Rolling

I woke up this morning thinking it was a weekday. Not sure why, exactly. Maybe just because I didn’t feel as though a whole week had passed. I’ve only been home since Wednesday which, of course, felt like Monday and so today felt more like a Wednesday or Thursday instead of a Saturday.

My brain is running in continuous motion today. Like a slide show or an old school movie reel. Never stopping, the thoughts just keep coming like an old relative’s never ending slide show of a vacation to a warm and sunny locale. Ever notice how the people in those slides never really looked all that happy?

Once I figured out it was Saturday and I hadn’t overslept, my first thought was of Don. I’d like to post a transcript for all of you someday. Give you a word for word printout of all of the stuff we talk about each night. Near the end of the conversation, Don said, “six hours” and I thought he had made a mistake. I thought he meant to say “six days” meaning the length of time until he arrives here in Ontario except when I corrected him and teased him for “wishful thinking” he said he meant that we had been talking for six hours. And I was sure he had made a mistake because, like always, it didn’t seem like that much time had elapsed.

And so, even though I had been sleeping for * less * time than we had been talking the night before, I missed him. Instantly. And when I got up and started my day, I missed him even more.

What do we talk about, you might wonder. Let me tell you, it’s everything and anything under the sun. And we can both talk for hours on a subject and listen for hours about the same subject and sometimes, like times like last night, I almost feel like I’m getting smarter during those conversations.

We started out talking about periods, of all things. How I have mine, the Encare tablets must work because I’m not pregnant and how Don is still a bit squeamish about the whole, “girlfriend bleeding for a week a month” gig. How my bloody pad was the first one he had ever seen and his first reaction was that it was redder than he thought it would be and there was more than he had imagined. And I cut him some slack because I was the first even though usually I have no patience whatsoever for people who freak out about menstrual blood.

And that led to us talking about pregnancy and childbirth. Labor and delivery and postpartum bleeding. Which led to a discussion about how untrusting women are of their own bodies in this day and age, choosing a C-section over vaginal birth even when there aren’t any medical complications. The whole “too posh to push” scenario. Same goes for breastfeeding. Viewing it as something unnatural when in truth it is the purpose of breasts in the first place. And for some reason, taking a mouthful or faceful of ejaculate is perfectly fine but breastfeeding is something icky. Which led to a discussion about adult breastfeeding and how that’s viewed as natural…drinking a woman’s milk…but again, swallowing cum is average. * Sigh* I’d better quit while I’m ahead because I feel another tangent coming on.

I could keep going…tell you about the car, the brick wall, the weekend plans, the discussions and the next huge instalment of the never ending discussion on sexuality (just because I haven’t blogged about it in a while doesn’t mean that we don’t still discuss it. It’s still a work in progress and we talk about it and work on it constantly…)…but we’d be here, well, for six hours!

So I’ll spare you.

And instead try to make sense of everything else rolling, rolling, rolling around in this curly head of mine.

Like how sometimes Rock will hug me like he did before he left this morning for his friend’s house in Ottawa. And how it will make me want to cry for reasons beyond me. How it actually did make me cry this morning, standing in the kitchen and how when Emma asked me what I was crying about Rock said, “grown up growing pains, Em” and I really liked that. It summed it up.

I’m having growing pains.

It reminds me of the year that I got ready to move out of my parent’s house. I had spent so many years holed up in my little bedroom, plotting and dreaming and wishing and waiting for the day I could break free from that house. All that I ever wanted was a space of my own. A little apartment that would be mine…all mine. And I could do whatever I liked whenever I liked and answer to no one in particular. My bedroom at my parent’s house was my sanctuary. We lived in the middle of nowhere so I spent a lot of time in that bedroom and everything I owned and everything I loved and every thought I ever had (that was of significance, anyway) was in that room. I lived in there, sometimes not coming out for an entire weekend except to go to the bathroom and grab something to eat. And I would create zines and write, write, write and listen to music and talk on the phone and watch old movies on a little TV in between taped re-runs of My So-Called Life and Mad About You. And I would work on decorating it with a Michael Jackson wall (remember…shut up about that) and cut out pictures and another wall full of snapshots of my friends.

And then, after all of that living and all of that planning and plotting, it was time to go. And it was harder than I thought it would be. Much, much harder.

And my Mom called it a growing pain.

Rock and I are getting to the end of this relationship. We’ve been “over” for a while. But a literal, physical end is coming into sight now and I can’t lie…it’s a little scary and a little painful and a little overwhelming.

I’m having growing pains.

As I contemplate being a single mom. Living alone with my three children in this house. Learning how to cut grass with the lawn mower and order oil because I won’t be able to keep burning wood by myself. And it does seem weird to think that Rock won’t be in this house come winter. It does seem weird that he won’t be here to do all of the little Rock things he does. That we will no longer be a union but two separate people with two separate lives.

I know I can’t go back and that’s really irrelevant because I don’t * want * to go back. But it’s the unknown, right? And the unknown is scary. For most of us.

And I’m thinking about my sister, Judy and my Mom. And that’s another post for another day and it’s really not my story to tell. So I’ll leave it be and let it live in the confines of my skull.

And I’m thinking about the Pow Wow next weekend. And how I’m changing it so dramatically this year just by bringing Don. And that’s not a bad thing, not at all. But it’s strange. Because I always say that I have roots and not wings and while that’s really true in a literal sense because I’m not much for moving around all the time and changing locations and I like the feeling of being settled in something, it’s also a lie because I long for the feeling of being settled, but so rarely actually experience it. I’m in constant motion, even when I’m still. Something shifting and moving and changing, usually within myself as opposed to outside the walls that hold me up. But it’s a shift nonetheless.

And now that I really think about it, I think I’ve always been that way.

And I’m thinking about the back to school season being upon us and I’m thinking of our Mary elkhound and how I related so well to her post about money or a lack thereof. And I’m plotting how exactly I’m going to be able to afford to have a good time at the Pow Wow next weekend and * still * be able to afford the school supplies and clothes and shoes for two children, not to mention the fact that Michael has nothing for fall. And I’m thinking about how I wanted it to be fun for the girls, not a chore and not a time when they really have to “settle”, you know?

We went into town before Rock left for Cherry’s and we browsed at shoes and Em picked out a nice pair that was on sale but even with the discount, I couldn’t afford to buy them today. And Kate pulled a Kate and fell in love with the most impractical and overpriced pair in the store and so we had to leave.

Sometimes it feels like my head might explode I have so many thoughts rolling through it.

And then there are times when I’m glad for my tendency to overthink everything under the sun.

Like when someone says, “I feel so much better now. Thank you for explaining”.

And my brain heaves a sigh of relief.