A dream is never just a dream when..

When you wake up clutching your sheets, with your heart racing and doing everything in your power to erase what you just saw. It is as real as real life, your brain accepts each motion, each feeling, and there is no line between reality and a dream.. until you wake. My last dream ended up to be real. No the world did not come to an end, obviously, or you wouldn't be reading this, but MY world as I knew it came crashing to a halt with an explosion. I have not written on this blog in so long because of that crash but last night, I had another doozie of a dream.

It started off with us having fun at a campground. There were aspects of the dream that were unreal, for example I was thin and younger in the dream. The gist of it was, I was sleeping in my dream, in our car, with no clothes on. (For some reason I was okay with this in this dream) We had been goofing around and swimming the night before and our clothes were drying out while we slept. We awoke to find that everyone we had been there with, had left us and had in fact taken a lot of our clothes as well. I ended up getting in the back seat and wrapping a blanket around myself. I began to get upset about the clothes situation. (Wouldn't you?) and we proceeded to leave the area for our drive home. I must note, in this dream we were not in europe because the correct side to drive on was the right side of the road.

So here we are, driving away from the site. There is Bill, myself, and our two children. Bill is still furious. Not that those other people took my clothes, but because I was upset and it had set him off in a foul mood. As he begins to get on the highway, Bill decides (and bear with me, this gets weird) to drive backwards in the left lane (the oncoming traffic lane) There are cars in the right lane, travelling the same direction as us, but he wants to go "his own way" to get us home. I start to panic because we are in the wrong lane, facing the wrong way and are going to get in a car accident. Bill spins the wheel around to get us going the right way, but we are approaching a bend and there is nowhere to merge back into the correct side. As Bill tries to avoid oncoming traffic, he ends up on the shoulder.. but still going. Instead of stopping, throwing on the flashers and waiting for traffic to lighten, he hits the gas and is driving in his made up third lane. It works for a little bit, this crazy erratic driving, but we then come up to a curve in the road with a small shoulder. Bill throws himself towards the right lane trying to force us in but the cars refuse to leave a gap and Bill throws the car back towards the other shoulder, just as a huge caravan comes our way. It shoves us off the shoulder and over the side of the road. At this point of the dream, that is when we realize, there is no ground beneath us. We were shoved off the road while on a bridge.

As the car careens towards the earth, still straight for some reason, Bill is still sure we can land and be okay. He focuses out the window and is waiting for the earth to meet us in the hopes we can land with all 4 wheels straight and he can press the gas to pull our momentum forward and we will be fine. I, in my own heart and mind, know this isn't going to happen, so I reach for my kids and tell them I love them and that it will be okay. I am holding onto each of them, as I look out my windows to see us about to hit the earth. I looked back at my kids and again told them I loved them, and seconds before we hit the ground, I jolted wide awake, in my bed, and began to freak out for real.

Do I think this will ever happen? Realistically, no. I don't think my husband is so mentally deranged that he would drive on the wrong side of the road. I do think that metaphorically, he can be driven to make wrong choices that will pull us off our path for a successful life, and my pushing him through anger may be the "driving force" being the catalyst that would cause him to make the wrong choices. I think us falling off the road completely is worrisome. I just hope this dream is just a dream, but it feels so much like the dream below, that I really can't be sure on that. If you are reading this, please pray for my family.

Methodical Methods of Madness

Ahh, where do I begin? I am so tired these days but I must keep busy.

Bill is in Afghanistan now. He left out of my life so quickly. I knew it would happen weeks ago. Hell, I put him up to it but I don't think I was ready for it. Can we ever be really ready for our spouses to just get up one morning and fly away with a kiss and a promise to be home soon? We all say that too.. "see you soon" as if convincing ourselves that it really will be soon, but who are we kidding? It's not soon. Maybe in the whole scheme of things, our lives as a whole, it's soon comparatively to like, becoming old and gray and wearing diapers again. But really, when looked at in the perspective of "I'm going to the store, be back soon" versus, "I'm going to war, be back soon" one is more accurate than the other. I guess it's all in perspective and we can kid ourselves saying it won't be long, but it's just that.. a ploy to convince our own selves it will be quick. It's a lie. One morning, I am afraid I'm going to wake up and the lie will catch up with me and go "HA HA! It's been weeks and he's not back. You Lied!" Until that day, I'm trying to stay ahead of myself so I don't get caught. Bill will be home soon. He will......

