School, if you haven’t heard, is out for summer.

*cue guitar solo*

Hear that noise? That’s the sound of hundreds of parents weeping at the impending “I’m booooooored,” that will pepper each and every  conversation from now until August, a date that seems impossibly far away from where I’m standing. Oddly, I like having my children around, even the ten-going-on-sixteen one, who has his moments of sweetness interspersed with what I can only assume is the beginning of puberty.

Hear that? That’s the sound of me weeping into my cup of coffee.

Summer vacation in my house meant two things: it was going to be ass hot, and my mother, as soon as I awoke, would hand me a slice of bread to eat as she booted me out the door, locking me squarely outside. It’s not that she didn’t like my company – I’m quite certain I was both a gentleman AND a scholar – it’s that she simply didn’t want to listen to me whine about being bored.

And, with kids of my own now, I can’t say I blame her.

We were a rowdy pack: there was my BFF(slash)mortal enemy (we switched it up every other day or so) Ashley, my best friend David Cook (no relation to the American Idol winner)(PROBABLY), and a couple of other kids thrown in for good measure. We got into all kinds of mischief and mayhem, or, what appeared to US to be mischief and mayhem. Mostly, we played American Gladiators and watched women’s wrestling.

Foxy boxing was, well, foxy.

We were a pack of free-range kids. Our neighborhood was tucked well out of the way from traffic, so the few cars that drove past did so slowly enough that we could pull in our hockey nets before getting run over. We had Lemonade Stands, played Ghost in the Graveyard, and, once, in a stunning fit of brilliance, peeled half the bark of the birch tree in the front yard.

I’ve been sorta sad my own son hasn’t gotten to have that experience. Ben’s the type of kid who, bless the good lord-n-butter, lives with his head permanently in the clouds. I’m being for-serious when I say that he’s the kid who’d be all, “Oh, you have KITTENS in your car Mr. Trenchcoat Dude in the Child Napping Van? LEMMIE AT THE KITTIES!”

It’s less a personality defect and “GRAAAAPPPPP” *hair falls out into a puddle around me* type of situation. I’m EARNING my bald patches.

Which is why I’ve been looking forward to this. The day has FINALLY come.

The younger two are now old enough to play in the front without me having to have a coronary because the teens that live in the houses surrounding mine like to use my normally-quiet street for drag racing contests. It’s like toddlers don’t know they shouldn’t go in the street or some shit. Clearly, toddlers are stupid.

Last night, I stood in my backyard, perched atop a precariously placed step-stool*, kicking myself for not weather-sealing the privacy screen that my roses use to climb upward, because black spot is a motherfucking asshole that I’d like to kick in its tiny fungus ass.

Below me, and oddly not trying to shake the ladder, my children clamored about in the backyard, a motley band of neighborhood kids all in one space, using the swing-set that I’d once bought for my (then) only child and eating Popsicles I’d had stashed away in the freezer for such an occasion. I listened to them chatter back and forth, “telling” on each other, playing dodge ball, pulling each other aside for “secrets” and, finally, having an American Idol-type singing contest.

(my kid, I’ll have you know, sang “Eye of the Tiger”)

I smiled, one of those soft quiet smiles you give yourself when you feel you’ve done something right.

American Gladiators may be long-since over. Foxy Boxing may only occur on YouPorn. I don’t own a birch tree (I own an Ass Tree that’s infected with an Ass Boner). I plan to pay my children NOT to host a lemonade stand.

But finally. FINALLY my kids? They, too, are becoming free-range kids.

Here’s hoping one of the toddlers reminds his older brother that he should not, in fact, accept candy from strangers.

If only I could train my roses to kick blackspot in the taco – THEN my life would be complete.

This is a random picture of Alex’s handiwork – apparently, he learned how to water-board while at school.

If you look carefully, you can see the reflection of an orchid in the bowl – it’s like one of those optical illusions. I wonder if you can see Jesus!

*Don’t ask me why anyone within a five-block radius thought that me standing on a step-stool was a good idea.

I was a waitress for close to ten years. And by “waitress,” I mean that I worked anywhere from the hostess stand, to the busboy station, to slinging drinks behind the bar. And for most of those years, I loved it. I love people, I love meeting people, and I’m one of the better bullshitters I know. It’s an art form, really.

During my stint as a waitress, I learned how to deal with people. I think every teenager should be forced to spend a year working in a restaurant in order to properly prepare them for the real world, where some people are assholes for no fucking reason, and rather than pee in their drink you simply smile and nod. It’s a good life lesson – being able to stare someone in the face that you hate, while not letting on that you’d rather be curb-checking them somewhere.

I realized, during my final stint as a server, that I was done. Just DONE. I couldn’t do it any more. Why? Someone had the audacity to ask me for a refill on their soda WHILE I was on the way to get them a refill.

HOW DARE THEY?

