Obviously, I'm in a funk

I don't think it'd come as a surprise to anyone who cares to read this that I'm in a funk. I have been since mid-summer, probably before that, too, but I distinctly remember thinking, "Holy shit. I'm not cool," somewhere around August.

I've struggled with the concepts of my marriage and reconciling them with who I am and who I used to be, being a stay at home mother, boredom and balance, exhaustion, loneliness, how much I hate Texas, getting some time to myself, giving myself a break, feminist mothering, and that [never really mentioned] infertility issue.

I can't believe that even ONE person has continued to read what I've written. What a freakin' downer I've been.

Thanks for hanging around, really.

Every once in a while someone writes a blog post saying, "I don't like posting sad/depressing/upsetting things because you can find that anywhere and I want to put positive things out there," and I think, "Gee. That's never even occurred to me."

I don't know if I'm selfish or if my craving for interaction is such that I am forced to put myself out there in all degrees of mood. I don't really care. I just try to be as real as I can without betraying my marriage or Anthony or any of my close loved ones. Everything I ever put here I've already said out loud to someone else; it's my insurance that no one will be surprised (Mom, really, I'm doing fine - please don't talk to me about any of this.)

Today's been odd. I feel aimless and my head is killing me. Tomorrow morning I catch an early flight out to Phoenix for my grandma's memorial. Truth be told, I'm not really going for the memorial. Those are for the living and she's gone, so what would be the point? I'm going to help my uncle and family friend go through her things; all her precious things she'd collected over the years and ensure that someone who appreciates them gets them. It'd have broken her heart to know that her treasures were sold at a rummage sale. If my aunt wants everything in her apartment, then I will happily box everything up for her. I expect to leave with nothing, but am hopeful that I will be able to save some of her things.

Anthony asked me the other day if I was nervous about going. I'm not. I don't feel anything about it. This will be the first trip I've made in years without my sister and I will be alone with our extended family. I've got a job to do and I'm going to go do it. Period. I was thinking earlier that I can count on both hands how many times I've seen each of them. My dad was close with all of them, but it didn't extend to either me or my sister.

Sure, we got cards and random gifts from some of them over the years, but our lives were never involved. I imagine it was a product of their relationship with my father rather than anything my sister or I ever did - of course, we were just children - but as adults, we've left our relationships as they started: no where, really. And I'm ok with that. It's difficult talking to them anyway when they always bring up these rainbow-and-puppies memories of my dad, so different from my own. I've never felt it was my position to correct them and explain to them why we were such "bad daughters" to him, so the happy Rob stories continue.

At some point, I will have other things to talk about than my own ennui. I'm sick to death of it. I really am. So, here, to cleanse your palette of my bitching, here's a couple of pictures Anthony took the other night of us on our walk with Hollis. A neighbor's lawn ornaments entranced Hollis for minutes on end. I gotta say, the skiing polar bear is pretty amazing.