So what am I doing with my time? I'm LOSING MY MIND! My kids are lovely little itty bitty DEVILS! I clean, they make messes. I cook, the don't eat it but eat everything else in the cupboard. I tell them to stop fighting, they kick each other in the head. I say stop, they say go. I want to get in their grubby little faces and scream at the top of my lungs and say "DON'T YOU SEE I'M BUSY HIDING FROM MY PAINFUL HEART RIGHT NOW? JUST SHUT THE HECK UP ALREADY" But I can't do that. I growl at them sometimes and stomp my feet but they just look at it as a challenge. I can't do much but watch the clock for bedtime. I live for those moments when I can talk to Bill on AIM or on the phone. I live to hear he is okay. Everything else seems so mundane but I come alive when I hear the chime of him coming online. Sometimes it's my mother and that excitement is short lived, but sometimes it's him. I want to reach through the screen and kiss and hug him and then yell at him for listening to me to begin with and for signing up for a stupid deployment.

I want to yell a lot it seems. I have a lot of aggression in me these days. I have a plan though, to take out this aggression at the gym. I can't beat anyone else up, so I'm going to beat up on myself. I'm going to fight away the cravings, the self soothing, the self pity when I go to squeeze into my pants and look like sausage. I'm going to wage war on flab. I have 4 months to get in shape and come hell or high water, I'm taking advantage of it. Exercise releases good endorphines and I'm hoping to use them for good instead of evil. My kids want to act like Bozo the Clown? Fine! It 'aint nothin but a thang'. Hopefully I'm not lying to myself now and a month from now on her giving excuses as to why I gave up.

I will get thin again. I will get in shape again. This deployment will be short. I will make the best of this.

Sure, maybe it's all lies but if I keep running from myself to hide from that fact, then maybe I will run enough to make the lies a reality. Maybe. I'd like to think so.

See you Soon!

On the 5th day of Christmas my true love gave to me..

Twas the night before christmas in USA


Twas the night before Christmas, and all through the skies,
Air defenses were up, with electronic eyes.
Combat pilots were nestled in ready-room beds,
As enemy silhouettes danced in their heads.

Every jet on the apron, each SAM in its tube,
was triply redundant, linked to the Blue Cube.
ELINT and AWACS gave coverage so dense
that nothing that flew could slip through our defense.
When out of the klaxon arose such a clatter
I dashed to the screen to see what was the matter;
I increased the gain and then, quick as a flash,
Fine adjusted the filters to damp out the hash.

And there found the source of the warning we'd heeded
an incoming blip, by eight escorts preceded.
"Alert status red!" went the word down the wire,
As we gave every system the codes that meant "FIRE!"

On Aegis! Up Patriot, Phalanx and Hawk,
And scramble our fighters--let's send the whole flock.
Launch decoys and missiles, use chaff by the yard!
Get the kitchen sink up! Call the National Guard!

They turned toward the target, moved toward it, converged.
Till the tracks on the radar all finally merged,
And the sky was lit up with a demonic light,
As the foe met his fate in the high arctic night.

So we sent out some reconnaissance to look for debris,
Yet all that they found, both on land and on sea
Were some toys, a red hat, a charred left leather boot,
Broken sleigh bells, white hair, and a deer's parachute.

Now it isn't quite Christmas, with Saint Nick shot down.
There are unhappy kids in each village and town.
For the Spirit of Christmas can't hope to evade
All the web of defenses we've carefully made.

But a crash program's on: Working hard, night and day,
All the elves are constructing a radar-proof sleigh.
So let's wait for next Christmas, in cheer and in health,
For the future has hope: Santa's coming by stealth!



~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I can't quite put my finger on how I'm feeling about this Christmas. I am excited to see the kids open their presents, but the whole day, I'll be thinking "I guess this is it" Shortly after Christmas, Bill is off to go comply with President Obama's orders. It's kind of put a damper on the Holiday cheer. I'm trying to get excited about the Holiday itself but this stupid snow is making it difficult to get to the store to get Bill's presents. I have no idea what to get him either.

What do you give someone who is about to go downrange? He won't be able to enjoy much of what I give him, but I have no idea what *to* give him. I want to get him an electric blanket, but aside from that.. I have no idea what else to get. I don't think he's getting me anything at all but the pressure to make his last couple of days wonderful is a lot of pressure.

Ahhhh!!

I really love Thanksgiving because it marks the beginning of the Christmas season, but this year.. this year is not very exicting. Money is an issue, my husband is leaving soon, and to top it off.. I'm still fighting off pneumonia.

This *isn't* the type of Christmas I had hoped for. Hopefully next year, I will have my health, we'll have some money to shop for each other, and he won't be leaving anywhere or gone during the Holidays.

That's my Christmas wish anyway.

Muddling through the Mud

I awoke this morning to a strange occurance.. the first thought on my mind wasn't "ouch". I mean, I was in a bit of pain, but it was manageable.

