Shortly after the whole nervous breakdown/divorce/get the nuts out of my house debacle, a friend of mine took my tearful ass out to catch a cup of coffee. Over coffee, he asked me simply: “What do YOU want?”

I sat there stunned, holding two packets of Equal, googling at him as though he’d suddenly grown a head from his shoulders.

“What I want?” I sputtered when I finally could make my vocal cords work again.

“Yeah,” he replied. “Becks, what do YOU want?”

Slowly, I shook my head side-to-side. No one had ever asked me what I wanted, unless they were looking for an answer like, “An Uncrustable,” or “John C. Mayer’s head on a platter so it cannot sing “Your Body Is A Wonderland EVER AGAIN.”

I didn’t answer him; I couldn’t.

Not because I didn’t want to respond to the question, but because I hadn’t thought about what I wanted in many years – that’s part of being a parent, a writer, a wife, the caretaker to many – you don’t have the option of putting yourself first. It’s not a dig at any of those roles, it simply is. How can you possibly nurse a migraine in a dark room with an icepack on your head if it’s going to lead to resentments from your partner or simply impossible – thanks to a gaggle of kids who’d prefer to poke you in the eyes and ask the same question 10382 times? The answer is that you can’t. Not often, anyway, and certainly not without a glistening pile of guilt.

I’ve been living on my own for a full month now. I have enough to pay rent (although that bitch Sandy is going to sorely affect my ability to freelance, considering NYC apparently looks like a zombie apocalypse has swept through it), which makes me beyond proud. I did it. I was terrified that I wouldn’t be able to do it alone, but I was wrong – the fear is a lying liar who lies.

In one month, I’ve spent more time thinking about the future I want to have, The Happyness I need to find, and what happens next than I have in 9 years. I’d put all plans for having my own life on a shelf, just out of reach, once I got married to a workaholic, popped out two more kids, and began blogging as a way to find the community, the friends I so desperately craved.

It was a full life, but it was a lonely one.

That’s not to say I have regrets – I don’t. But I’m left grasping at straws and rediscovering who Becky Sherrick Harks really is, beyond a mother, freelance writer, leader of a non-profit and blogger. Certainly these jobs I cherish, but we all know, Pranksters, that there’s more to be done. I don’t want to be an old woman, sitting on the porch, wishing she’d taken that risk, chased that dream, followed her heart.

So I won’t.

Divorce doesn’t mean that my life is over; that I’ll never find love again, I’ll be stuck in front of the TV night after night watching Dexter reruns, pretending to be married to men from television. Divorce doesn’t mean that I’m suddenly going to become a crazy cat lady or hoarder or a recluse who collects her pee in jars. The things that have changed are those that needed to be changed in order for the next part of my life to begin. It’s time for me to find those dreams left trapped in a jar (clarification: not pee-filled jars) on a shelf somewhere, dust off the cobwebs and figure out what, exactly, I want to do with the next chapter of my life.

This is my life to live. I don’t know what will happen tomorrow or next week. I don’t have any way of knowing if the dreams I once had will have stood the test of time. If they have, I will chase my heart. If they have not, I will find a new dream. Life has a weird way of working out like that.

I can hardly wait to see where it takes me.

P.S. Giving away a copy of my book here.

It’s been no secret that I’ve been depressed.

I’ve stared at the blinking curser on a blank blog page, all Imma talk about it I don’t know how many times (at least twice), but realize that whatever I say will be all wah, wah, wah, bleeeerrrggg, because I’m not depressed about things that are entirely fixable with anything but time. I’ve done my best to keep my head up through the storms and keep one foot in front of the other – that is, when I’m not too busy falling over kitchen appliances and giving myself minor concussions – and keep on truckin’.

It’s the only thing I can do.

So instead of telling you my laundry list of things that have been depressing and/or heartbreaking, it’s time to take a gander at depression through the ages. That way, when I’m sad, I can stop being sad and start being awesome again.

Depression, Age 10: “Wahhhhhhh, I broke a lace on my new skates and now I have to wear these rental skates and NO ONE will want to slow-skate with me because I’m going to be all stinky-foot on their asses. These skates smell like at least three people vomited inside of them. How does that even happen? I need my mom to buy me a new pair of these kicky shoes – Chuck Taylor’s. That’ll help with this OMFG humiliation of skating in barf skates.”

Depression, Age 15: “Wah-Wah-Wah, I’ve just dumped this guy that I OMG loved so much with all my heart and I just knew we’d be together forever even though we only were “together” for a night or whatever, but he’s SUCH a good kisser and I’m SURE he’s my soulmate. I know we’ll work out*. In the meantime, I need some kicky motherfucking shoes. AND, I need my friend to pee in his mailbox. Clearly. Oh, if only I had a social network thing to quote very, VERY meaningful song lyrics and/or quotes that remind me of my lost looooovvvveee.”

