

I know.

It's a whole new world at Kellyology.

Excuse me.

I need to go tweet about it.