Across the State Line

We tossed out several ideas for what to do this weekend. Out of all of the ideas, we decided to head up to Tahoe.  But not just to Lake Tahoe, we decided to be really daring and head to the Nevada side.  We haven't been to the Nevada side since driving across the border almost two years ago...to live here.



First, we stopped in Tahoe City on the north side and had what we felt was mediocre food.  Where that was isn't important.  But now we know why the Visitor Center guy didn't mention it last time.  We should have known.  From there we headed to Incline Village....on the Nevada side.  We've heard varying stories about the sides of Tahoe.  First off, you have the South side and the North side in California.  Everyone has their favorite.  Then you hear about the Nevada side and California's side.  The states seem to bicker about who has the best stuff.  Nevada seems to have the casino stuff.  And also....




Their beaches cost money.  $12.




Nevada has the best parking places though.  Seriously.  I haven't seen parking spots with that sort of room since leaving the Midwest.



And yes, our car is filthy.  California is in a drought.  And we probably wouldn't have it washed, anyway.






And last....the best beaches.  By far.  California can't even compete.  But don't tell them we said that.  California might get upset with us.  And we don't want to give Nevada any additional reasons to gloat. But seriously.  Even for a couple hours, it was $12 well spent.

The Redhead was excited and shocked to find Lamb's ear.  (We had a lot of Lamb's ear in our landscaping...and yard...in Kansas.)

The Redhead was eyeing what somebody left on the sidewalk.  The answer was "no."

Meanwhile, I was eyeing that beautiful darling.

Even the rocks on the Nevada side were different.  So it seemed.

These were The Redhead's version of model poses.  That she was mocking.

I swear that rock had a face.

Lion King posing.

This was especially fun as our GPS pronounced "Susie" as "Sussy."  Mister Man's sister's name is "Susie."  He's thinking her name is now, "Sussy."

Wild About Harry: Box Top'n it

I love saving Box Tops. On personalized sheets I make myself.  My latest one is themed for the party.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0ByuFq0hcaeVAdVZNSTdJVk9JTUk/view?usp=sharing

Wild About Harry: Painting Snitches is a...

I don't know if you've ever played Quidditch, but in case you haven't, the most important part of the game is catching the golden snitch, this beautiful golden little ball with wings.  It flies around all stealth-like and if you indeed catch it, like Harry Potter himself, you're golden.  Or at least you've won the game.



Sounds easy enough, right?


Of course.

So, I decided to make some golden snitches.  I figured it should have been simple enough.  If Harry Potter can catch those little buggers, surely I, a middle-aged woman could make a few.  Or one dozen.  I did so with ping pong balls from the 99 cent only store, glue sticks, a nail, white feathers, and gold spray paint.  I first punctured some holes in the sides and used hot glue to make designs The Redhead liked.

  Then I took those wonderful little balls of joy outside to paint.  So easy.  This was going to be a breeze.

Oh yeah.

Well, it was a breeze.  Or at least there was one.  And you know what I tend to forget?  Somehow, magically forget?  Balls roll.  They roll while you spray them with paint.  They roll with the wind while they dry.  They roll.  Time and time again, those little buggers roll.

It's like they're balls or something.

Eventually I had them all painted and luckily I didn't make too big of a mess on the concrete found on the side of our yard.  I had Midas' touch again.  And I had little snitches just in need of wings.  The holes needed to be bigger for the wings, and The Redhead preferred the wings to be white, so with wings added, we were closer to being prepared for a game or twelve of Quidditch.

Be Nice, Anyway

Sometimes in my head, I break people down into categories: The Users, The Fellow Used, and The Not So Bad.  I don't always think of them by those exact names, but they're categorized just the same.  You can feel free to sort yourself into your own category, but don't expect me to tell you where I think you fit.  Because that knowledge stays inside my head.  And maybe perhaps in text messages to my best friend.  That has been known to happen, there's no use denying it.