Yesterday, after starting the antibiotics, I woke up to my head throbbing so hard, my throat dry and scratchy, my lips chapped and sticky and my lungs burning fire. I called Brie hoarsely and she came running (my sweet little girl is so good to me sometimes) and she goes "Mommy, what's wrong?" I tell her "Mommy needs her medicine, honey. Can you help me?" She runs downstairs and gets me some water, my robitussin with codeine and the advil. I take it all and force myself to swallow the liquid down my throat which felt like sawdust and then I passed back out.
I wake up about 20 minutes later to hear Brie trying to get Justin out of bed. He's kicking and screaming and mad because he doesn't want to get up, and she's frustrated because she's only trying to help me. I crawl out of bed and lurch to his doorway and tell him "It's time to get up, so get up now and get dressed please" I go downstairs to once again pass out on the couch.
Then my other saving grace of the day enters into the scene.. Bill. He comes in the front door, sees what needs done then whisks the kids off to school to let me get some much needed rest. I slept and slept and slept and then slept some more. I woke long enough to get more advil.
But then 2 oclock happens and Bill is still sleeping upstairs. I climb the stairs to see if he is getting up and get to the top step to have the room start spinning. I can't catch my breath and I start to sob thus making it harder for me to breathe. (Oh how pathetic I was)
I pulled myself together long enough to get Justin from school and came home to lay down again. It was like my body knew it had permission to finally get better and was fighting off having to do anything to hinder the healing.

Bill wakes up in time to get Brianna and then comes home with stuff to make tacoes. When it was ready, I go to sit at the table and try to be upbeat and jump up to get some forks for everyone. The walk from the table to the kitchen drawer happened too quickly and my lungs decided not to play nice. Once again, the room spins and the dry heaving starts. Why I start dry heaving every time I'm short of breath, I don't know. It's some kind of wierd response. Bill helps me sit down and now I'm not even hungry, but I know I have to try. Why? Because it is our 6th wedding anniversary and I wanted atleast something to go right today.
We begin to eat and Bill makes a joke and I start to laugh which gets me coughing and gasping for air again so what do I do? I bawl.

I am feeling so pathetic these days.

So this morning I decided this wasn't going to beat me. I woke up on my own, (Brianna brought me some advil though)and got the kids ready and walked all the way to the school and back and guess what... IT SNOWED!!!! Big fluffy, wet, snow flakes!
They didn't last long and melted as soon as they touched the ground, but I saw snow this morning.

Now I am back home, warm and on my couch and debating on taking more medicine. I'm coughing and my lungs hurt, but I want to stay awake to do some christmas shopping when Bill gets done with the dentist.
Either way, I am alive and on the mend. Hopefully, even though Bill is leaving shortly after, that we all can have a nice Christmas together and celebrate his birthday in style.

Hopefully my next post, I will be mostly done with this pneumonia bull crap.

So Sick and Tired of being Sick and Tired

*cough cough cough*

*sniffle*

*cough*

There, that's the update.


blech







I am SO sick right now. I spent the day in the ER getting some much needed TLC from the doctors. TLC in the form of IV fluids, antinausea meds and breathing treatments. I found out today that I have been sick for weeks, trying to ignore it, when in fact I've been living with pneumonia for quite some time. It's gotten so bad that I see stars and bright speckles out of the corner of my eyes.

I'm on antibiotics and what not and am resting.

So there's my update. Tomorrow is our anniversary and I'm hoping to be able to get my butt off the couch. It would be nice.

It's a beautiful day in the neighborhood..

Would you be mine? Could you be mine? Won't you be my neighbor?


Life is okay today. We (B and I) got to go out to a predeployment briefing to learn all the good stuff we should know for when our spouses are gone. They didn't tell me the really good stuff I wanted to know like "Where are the best places to shop when your husband is away and "who do we call if we want to yell at our husbands and they aren't available".

I guess those are maybe only my concerns.

Really, it's okay. Maybe this "separation" will mature me a little bit. Ha ha.. I hope not! But maybe.. I hear of some of my friends' husbands deploying and they're leaving for like a friggin YEAR! A YEAR!! Omg.. 18 MONTHS! Are you serious?? I know people who meet, fall in love and divorce in that time frame but they're supposed to keep a marriage going strong and the fires burning bright for EIGHTEEN MONTHS! No way! No friggin way. I love Bill immensely but I don't even think I'd know who he was anymore after 18 months. You'd have to start dating all over again when he came back to see if you were still compatable.

I think the 5 months this deployment will be won't be that bad. 5 months is like an extended temporary duty assignment. That's not even the half way point for most army dudes who are going. Okay, not dudes.. "Soldiers".. sorry to exclude the women there. I'd just hope that most women are smarter than their male counterparts and Go Air Force instead. ha ha. I'm biased like that. People say "Army is so much better than Air Force" but guess what IDIOTS!! AF is deploying for FIVE MONTHS while ya'll are out there A YEAR!! I think the proof is in the pudding princess.. Air Force is better! It may make you "tougher" to go Army, but HELLO!!!! Knock Knock.. Who's There? COMMON SENSE!!