Depression, Age 20: “Holy fuckstick, I got a baby in my belly and he’s all dancing on my bladder and shit and I have to pee two ounces every three seconds, and if he’d just lay off my liver, things would be okay again. Well, that and a simple, “Congrats!” from anyone – kinda sick of these angry looks. I’m twenty years old, not thirteen. I bet a new purse would do wonders to cover up my gigantic ass. Who the shit gets pregnant IN THEIR ASS?”

Depression, Age 25: “Ha! TAKE THAT! I proved those motherfuckers wrong – I raised that baby up, I got married and I graduated at the top of my nursing class. With the whirlwind I’ve been living in, I don’t see AT ALL how I didn’t notice that working as a floor nurse might just make me homicidal. Oh, and autism kinda sucks ass – I thought it would be better once I had real time to devote to the kid. Oh! I know what’ll help – ANOTHER BABY. So why can’t I get fucking pregnant?”

Depression, Age 30: “I got this. I may be miserable, but who the fuck wants to think about that shit? I can totally just push it on back there and be all, “MY LIFE RULEZ. It’s important that it has the “Z” in RULEZ, because obviously. No one needs to know how shitty things are, even IF I do have a social media network to whine on – who wants to read that? I bet a joke about squirrels in diapers would TOTALLY cheer me up. I should tweet that shit.”

Depression, Age 32: “Starting over again, huh? Not the way I thought it would be. I could put up some inspirational shit on my social media networks, but that might make me stab myself in the toe with a blunt fork. Who cares if “tomorrow is a new day” if today, like all the days before it, has sucked ballz. YES, ballz needs a “Z.” Why? Obviously. Being this whiny means I should probably shut my whore mouth until I’m able to say something awesome again. So that’s that – when I get sad now, I’m going to stop being sad and start being awesome.”

*he had a tiny wang – think pretzel rod, Pranksters – and we never did get back together. Thank the Good Lord of Butter. Bullet motherfucking DODGED.

(when you can’t find me here, you can find me here, which has some rad guest posts on it. Why? Because when I get sad, I stop being sad and start being awesome. Duh.)

We’d been tasked, The Guy (at the time) On My Couch and I with wrangling the children outdoors because the window guy was indoors, ripping out our old drafty windows and installing brand-spankin’ new ones. The house was an investment, and we couldn’t WAIT to have windows that properly opened and shut so that we could do things like, “feel the warm breeze” without the cats jumping out the windows in a desperate effort to save themselves from our formerly white (WHITE!) carpet.

(Pointless aside: who the fuck installs white carpeting? Answer: not I)

We’d spent the day gardening with el kids (a couple of neighborhood kids thrown in for good measure), laying down grass seed and puttering around doing old people shit. Dave, on the other hand, was indoors working on something very important – perhaps a game of Civ 5, I can’t be sure – I’m no gamer, so they all look the same to me (read: equally baffling).

Finally, we sat in the garage, sweating our nards off and talking to the window guy who was done with the install for the day. He explained that he was waiting for his partner to come and pick him up, but that he’d be back tomorrow to install some whoo-dillys and whacha-ma-callits. I just nodded, happy to be out of the blistering sun and away from the bugs, if only for a moment.

Soon enough, a child-napping van pulled up into our driveway – perfect for both kidnappers and tradespeople alike – and his “partner” popped out. When I’d envisioned “partner,” I assumed he meant an older, more grizzled version of himself, someone who likely wheezed upon any exertion – like getting out of the child-napping van. But no, his partner was a woman.

She practically ran into the garage, begging to use my bathroom.

“Sure,” I said, sympathetically. My parents had performed a procedure when I was quite small in which they replaced my own bladder with a squirrels, which means I have to pee approximately every four seconds, while somewhere, skulking around Illinois, is a squirrel who hasn’t peed in over seven years.

“It’s right behind this wall,” I gestured. She dashed inside as we continued talking shop – a euphemism for listening to someone who knows a lot about whoo-dillys talking wildly about Mr. Gadget shit while I sat there, nodding and trying not to drip sweat into my eyes – with the Window Guy.

The minutes crept past us as we jabbered on, The Guy On The Couch and The Window Guy, while I began counting the mosquito bites that had formed a particularly awesome pattern on my legs. Soon, my mind drifted and I began to look for patterns in the bites. Just as I thought I saw Jesus composed entirely of mosquito bites, imagining the lines of people who may line up to see my legs and pray over them for upwards of two days – or until the bites subsided – she flew back out of the house. She’d been gone so long I’d assumed she’d found Dave and had begun to talk to him about video games or sealing wax, or other fancy stuffs.

“Thanks again,” she said to me, as I nodded sympathetically. “I’ve been holding that a REALLY long time.”

“No problem,” I said to her, “happens to me all the time.”

“Yep,” The Guy (then) On My Couch affirmed. “Her bladder is the size of a Fruit Loop.”

The Window Guy and his partner made their way back to their child-napping van, where I hoped they would go home WITHOUT kidnapping innocent children, and I turned to The Guy (then) On My Couch, “Holy fucks, I gotta pee, motherfucker.”

He looked at me, deadpan, “This is my surprised face.”

I flicked him off on the way into the cool house, the sweat on my face practically freezing as I walked indoors and into the bathroom, ready to evacuate 2.5 ounces from my bladder.