There are these memes and quotes where they tell you "maybe ____________________, but be kind anyway." And there is a ton of examples of people behaving badly, but it always ends with, "be kind, anyway" and some sentiment about it never being about you anyway.  And I understand this so well because in my life I find myself more often than not getting into situations that are very one-sided.  I know I'm partly responsible for that, as it can't just be the other people.  Mister Man claims it's because people seek out people like me because there are far less "Used" than "Users."  Whichever party is to blame (I'm thinking both), this happens.  People act ungrateful, I continue to help them.  It's like I'm all, "YES.  MORE PLEASE" or something.  These people do not see me as used, nor kind, I assure you.  I am merely a means to an end and honestly, I'm invisible the rest of the time.



I've had more family treat me like this than don't, "friends," and people I barely know.  And for whatever reason, I always would let it go on, mostly due to a combination of not wanting to be confrontational and another thinking it was simply "the right thing to do."  I kept telling myself (and other people did too) to keep doing it anyway.  You should always be nice, right?  You should always treat people how you want to be treated, right?  You should be above it all, right?


Right.  That's correct.  You should still show your integrity.  You should always be nice.  Exhibit kindness in everything you do.  Entitlement, be damned.  Reciprocation, be damned.  Two-sided kindness, be damned.  The problem is....dignity, be damned happens too.



Yeah, I typed it.



Does that mean you stop?  No.  It doesn't.  But one method that's worked for me is moving over a thousand miles away.  Have you ever heard that phrase "if someone borrows $20 and you never see them again, consider it money well spent"?  Well, move across the country.  The same sort of thing happens.  Seriously.  They stop calling you for favors because you're not around.  They don't beg you for anything.  They don't even contact you.  Ever.  They'll claim it's because they're busy.  Sure, sure.  That happens.  You completely understand.  But you're too relieved to be free from the hassle, that it doesn't matter what excuses they could offer.  The fact is, these people kept you on their mental Rolodex because that was the purpose you served in their life, or at least that's the purpose I served.  And I'm not even angry.  It's not like I didn't know the truth.  I always knew.  I always knew they never liked me because that wasn't my purpose.  It was always about what I could do for them.



Friends.  Acquaintances.  Family.  Very few people even attempt to keep in touch.  In fact, I can count on one hand the people I hear from often.  And the people I hear from every so often?  None of them are family or friends either.  They're all teachers or staff we had in Kansas, which I do consider friends, as they've had more of a part in my life than most people.  I receive texts from our new tenant far more than most people, and they're friendly texts too.  When we were moving, can you guess how many people helped us?  How many people stopped by to see us before we moved?  The number is embarrassingly low.  And most people who did stop by?  Yeah, they were stopping by to ask if they could have something.  Aside from Mister Man's parents, we didn't have any family wish us off.  And that's okay.  I knew where we stood with all of them far before we ever moved.



Now this isn't to make you feel sorry for me.  For us.  Absolutely not.  But one of the reasons my husband was so determined to eventually move to a coast was because of the lack of support we received and the amount of support we gave.  He despised the imbalance.  It's not that he wanted anything from anyone; he didn't.  He never did.  But he hated watching how family, friends, etc. continued to treat me.  He saw everything I did, all the good things, and he never could understand how or why I would continue doing it with little to no gain.  He saw family repeatedly be ungrateful with their insipid whining, he saw "friends" berate me, he saw people continuously tell me I wasn't doing enough, and if I couldn't fulfill a favor for someone immediately, he saw the backlash and what it did to me.  He saw me cast as the villain.  Each and every time.  And he would always say to me, "you make me look so nice and so good and everyone thinks it's because of me, and not one of these people are willing to recognize it's always you."


We have been on the west coast for almost two years now.  We haven't heard from most people for over that amount of time.  It's hilarious, actually.  But it's mostly relieving.  It's freeing to know where you stand with people.  When all of your self doubt rings true....it's saddening, but it's an honest thing.  And you start to doubt yourself less because you realized your intuition was truly spot-on.  And I'm kind anyway.  I'm guarded and I'm still unable to really allow myself to get to know people or let them know me. I recently found myself in another situation being taken advantage of, and it felt familiar, like an old adversary.  It was both comfortable and uncomfortable.  And I found my old pal, Experience, helping me know how to handle it, which was with awkwardness and little to no skill.