This deployment 'aint nothin but a thang'.. but watch, 3 weeks from now I'm going to be pouring my eyes out and blubbering like a baby about how lonely I am.

FRACK THAT! I'm gonna be excited about our trip to see Cirque Du Soliel. All's I need is the money.
Money.. money.. money.. I am so SICK of money!! Seems to be the one thing that is the hardest to find and there is never EVER enough. This whole deployment was driven by money.

Switching gears now, as to the whole T and B thing, the longer I am away from T, the more clear headed I have become. It really is like coming out of a fog. The woman has isolated me so much and has bogged me down with her incessant rants and incessant calls and incessant "Im coming over"s and her incessant "come to our house" and her incessant INSANITY that I have forgotten what it's like to breathe fresh air. OMG! It is a lovely thing to breathe fresh air again. I am thinking clearly and seeing things clearly and HAPPIER! I am so much happier today!

Sadly, I'd forgive her if she wanted to make ammends but I would never forget or absolve her of her responsibility to the friendships she has tried to pretend to be a part of. She would have to own up to it all and clear the air. I have apologized and apologized again for being untrue to my friends and for believing the lies but they have forgiven me and I love them for that. It speaks volumes to me that they would forgive me, when the unforgiving nature of T is what sparked this whole mess to begin with.

I think I'm actually proud that this woman no longer considers me her friend. I don't think I'd want to meet her approval. Far better people she has condemned in her eyes so to be among their ranks is a privelidge. I am proud to be her "castoff" because it shows for once, that I have risen above her hateful nature. I am free..

Free at last.. Free At last.. Thank GOD AlMIGHTY! I'm Free at last.

And I have friends... true friends.. who accept me for who I am and I can't figure out for the life of me why they are still friends with me, but I'm not going to take that for granted again.

Cheetos and Coke to Cope

Today is a new day. The sun is shining, the birds are chirping, the kids are fighting... all is good in the world, right?

wrong

But we can pretend.

Let's pretend that things aren't going to hell in a handbasket here. Let's pretend my husband isn't grumpy because he leaves soon. Let's pretend my son isn't sick and feverish and I am not in my Pjs sitting on the couch eating cheetos and drinking coca cola. Let's pretend that I don't get some kind of sick preverse enjoyment watching the dinosaur fight reenactments on tv. When I said that we don't have any more make believe in our lives as grown ups, I LIED! I'm doing a good job today of make believing. But let's pretend I'm not.
Really, I'm not as depressed as I think I was yesterday. Maybe I am, but I choose to ignore it. I talked to B and found out that life is pretty shitty for a lot of people as of late. I look at pictures of T and think "How could such a lovely looking person have such ugliness on the inside?" I don't get it but I guess you could wrap a turd and make it look nice. Put some potpourri on the box and those who receive it will think "oh how nice" until as it gets older and older, the potpourri wears off and the stink permeates outside of the box. Eventually it gets unbearable enough that you just want to throw it away. I think I've reached that point. Even if it gets rewrapped with even better potpourri and an even more insulated box, I still know it's just a pretty box of wrapped shit and I don't want to hang onto it anymore. (let's pretend I'm still talking about a box here too, ok?)

The loss of my friend Jean is sinking in every day and I wonder how trivial it is that I am stressed by this crap, when she would probably give anything to be back with her kids and have trivial things to stress about. I want to live each day and enjoy it, not taking it for granted, because she can't. She was denied that opportunity by her sick and twisted husband.

I don't know how this will all eventually pan out but I hope all is not lost. I hope I don't lose all of my friends because I wasn't smart enough to catch onto what was happening until I was swept away with it. I feel like a frog who was in a pot of warm water not realizing the heat was rising until my butt began to cook.

Me and my metaphors. Bill hates them and says : "I wish you would just say it plainly"

lol, but I don't know how. Oh yeah? How bout.. "Dang I messed up pretty badly with this" My excuse is that I'm not used to making friends, but I should've known better. Oh well, I think I learned something from this.. I hope so. I am not pretending that either.. I really hope that I don't end up in this situation again. From now on, I'll be smelling boxes a little more closely and trying to see beyond the wrapping from the get go.

Bill is taking off for his "all expense paid trip to the sandy middle east" and I will be here with just me, the kids, and glen our cat. I plan on taking the kids to see Cirque Del Soliel next month if I can get tickets. I think it'd be cool to take them to see another pantomime. The one in Bury is fabulous! I love the UK.. aside from the nutters.. it is a nice place. There is so much to see and do.
I will get back to the "Greene's comings and goings" once I get out of rut. I'm working on it though. It may be just a make believe tale in the works, but I'm still trying to turn the pages, which has to count for something.. right?