It hit me like a freight train as I flicked on the bathroom light: the incredible, unmistakable stench of shit. I googled a bit, eyes watering, before closing the door and turning the fan on. Didn’t need that getting out into the general circulation.

After I made my way to the upstairs bathroom and back to the garage to watch The Littles, I pulled The Guy (then) On My Couch aside, “Holy balls, Ben,” I said, “She dropped a HUGE deuce in there.”

He laughed, “Really?”

“Yup,” I replied, my eyes wide as dinner plates. “I’m kinda shocked.”

“Me too!” He agreed with me. “Who goes and takes a monster dump at a complete stranger’s house? Isn’t that what gas station bathrooms are for?”

“Yes,” I said, eyes still open so wide they nearly fell out of my head. “That and weird creepy gas station bathroom sex.”

I thought for a minute.

“It’s always my fucking luck,” I confessed. “Or maybe it’s everyone’s thing – I can’t seem to find a bathroom to use that someone before me hasn’t taken a warm, steaming dump. I’m always fucking afraid that stench is going to get in my hair. I can’t TELL you all the times I’ve walked into to a bathroom to take a pee and I’m stuck gagging at the remnants someone’s dinner from the night before.”

“You do pee a LOT,” he replied flippantly.

Not really acknowledging what is, apparently, common knowledge, I continued. “But do you know what’s the worst?” I didn’t wait for a reply, “It’s when they’ve used that canned air freshener shit and I’m sitting in peach-scented poo. That shit never works like it’s supposed to – rather than mask the odor, it just ADDS to it. Fucking gross.” I shuddered as I dry-heaved a little. “Blech.”

He just nodded, laughing too hard to reply.

A lifetime later, a company sent me yet another bizarre item, which I promptly put into my box of items that were to be moved to my new home. As I was taking very little from our house, save for one set of the couches and a few odds and ends, I’d happily accepted anything anyone wanted to send me. You never DO know what you’re going to need.

The PR rep would occasionally email me to ask me about the item, which was called “ReJuvenescence,” and I promptly ignored her emails – my life was in boxes, and no, I hadn’t had a chance to try their new product, which sounded, each time I got the email, like something you’d use on your vagina.

It’s not.

Finally, once I was settled in my new place, I unpacked the box and stared into it – a little shocked. The wee box was filled with toilet paper plastic thingies (sadly no toilet paper). The instructions informed me that I was to peel some stickers off, pop a roll of TP on them, then relax and enjoy. Or something like that, I don’t really read instructions.

I wrangled the thing onto my toilet paper holder, curious as to what the nuts it would do. I hoped that it would:

A) Sing to me

2) Clap and/or cheer

73.7) Return my bladder to normal, human size.

It did none of those.

What it did do, however, was make my bathroom (and subsequently) my toilet paper smell kinda… nice. Not like that bullshit pine tree air freshener “nice” (which only serves to remind me of my days as a teenage delinquent), but sorta… good.

But let’s be honest with each other, Pranksters, I’d be more impressed if it sang Christmas Carols or various versions of the Pina Colada song.

“Hey,” Dave asked me on Thursday of last week, “I want to take the kids to the pumpkin patch on Sunday.” Our annual pilgrimage to the pumpkin patch was always something I’d looked forward to, but I’d assumed that he meant he wanted to take the kids with someone else. Fair play, I shrugged, and agreed. Can’t have it all ways, right?

When Saturday turned out to be a bust – the kids were happily ensconced on my couch playing with their new capes and jumping around like a couple of monkeys, Dave suggested Sunday as the day we’d go to the pumpkin patch. Still certain he didn’t mean, “how ’bout we BOTH take them to the pumpkin patch,” I agreed. The kids were going back to his house; what he chose to do with them and with whom wasn’t something I really had any say in – and frankly, it wasn’t exactly something I was upset about. Next year, I comforted myself, I’d be able to take them to the pumpkin patch.

“Well,” I said, “why don’t you come over and have breakfast with us before you go? The kids made cinnamon rolls and will be happy to see you.”

“Oh,” he said, confused. “I thought we were going to the pumpkin patch…”

“Wait,” I said. “You want ME to go, too? Okay!” I happily agreed. I love the pumpkin patch NEARLY as much as I love the color blue and finding eclectic artwork.

We decided, after noshing on cinnamon rolls, that we’d simply pick up some pumpkins at the store and go over to The House Formerly Known As Mine to decorate them. Thoughtfully, Dave asked if that was okay with me. Considering I’d had my garage door opener – my one way into the house to collect my things – taken away, I was thrilled to go over there, decorate pumpkins and collect the things that were mine. I hadn’t taken much of the stuff from the house when I moved – the plan had been to keep The House Formerly Known As Mine “Switzerland,” so I figured leaving some furniture behind was okay.

We pulled up to The House Formerly Known as Mine and I noted the peonies, which I’d carefully planted many years ago, were preparing for winter, shedding leaves and turning an unsightly shade of green. I blinked the tears from my eyes before anyone could notice, wondering if anyone would be taking care of them as I once had – with unabashed joy.