Yes, be kind anyway.  No matter how someone treats you.  However if you find yourself eventually unable to do that, that's understandable too.  Because it was indeed always about them anyway.  They made sure of it.

I Don't Miss Working Anymore

I don't miss working anymore.  Well, I kind of do.  I do.  I do still miss working.  But not like I did.  I used to ache.  For a while, I was jonesing for that hectic life again.  I was definitely in withdrawal.  And it's not the job I was longing for.  It was everything that came with it.  The hustle.  The rushing from one place to another.  The pushing myself to stretch time, to make my time do cartwheels.  I was so proud of myself for getting everything accomplished that I accomplished in a day.  Sure, it ticked me off when people would say, "well, you have so much more time than I do," and I'd look at their schedule and I'd look at mine.  How was I working full-time nights, doing all the community service things I was doing, school PTO, attempting to sleep and still having more time than everybody else?


Well, I wasn't.  It just looked like I did because I made the time.  I always made the time.  I always said, "I'd make it work."  I did so regardless of what it did to me mentally or to me physically.  I did it again and again with pneumonia.  I always made it work.  And everyone knew I'd make it work.  So therefore, surely I had more time than them...because it's not like they'd ever make it work.  It had to be based on time, and nothing else.



But I don't miss working anymore.  Not everything that came with it.  Not the self doubt.  And the constant feeling that I never did enough.  Because now that I no longer am working, I finally realize my worth.  I always thought working made me worth something.  I felt like that when The Redhead was two and I decided to take a part-time job...to prove my worth.  To show I too could be productive.  And so many people were more than willing to let me know my lack of worth.  They were more than willing to explain how much abundant time I had.  Whether I was "just a mother."  Whether I worked part-time almost every evening and weekend.  Whether I worked full-time during the day.  Even when I worked full-time nights.  These people were so overly helpful.  And it took me moving to the west coast and not working to realize that it was never about me.  It was always about them.



I don't miss working.



When we moved out here, Mister Man negotiated a compromise with me.  He really, really, really wanted me to stay home for a while.  He asked me to stick it out for six months.  Shortly after that initial negotiation, he upped it to a year.  And then before I knew it, it became an indefinite stay.  He loves dinners at home.  He loves that I take The Redhead to practices and lessons and am available for sick days.  I can handle all of the doctor and dentist appointments.  I do the shopping.  I handle the charity work.  And I did a lot of that before, but now I do it without bags under my eyes.  I do it without us comparing schedules and moving around time slots.  The house is cleaner.  And there's no sense in pretending- our house could not be clean when I was working.  I had two people home when I wasn't there putting things in places they didn't belong.  And I have two modes.  Perfection.  Or Chaos.  I'm an all or nothing sort of girl.




Now don't get me wrong.  I love to work. LOVE to work.  I love cramming as much in a day as possible.  I'm not a television girl.  I'm not a restful girl.  I'm the girl who moves constantly and has to always have something coming up, something due.  I live my life like that. I'm always like that.  I thrive off of that.  But I have discovered that's my personality, for better or for worse, and I'm always going to be like that.  Whether I have a real job or not.  I'm always going to be doing something.  That's who I am.  Just because I don't have a job doesn't mean I'm any less, and it's taken me a REALLY long time to see that.  I'm a workaholic by nature.  And just because I'm actually enjoying not working doesn't make me lazy.  I'm still coming to terms with that part.  I'm a lucky wife though.  I am.  I know.  I know I'm lucky for this lifestyle and situation.  However, I'm realizing my family is lucky too.  And I find they missed me and I missed them far more than I even miss working.


Even though I still do sort of miss it.  But almost two years later, I miss it less.  Withdrawal is over.  But I'm still a junkie and recovery is tough.  I know what's important now.  And it's not my interpretation of what everyone else thinks.  And that's the greatest thing to come from this.