Some pictures, peeps. I made a Cthulhu toy for the cool home ec teacher/game store owner who got a new job for September. It was half farewell and half payment for getting me started re-lining my favourite spring coat (translation: she traced, cut and sewed it together; now I get to sew it in. I'm cool with that.)

For those who worry, I am seeing a counsellor about once a month. I'm also reading some good books about CBT and one called Rebuilding After Your Relationship Ends which sort of makes me mad but has some good stuff buried among the patronizing points. Last night, when all I felt like doing was crying, Mason came over and made us supper. Good, healthy, fresh food does wonders for my mood. I even had the energy to clean up the kitchen before he arrived, which was an insurmountable horror when I was weeping into the tissue Blake so kindly provided. My parents are worried that I'll scar Blake with the tears, but the truth is that I cry very infrequently around him. Yesterday was a big exception. I worry more about the time I disengage, although I don't suppose it's any worse than what the Boy was doing this fall. I'm hoping to use the next two weeks to recharge and find my joy wherever it's hiding.

Labels: angst, crafty, health

It’s been a rough week. The end of the school year is always a bad patch for me – at its best I just want to sleep 24 hours a day, and at its worse I feel like my life has been a total waste. I’m at that second extreme right now. It’s like the school year puffs up my days full of air, and once that air is gone my life collapses into a new, shrunken state covering the odd, small shapes that lurk below. Every year I wonder how I could have let my life become so impoverished, so flat, so lonely, so boring. For the last few years I’ve also had the feeling that I’m a failure as a mother for not being able to shift into full-time mom mode as gratefully as everyone else seems to. The Boy has been my bulwark against the worst of these feelings for eight years in a row. This year he is gone, never to return, and suddenly that pain is breaking over me in waves that make me feel like this summer will drown me.

It’s pretty dumb stuff, too. This afternoon I dragged myself to the grocery store, and I was overwhelmed with thoughts of every trip we ever took to stock up. Every meal we ever botched in Nova Scotia, every pint of cherries we ever ate on the way home from the farmer’s market, every discovery we ever made in cookbooks and at the houses of friends: I’m the only one with that stuff still sloshing around inside me. From the way the Boy would talk in our last month together, it was pretty clear that he remembered our past as one unbroken stream of unhappiness. I’m the only one on earth left to think about the meals we cooked on our tiny hibachi and remember being in love. Sometimes I feel that the worst part about losing him is that I’ve lost my back up memories, and without my back up, how can I know for sure that I spent those years well? I thought we were happy but look how wrong I was. Why couldn’t I be wrong about everything else?

It was just as bad when I was shopping for Blake’s summer clothes. This is the typical, boring job we would have done together, late in the season and rushed. Every year we got to pick out the clothes we would get to love Blake in this summer. Now I get to pick out the clothes myself and think dismal thoughts about the Boy’s reaction.

Some people who used to be my friends got married this month. I’m in the awkward position of finding out through the internet, which doesn’t make this time any easier to bear. I just hope that they do better than I did. Than we did.

Labels: angst, blake, the boy

I am closing in on the end days of my sixth year as the World's Worst Teacher. This has not been one of my better years. I am profoundly disappointed in my time management, and my deep, deep procrastination reflex has never been exercised quite as much as it has this year. Of course, I have an automatic: this is the year the marriage sprung a leak, foundered and sunk. Still, I'm going to need to rise above it sometime, and that's going to have to be next year, I suppose. Next year I will have to learn how to balance the single mum thing, the teacher thing, the crafty thing and the dancer thing with the venerable closet intellectual/weekend goth thing. I think I'm going to have to get one of those books on how to sleep less at night.

And yet, I haven't done too badly this year. I had grave doubts about my ability to deliver term marks before exams were written (because marking term work and exams together is hot, crispy death), but it happened. All I had to give up was lunch yesterday, and while I am not one of those people who can skip meals without noticing, it all came right in the end. I was able to go to my exam supervision with a clear conscience, and once the whanging headache subsided, I had an awesome evening that included two dinners. Sweet.

Last night was a costuming session for my troupe, and I was all ready to skip it on the grounds of not enough good health and too much the Blake (who was not misbehaving, but who is not a kid you can safely park in a corner while you do something else). As Blake and I left the house to run an errand, a tiny bell clanged in the back of my mind. Hadn't I promised...something? To Juuki? About giving her a ride tonight, oh crap. So I went to her house, drove her to the meeting and was prepared to turn around again when Blake asked if we could go in.

"Just to say hi," I said, thinking he'd lose interest quickly. After all, he hadn't eaten dinner and we were on borrowed time. I hadn't counted on the amazing attraction of a new male friend, all to himself, in the person of Jessamyn's husband. The two of them played video games in the basement while the troupe ate freely of the potluck feast (to which I hadn't contributed, of course, not that it stopped me from eating away) and worked on our costumes. Blake was awesome for two hours, and the only reason we went home is because it was my bedtime. By this point, Blake had tried on my skirt and demanded his own so that he could dance with us.

He definitely has moments when his cuteness threatens to overwhelm existence and snuff out life as we know it.