As the kids got settled inside with their pumpkins, I began the arduous process of dissecting the pile of things that had been left in the garage – presumably my own stuffs – and moving the items I needed into the back of the van so that I could transport them to my own home. It only took a few minutes, but I wasn’t quite ready to enter the home that had once been mine – my forever home. It’s been extraordinarily difficult to see the places I once haunted; to realize that it is, in fact, all over now.

Without making eye contact, I grabbed a cup of coffee and went back into the garage, only this time, it was to sit and let the tears flow without fear of repercussion. I sat myself on the cooler we’d once bought together for this or that and stared around the garage, the sun shining merrily, my neighbors all working in their yards or on their cars in the same way they’d always done. While I’m not narcissistic to assume that life will not go on without me, it did dawn on me that it had and that inexplicably hurt.

I looked around the garage, which seemed a glaring reminder of what had come before.

There’s that rake up there, the one that’s made to look like a bumblebee that we bought for the kids to “help” in the yard after the trees had dumped their leaves. It had to be five or six years old, but there it was – still intact and still working.

And over there, the matching pink and red Red Ryder Big Wheels I’d bought on two separate Black Friday’s off Amazon: one for Alex and one for Mimi. I smiled, recalling how happy I’d been to find such a good deal on them; how much I’d loved riding my own and how I just knew that someday, these would be treasured toys.

Right there, in front of me was the adorable Power Wheels I’d bought Alex that March, well before I knew that I’d soon be moving.

To my left were a couple of buckets leftover from Easter. I’d moved them outside so that the kids could “garden” (read: dig holes in the dirt) with me, a favorite activity for the four of us. I wondered briefly if we’d be able to do that again someday; how joyful it would make me if we could.

On that shelf, the one we’d bought when we first moved in, I saw all of the sprays I’d bought to save my roses from the dreaded black spot, carefully applying it every other week so that their blooms would smell of heaven and their leaves wouldn’t turn an unsightly shade of yellow. I remembered how many hours I’d spent in that rose garden, lovingly tending to the plants, releasing my stress and watching something beautiful come from a small, innocuous plant.

And there, hanging up, the Baby swing that had fit both Alex and Amelia at one time or another, allowing them to swing alongside their older siblings until they both grew out of it. I remember carefully choosing a playset for the kids so that they’d have a backyard playground, Dave and I in agreement that it made our house feel like a home.

Tears rolled down my cheek as I wondered how it had all come to this.

I couldn’t answer that, so I swiped at my eyes and took a deep breath.

It was time to watch my babies decorate their pumpkins before I returned to my empty apartment, armed with stuff I’d left behind, leaving those things that were never mine to take.

You’ll be glad (or dismayed) to know that I am not dead.

While the freezer door did make an attempt upon my life, I am still upright and breathing. But after the gas leak from a dead pilot light the week before, I’m now warily watching the washer/dryer unit to see when, in fact, it will make its play to kill me. I can only surmise that it is plotting against me, but without real proof, I cannot be sure. So rather than being productive, I instead watch it with the phone book open to the number of the local hospital, as a warning of sorts, that if it does, in fact, try to kill me, I have backup motherfucker. And not Life Alert, although that may be a wise investment.

In that time, though, I’ve been thinking a lot about the lies we tell ourselves:

I wonder, sometimes, if we tell ourselves these lies simply to avoid the truth: that the moment we’re in is hard; that the end is nowhere in sight; that we do really jam out to John C. Mayer when no one is looking; that becoming a morning person means that we are now able to be smugly superior to the rest of those crazy “late sleepers.”

I don’t know the answer.

And I don’t know if the lies we tell ourselves in order to believe that somehow Our Happy is just around that corner, ready to spring out and beat The Happy into our brains is a healthy way to cope. I don’t know if dwelling on the past, mulling over the mistakes we’ve made and the things we’ve done that have hurt others is a better solution.

I’d surmise that the answer lies somewhere in the middle – we tell ourselves the things that allow us to feel briefly better, like it was all meant something, that someday, the meaning of the tunnel of shit we’re wading through had a far greater purpose: without X, Y wouldn’t have happened. I like to believe that sentiment  – normally I find that the tunnel of shit does bring about, in time, diamonds, and not rocks.

Take for example, my daughter, who was born with a previously undiagnosed neural tube defect called an “encephalocele,” which is a fancy way of saying that her skull got lazy, didn’t close, and brain matter developed outside of her head. While normally diagnosed prenatally during a routine ultrasound, someone somehow somewhere fucked up and managed to NOT see the hole in her skull. In normal conversation, I tell people that “it’s better that I didn’t know she had an encephalocele ahead of time,” because it would’ve “made the pregnancy that much more stressful.”

I don’t know if that’s true – if it’s another lie I tell myself to make myself feel better – there’s nothing like dangling in the labor room, listening to the NICU whirr and click and clack and whisper about your baby while you’re stuck there, delivering the placenta and getting your girl bits stitched up while your daughter, mere minutes old, is in the midst of getting an examination that will seal her fate as one of two things:

1) Innocuous, unsightly cyst

B) Something really, REALLY bad.

Any of you who’ve read my blog know what happened: she now has a handy skull graft and that pesky brain tissue exploding out of the back of her head, well, it’s been long-since removed. The scar is still there, growing along with her, as she whirls and twirls and plays and giggles. I couldn’t have asked for a better outcome for a situation so very dire.

While the situation was, to put it in the most mild way possible, terrible, some good has sprung of it.

When I first confessed my shame at having post-traumatic stress disorder (this post) it spurned an idea that had been rattling around my own brain for a long time – putting together a group blog for people to share their stories of darkness and light, and pair these stories with resources about a particular subject. I recall scouring the Internet for information about encephaloceles after Amelia was born only to find that the information was scattered; not put together in any real order. I wanted to change that.

I did.

I formed Band Back Together in 2010 to do just that: allow people a safe moderated environment to pull their skeletons from the closet and make them dance the tango, in the hopes that by telling our truth, we’d be able to grow, learn, and begin to heal. One of the most powerful things in the world is to realize that we are not alone in this world; that others have felt the way that we have.

That’s the reason the wonderful volunteers at Band Back Together (if you’re into volunteering with us, email volunteer@bandbacktogether.com) continues to post stories – your stories – and create readable and informative resources. It’s also why I continue to write out my life for anyone to read, despite thoughts of, after eleventy-nine years, simply calling it done and walking away from my blog. I haven’t. Not because I haven’t wanted to, but because if one person out there can read the words I’ve written – some good, some great, most bad – then I have done something with my life.

And despite my shortcomings and failures; the lies I tell myself to get one foot in front of the other, that means something.

Scene 1 – My new kitchen, middle of the work day on Thursday:

Me (humming the Flight of the Bumblebees and wondering how THAT became my theme song): “Man, I am THIRSTY. I should grab a nice, tasty beverage from my fridge.”

My Fridge: “You need to eat something.”

Me: “Says you – I’m not hungry.”

My Fridge: “All you use me for is to stow diet Coke and the occasional food for The Littles.”

Me: “One word: Divorce Diet.”

My Fridge: “That was two words.”

Me: “Yeah, well *sputters* SO?”

My Fridge: “If you’d EATEN something you’d have known that statement was, in fact, two words.”

Me: “Yeah, well, have YOU been through a divorce?”

My Fridge: “Nope. Still with the oven – we’ve been together since 1956.”

Me: “Well balls to you then, Mister.”

My Fridge: “No need to get hostile. If you ate something, you’d be less hostile.”

Me: “No, I’d be less hostile if you were the actual size and shape of a REAL fridge. You’re like the Napoleon of fridges – short man syndrome and all that.”

My Fridge: “It’s called “compact,” which you’d know if you’d EATEN anything in the last week or two.”

Me: “Shut your whore mouth. I just want a diet Coke. Can you let up for one fucking second about the “you need to eat” shit? It’s getting old.”

My Fridge: “You know you’re probably embalmed already by the amount of diet Coke you drink.”

Me: “So? Makes the mortician’s job easier.”

My Fridge: “That’s a dreary thought.”

Me: “YOU brought it up.”

My Fridge: “Touche.”

Me: “So are we done with this lecture yet? It’s been enlightening and all, but I gotta get back to work.”

My Fridge: “As you wish.”

I reach down to grab a diet Coke from the bottom shelf and, upon standing back up, thwump the back of my head on the door to the freezer, which was made well before anyone thought about safety or end user error. Rather than standing up and shaking it off, instead, I fall backward, prized diet Coke in hand, and adding insult to injury, bash my head against the chipped Formica floor and am knocked unconscious.

Minutes pass.

——————

Scene 2: I wake up in a pool of my own blood and a throbbing headache.

Me: “That wasn’t very nice.”

My Fridge: “Neither was implying I had “short man syndrome.” That was UN-nice, which you’d know if…”

Me: “…I’d eaten? Sorry Fridge, but eating doesn’t exactly cure all that ails you.”

My Fridge: “Still, it was a mean comment.”

Me (growls): “You wanna see mean? WHY DON’T YOU LOOK AT YOUR FUG COLOR IN THE MIRROR? I LIKE TO CALL YOUR COLOR “DOG PEE ON PLASTERBOARD.”

My Fridge: “I don’t have legs.”

Me: “SO not my problem.”

My Fridge: “Go clean yourself off – you’re dripping blood everywhere. It’s unsightly.”

Me: “So’s your FACE.”

My Fridge: “Now that was just stupid.”

Me (wobbling off to the shower): “Yeah, well.”

My Fridge (calling after me): “Don’t you think you should call someone about your head?”

Me: “I have a therapist.”

My Fridge (trails off as I get into the shower): “That’s not what I meant – you’re woozy and look like you have a concussion.”

Me: “Oh NOW you feel concern – this IS your fault, y’know.”

Refrigerator goes silent, for once, as I sit in the shower, washing off the blood.