Labels: angst, bat masterson, dancing

Things I Should Be Doing this Weekend:

1. marking the work that was handed in three weeks ago
2. cleaning the frying pan. I made those eggs on Thursday.
3. marking the crummy Catcher in the Rye essays that have been trickling in all week
4. putting away all of the yarn that has migrated to the main floor
5. folding and putting away the laundry that's been lying in the basement hallway since...God, I don't know.
6. going to see Pixie & Kelpie at the bike courier races, so I can give her her birthday present
7. cleaning my toilets. Because the frying pan isn't gross enough
8. marking! Goddamn, exams start on Monday!

Things I Did Instead:

1. ordered a pizza and ate it in the backyard with Blake and without the benefits of plates or napkins
2. took Blake to visit the twins up the street for a playdate/bbq. No bbq, so we played in the back yard until Blake got into it with another kid and I dragged him away.
3. bundled my reprobate into the car seat and went downtown to Lettuce Knit for the Yarn Harlot's birthday a.k.a. Worldwide Knit in Public Day a.k.a. the Toronto branch of the 1000 Knitters Shoot. Even arriving hungry and wondering what I would do with Blake during the party couldn't dent my happy anticipation. Whee! Blake, however, was disappointed when his favourite kid Obi left with his family to go "to Space Island." "Better wear your helmet," I cautioned. Space is rough that way.
4. went to KOS for brunch and a bellini; found Jendricks, Fenner, Tapeheads and Zoe. All the mamas had booze. Blake was happy with his baconface.
5. came back to LK in time to hear Mason's Amazing True Stories of How He Learned About Lapdances to the Detriment of Sage's University Fund. Was totally charmed by his tales of drunken ineptitude, especially as he was unshaven and wearing a new snappy hat, like a character out of Small Change. Blake takes advantage of my distraction to start shovelling sweets into his mouth. Everyone thinks he is the cutest thing ever. They're right, but wait until the sugar crash, friends. It gets real ugly real fast.
6. got my photo taken by Franklin. He is awesome and I just wish I'd had more time to hang out after the shoot when he wasn't working his butt off.
7. left at around 4 o'clock: Blake sticky, Mason hungover, myself sad that I couldn't celebrate WWKiP day with more than a few seconds' knitting. I did start a new project, but I didn't even finish the cast on that day.
8. arrived at Juuki's house for the double-header birthday: her husband and the cat. As the first guests, we had the run of the place, and the adults were able to go up to the balcony while Blake and Paisley splashed around in the inflatable pool. Tranquility interrupted with the news of a missing child.
9. spent the next hour walking around with Blake (who was wearing his underwear and a pair of shoes) and looking for the lost boy. Not as much fun as I'd anticipated. Came home to find that everything was resolved. Ate a slice of meat cake (the frosting is mashed potatoes!) and drove Mason home.
10. fell asleep almost as soon as we got back to our house.
11. went to church. Dragged Blake off the refreshment table after 3 brownies too many and hauled his protesting self home.
12. drove to Mo & Brand's condo for a house-cooling party. Watched Blake run with the herd for 2 1/2 hours before scooping him up and taking him home.
13. watched Blake dump orange juice on the floor in a temper, carried him to the bath and got him to bed without further incident. He was clearly suffering from Too Many Parties.

There is no completed marking, or housework, or crafting to report. I am going into tomorrow the least prepared I have been in years. And yet, the weekend was fantastic. Wouldn't have traded it for anything. Even those sugar-fuelled temper tantrums and the anxious hour of child-searching were a decent price to pay for pizza in the backyard, bellinis with knitmommies and photos with some of my favourite craftistas.

Labels: bat masterson, festivals, friends, knit, outings

Ugh. I am in a shit mood right now. The end of the year always hits me like an emotional tonne of bricks. I always feel like I’ve let all of my students down. They are always more than happy to blame me for their marks, lack of attendance, personal problems, etc. I have felt like shit since the moment that one of my students, in trying to guess my ethnicity, said, “she’s not Swedish. Swedish girls are sexy.”

The problem with that statement is that any way you slice it, including a retraction, it’s either creepy or insulting.

In an effort to boost my mood, I’m trying to make a list of Good Things That Happened Today. If that doesn’t work, I’ll expand my time limits.

1. only one teaching day left, and if it doesn’t rain, I’ll be spending it outside next to a gladiator ring, wearing my World’s Worst Teacher shirt.
2. I bought Mill Street Tankhouse Ale on the way home, smoothing my evening with a single craft-brewed beer.
3. tonight is the lowest stress meal ever: breakfast for dinner night. Yay!
4. after supper, I’m going out to buy 2 ½ yards of fabric and an inflatable pool. Don’t you want to be invited to my parties now?
5. usually Blake does the occasional overnight at Camp Grampa (as much his idea as mine), but as of today Blake is staying with me for the next uninterrupted week. Uninterrupted! Week!
6. this weekend’s going to be awesome.
7. next weekend may involve Drunken Knitting, retro goth dancing and a going-away party for two of the city’s “most beloved chefs.” I only met one last Saturday and I already love her.
8. last night I danced for 2 hours and became the Belly Dance Secretary. Her shimmies are entered into the minutes!
9. my credit card bill for this month was $700 less than it was last month. (There are a couple charges going through soon, including the dinner where I met the chef of #7. Yummmy.)
10. I am two arms into a Cthrocheted Cthulu. Eee!
11. hugs and kisses are mere hours away, waiting in my friends and in the future for our next meeting.

Is good.

Labels: blake, friends, happiness