Me (mutters): “Fucking appliances… always out to get me.

The Shower Faucet: “Have you eaten yet?”

Me: “Shut your whore mouth, assface.”

I’ve been asked by my pregnant friends what labor feels like, and each time, I’m stuck wondering how to respond. In the end, I always answer with something semi-true like, “strongest motherfucking period on the planet,” which is semi-true. It’s also completely wrong. Labor feels like, well, labor, and nothing else. Even after popping three kids outta my delicate lady bits, I’m not sure how else to describe it, beyond saying something completely unhelpful like, “It feels like labor,” alternately, “it feels like a thousand angry chipmunks gnawing your uterus.”

When the divorce talk came a-knockin’, my previously divorced friends offered me similar sentiments about what I could expect; excepting, of course, that none mentioned my uterus, which was thankful. That organ has seen enough. I was warned that, “it would be hard,” and that, “the first year would be the worst.” Of course, much like my labor speech, it was simultaneously unhelpful and the truth.

I sat the back of the U-Haul three weeks ago tomorrow, watching Dave and The Guy Formerly On My Couch moving, the weather unseasonably hot for a day in late September, working on my tan and watching my kids frolic in the yard I’d dearly loved. It was then that I truly realized that this marked the end of the life I’d had. I shed a few tears before lugging the rest of my belongings into the truck, wondering what the next chapter of my life would look like. I contemplated asking my aforementioned friends, but realized that they knew as much about what comes next as the squirrel who’d been intently staring at me while I tailgated on the U-Haul.

(hindsight being 20/20, I should’ve thrown a good-bye tailgating party and grilled out right there in front of The House Formerly Known As Mine – there are too few occasions that one can set up a grill in the street and roast encased meats)

We drove off, each car packed to the brims – some sent by my wonderful Pranksters, for which I am forever thankful, having those lifelines means the world to me – handily closing that chapter of my life. I didn’t cry. Not then.

At my new home, I pretended I was a pack animal, an alpaca, which probably doesn’t, in fact, lug things around on it’s back, but it helped get me into the moving mindset from, “I’m sweating (proverbial) balls and I think I just flashed my neighbors by accident,” to “I wonder if alpacas actually lug shit on their backs, because now I want one. I don’t know what they look like, but I think I need one as a pet. I bet they’re fucking adorable. I mean, even their name is awesome.” Soon, the boxes were all inside, ready for me to give their contents a home.

I spent the next two weeks unpacking, hanging pictures, decorating (badly), wishing I had more art for my walls because Pinterest had made me all, OMFG I NEED BEAUTIFUL THINGS MADE OUT OF THREE EASY KITCHEN INGREDIENTS (sidebar: Fuck you Pinterest for making me feel super NOT crafty), and slowly turning the empty apartment into a place I could call home. “Wow,” my mother said as she dropped by a few days after I’d moved. “You’re unpacking like it’s your job.”

I laughed, “I just want the kids to feel like my house is a home, too. It’s a big change for us all.”

Keeping busy was my salvation, even though there was a warning bell chim-chiming somewhere, a foreboding, “when you’re done with The Busy, it’s going to suck,” clanging.

Apparently, my brain knows me well, because once it was all over but the shouting (er, decorating), the truth sunk in: this wasn’t some white-carpeted (WHITE!) hotel suite. This wasn’t a vacation. I wasn’t going back to my old life. No, this was my new life.

And while it’s a hard thing to wrap my three remaining neurons around, it’s been… okay. Sure, there have been tears and fears (but not Tears FOR Fears because I am NOT an 80’s band) and doubts, but there’s been a lot of freedom, too.

For the first time ever, I’m living life on my terms. I’ve been given the opportunity to take the old, examine it, and toss out the bits of it that don’t work for me any longer and lovingly polish the parts that do. While it’s not an easy process, it’s an opportunity to turn something that’s shattered me into a life that is my own. The ability to take stock of what I stand for and what I don’t.

To put the pieces back together into a bigger, better whole.

While I know the process is going to be long and (at times) hard, I know that I can and will.

I’ve begun tossing the things pieces that no longer fit.

Starting with my hair:

Pranksters, I’d like you to meet Becky, As Herself.

(ring ring)

My Mother: “Hello?”

Me: “Hey Mom, it’s me. I think I caught Dad’s cold.”

My Mother: “Oh no. He’s still sick!”

Me: “Yeah, it’s like that. I’m considering going into phone sex until this stupid shit is gone. I could make a killing if I could find the dudes with a fetish for chicks who cough and sound like Thelma from The Simpsons.”

My Mother (dryly): “Sounds like a great idea.”

Me: “Hey, work with what you got, right?”

My Mother (laughs): “Did you take some Tylenol?”

Me: “No, I don’t have any. I’ve been alternating between the heat and air, trying to get comfortable. Waging war on this fucking virus.”

My Mother: “Well, I have some Tylenol.”

Me: “I can swing by a little later and pick it up.”

My Mother: “Oh, I can drop it off. You live four seconds away.”

Me: “Wow. Cool. Okay. You sure?”

My Mother: “Can you meet me in the parking lot? My knee is killing me.”

Me: “Sure, no problem.”

My Mother: “See you soon.”

Me:  “Sweet, thanks, Ma.”

—————–

(thirty minutes later)

Me (thinks): “Wow, she’s driving that fancy new car awfully slowly through the parking lot. I hope she at least put the Tylenol in a brown bag or something so it doesn’t look… suspicious. The last thing I need is my neighbors to think I’m a drug dealer. Wait, maybe I should play the part – I got some aviator sunglasses somewhere. I bet I could get one of those nose/mustache/fake glasses things so I look like I’m trying to be “in disguise.” Or I could go knocking on the doors of my neighbors, holding my baggie of Tylenol, so it makes me look all suspicious. That’d be kinda funny until the police came. I’d probably get arrested for the indecent wearing of sequins or something. I can never keep up with the laws about Being Gaudy In Public. And GOOD LORD OF BUTTER, Ma, can you LOOK any more suspicious driving through my parking lot? Probably not. At least, I don’t know how. Maybe I should get HER some of those novelty glasses or something so it REALLY looks like we’re being illicit. ARGGG! MA, DON’T RUN ME OVER.”

Me (walking up to the driver’s side window): “Thanks Ma, for bringing these by. I’m in some sorry shape.”

My Mom: “Well, I hope you feel better. (rustles around in her bag for a couple of seconds while I stand there, looking suspicious.) Here you go!”

Me: “HOLY FUCK, MA. We look like DRUG DEALERS.”

My Mom (laughs): “Go knock on some doors and see if you can sell the pills.”

Me: “MOM! I need to LIVE HERE. I can’t try to sell my neighbors TYLENOL.”

My Mom (giggles): “Yeah, I guess you should try and sell ’em the GOOD stuff.”

Me: “What, like Ibuprofen?”

My Mom: “NOW you’re talking.”

Me (laughs): “All right, Mom, thanks again. You and Dad will have to come over and see the new space soon.”

My Mom: “Sounds good!”

Me: “Bye – thanks again!”

My Mom: “Be sure to get top dollar for those pills – they’re EXTRA STRENGTH.”

Me: “MOOOOOMMMMMMMM!”

(she drives off)

Me (looking down at the bag): “Holy fucksticks. I’d better get inside before someone sees me.”

And THAT is how my mother became my Tylenol Dealer.

Most days, before I go pick up Alex at kindergarten, I swing by my former house to pick up my mail while I grab the various and sundries I’ve inadvertently left behind. I guess that’s the problem with moving while other people stay behind – you have the ability to leave your crap behind to be picked up at a later date, which makes you extraordinarily lazy, especially when one of the boxes contains nothing but bacon spam. I try to get this sort of thing done sans kids because it’s just easier that way, hence my 10:30 trips back to the House Formerly Known as Mine.

Tuesday morning found me there, bright and bleary, seeing if a) the mail had come and 2) trying to knock the two remaining neurons in my brain into functionality so that I could figure out what, precisely, I’d gone there for.

After I pulled into the driveway, leaving the car to idle, I’d noted that the mail was not yet delivered, which had been my main reason for the visit. I weighed my options: I could go skulking around the garage, where Dave had thoughtfully piled anything I’d left behind or I could try and make those misfiring neurons work their asses off to recall what, in particular, I’d wanted so badly from the house.

Standing in the driveway like some sort of mouth breather, staring into space, making my neurons work hard for their money, it dawned on me: MARK ZUCKERBERG. I needed MARK ZUCKERBERG.

While I’d bought him to be a hulking force in my backyard, poised to take over lesser companies and get sued every other day, I no longer had the yard. And, to be frank, Dave wouldn’t miss him – gaudy shit is more my speed than his.

I’d bought Mark Zuckerberg on one of my Friday night excursions to my boyfriend, Target, grocery shopping with my daughter, and upon bringing Mark Zuckerberg home, Dave had bluffed, telling me that he didn’t absolutely hate the peacock, which meant that he probably would’ve burned it, given half the chance and double the energy.

It’s a good damn thing he’s not a poker player, because damns, his bluffing skills need some work.

I’d been anxious to bring Mark Zuckerberg home with me and kept forgetting to grab him from the backyard every time I swung by because, well, with a mountain of my crap in the garage, I sorta hated the idea of neglecting that in favor of a lawn ornament. Hence the skulking.

I’m not sure my neighbors know that I’m gone, although I imagine they suspect it, what with the U-Haul and removal of loads of boxes and furniture. I didn’t have the heart to tell them before I left because I knew I’d fall into a sloppy sobbing mess – I loved living in Pleasantville – and that would be awkward for all involved parties. So I put on my best poker face when I moved, bluffing my way to my new place, hoping the neighbors would simply think I’d gone on a long trip or something.

Which is why, on Tuesday, I felt like a fugitive, standing in my driveway, ready to sneak into my own backyard to take Mark Zuckerberg. I simply couldn’t imagine what they’d think was going on, and while my neighbors weren’t particularly nosy, sneaking into someone’s backyard for a statue could’ve caused some particularly ugly conversations.

I considered making a dash for Mark Zuckerberg, only to remind myself that I am still on the mortgage, which means the house is technically still half mine, which made me stupidly sad all over again. Instead of skulking around in broad daylight (I prefer to skulk at night, thankyouverymuch), I walked into the backyard, opened the gate – the one that never actually latches – and meandered over to the pine tree to take my peacock and bring him home with me.

Carefully, I avoided looking at my roses, which I’d spent so long maintaining (if I couldn’t see them, they didn’t exist, right?), and marched back to the front, Mark Zuckerberg in my arms, half-expecting one of my neighbors to be standing in front of the car, all, “Hand over the tacky peacock and no one gets hurt,” but save for some chalk drawings on the driveway, no one was there.

I put Mark Zuckerberg into the front seat with the wind-chimes I’d bought myself for Mother’s Day and slammed the door. I got back into the car, sobbed for a couple of seconds like an asshole, then dried my eyes before backing the car out of the Driveway Formerly Known As My Own, and heading toward the school to pick up my son.

He bounded toward me, arms wide open, and I smiled my first genuine smile of the day as I swooped him into my arms, kissing his face as he told me about his morning at school, as I thought about the games that people play.

….when it’s a back massager.

I’ve been writing (often badly) about love and sex for years, which, Imma be straight with you, Pranksters, Carrie Bradshaw makes seem much more glamorous than it truly is. I mean, I’ve never actually made enough to outfit my closet in anything besides Target Sale Stuffs, not Manolo Blahnik’s, and I’m okay with that. Shoes for $400 bucks would make me nervous and twitchy the same way owning a Ferrari in New York would: while sometimes pretty, it’s not worth the anxiety it would cause. I mean, if I ruin a $20 pair of shoes, I’m annoyed with myself. I can’t imagine how I’d feel if I broke $400 worth of footwear.

Alas, I digress.

Because I happen to own a blog that ends with “blog,” I’m often hit up by PR companies to send me such items as “a coupon for a frozen dinner” that the PR company is just CERTAIN I’ll want to wax poetic about to my awesome Pranksters, not understanding that I rarely eat, and when I do, it’s not the cause for a blog post. I’m no cooking blogger, y’all, and I normally want to hork anytime anyone posts pictures of food. It just doesn’t translate well without a $5,000 camera and professional lighting set-up, which, Pranksters, I neither have nor want. Who wants to look at their pores under those lights? (answer: not me)

Once in awhile, though, I’ll receive an offer for a sex toy, which, duh, of course I take it. Doesn’t mean I need to write a soft-core porn post, although that might be humorously disgusting, but still – who doesn’t like sex toys? (answer: people who hate fluffy kittens)(no, not SWEATER kittens).

Well before I moved, Lelo (link PROLLY not appropriate for work), who happens to be one of the best sex toy makers out there, somehow stumbled here and read about the pain in my neck and how I “give good spasm,” (neck spasms, Pranksters) and offered to send me one of their neck massagers. Which, after I’ve already done PT, weird drugs, seen a chiropractor, and bought a tens machine, all to no avail, I was more than willing to give a proverbial shot.

When it arrived, I’d already forgotten that Lelo had sent me something, so I was shocked to open the package and find this:

I goggled at it for awhile, certain that this couldn’t possibly be a sex toy. I mean, it LOOKS like a sex toy, but frankly, I couldn’t POSSIBLY begin to  imagine using that on anything other than my neck. The two men in my house disagreed.

Dave: “WOAH, why is there a huge penis charging on the kitchen counter?”

Me: “It’s not a penis, it’s a neck massager.”

Dave: “Bwahahahaha. No it’s not.”

Me: “I did pop three babies out of my vagina, but damns, that thing isn’t gonna fit there.”

Dave: “Bwahahahaha.”

—————–

(two hours later)

The Guy (Formerly) On My Couch: “Wow, Becks, nice dildo.”

Me (through clenched teeth): “It’s NOT a dildo.”

The Guy (Formerly) On My Couch: “Oh yes it is.”

—————–

So that was that. Two out of two men assumed that the neck massager I’d been using to work that knot from my neck, the one that had been there for three years was actually intended for the vagina. I had no way to make them understand that this neck massager was, in fact, a massager and not an extremely large dlido.

Finally, I approached the two of them, who were sitting on the couch together eating dinner and watching incredibly crappy television, neck massager in my hand.

“If this were a dildo,” I began. “Why on EARTH would a well-known sex toy company send me it under the guise of it being a “neck massager?”

They both stared at me, slack-jawed before nodding a bit.

“Gotta admit,” Dave began. “You have a point there,” finished The Guy (Formerly) On My Couch.

“Good,” I replied. “Glad we had this little talk.”

As I turned to walk out of the room, Dave leaned over and semi-whispered to The Guy (Formerly) On My Couch. “It’s totally a dildo.”

“Yep,” The Guy (Formerly) On My Couch replied. “It sure is.”