(I kid, I kid, I drink Diet Coke like it’s going to be extinct)

If I’d continued working there, I’d have ground my teeth into nubs by the end of each shift.  I could no longer smile and make nice while I served up pizza, pulling in $30 for a 5-10 shift. It just was…it was over.

I’d begun to feel that way about blogging.

Gone were the days that I could pull up a blank WordPress screen and pour my heart out through my fingertips. Gone were the days when stories flowed. It’d become so much harder. I’d hurt too many, I had to censor myself, I didn’t always have a hilarious spin on shit, because, well, shit isn’t always funny.

I worried I’d become boring – I wasn’t doing much new. I didn’t want to become one of those bloggers who’d been around so long she had nothing else left to say.

And the in the New Blogging World, well, I still don’t fit in. In a space where Tumblr and Pinterest can capture the attention because oooh! shiny! who wanted to read WORDS? LOTS of words! BORING words? Was blogging worth it?

I couldn’t answer that.

I’ve been around long enough to have been able to see the metamorphosis of blogging – people had gone from using blogging as a means to tell stories and keep up with family and begun buying into the business of blogging. While I *do* run a non-profit now, it’s not like sponsors are piling up at my door, knocking themselves over trying to sponsor me. And frankly, I don’t know that I’d want them to, anyway. I like blogging on my terms. I’m beholden to no one but myself and my Pranksters.

But in a world where blogs are now businesses, and the “Word Of Mom,” has become king, where does that leave someone like me? Sure, I sell ads – I have to support the cost of running a non-profit, but I’m still waiting on my yacht or my all-expense paid trip to Detroit or Delaware.

I’ll be waiting a long damn time.

I considered shutting my blog down – I mean, it’s only a matter of time before I reach the end of the Internet – which, I imagine, will look a lot like a ball of hair – and why not quit while the quittin’s good?

I’ve been thinking long and hard about that.

And it came back around to this: I started writing because I needed a place to fit in; a place I could tell my stories, and a place I could make friends and connect with other people. I never expected I’d find a family in my Pranksters. I’d never expected to have a soul read my blog, unless it was some spambot named Robert trying to sell me some quick and easy pay-day loans or enlarge the size of my non-existent penis.

When I began Mommy Wants Vodka, I fit in on the fringes. My very first friends were my baby loss mamas and the infertile community – these two groups understood how it felt to be on the outside looking in. And today, my greatest friends are still from the IF/Loss community. They’ve been the sort of friends who have dusted me off, wiped the vomit off my proverbial chin, and reminded me that sometimes life is a hot bag of dicks.

These two communities are what lead to the embryonic idea behind Band Back Together: it would be a space for the IF/Loss/Special Needs community to get together and share stories – libraries of stories of people who had been through the same problems. In that way, we could be none of us alone.

In turn, I’d use my nursing background to create valuable resources for those who are struggling; to be used as a sort of reference, to learn more.

But being exclusive hurts my vagina, so I opted to invite anyone to share their stories: stories of IF and loss, stories of mental illness and triumph, stories of natural disasters and recovery. YOUR stories. We ALL have a story – it’s up to us to tell it. To reach someone in some far corner of the universe who may find your words and take some comfort that he or she is not, in fact, alone.

The shelves in my online library of stories at Band Back Together have grown and outpaced anything I could dream of. I couldn’t be more proud of The Band and all that we do.

All are, as always, welcome to submit their stories. Even you. Your story is just as important as the next person’s.

Here’s the link to submit to Band Back Together and here is the link to read stories.

But it was thinking back on where I’d come from and where I’d go from here that I was reminded of my roots. How I do have the capacity to simply open up my blog and pour my stories out, whether or not I win fancy awards or get sponsored to visit Texas. How all of that bullshit about ranks and numbers and followers, it’s just that: bullshit.

I still have my words. I’m going to continue to write like no one’s reading.

And as I do that, I’d like to remind you, the Infertile/Loss community, that I’ve never forgotten my roots. June is National Infertility Month, and each month on Band Back Together, we choose to shine the spotlight on a condition (or conditions) that do not receive enough time in the sun.

This month, we’re shining the spotlight directly onto IF/Loss so that we can turn what was once hidden in the dark, back into the light.

I invite you, my Pranksters, to join us in getting the Band Back Together. For infertility. For loss. For ALL of you.

(yes YOU)

So get your leather pants strapped on, and start your storytelling. You never do know who will be touched by your words and be reminded of our mission: we are none of us alone; we are all connected.

It’s safe to say (I think) that I came from an abnormal family. Anyone who writes a blog on the Internet as “Your Aunt Becky” is not exactly someone who you’d hold up as the pinnacle of normal.

My parents, as white-collar hippies didn’t exactly promote the idea of normalcy as something to strive for.

You want to shave half your head and dye your scalp purple? Go for it!

You want to shave your legs in vertical stripes and wear mini-skirts? Why not?

Want to get your belly button pierced at age 14 by some guy in the back of a music store with instruments that were probably NOT sterilized? WHY NOT?

They did draw the line at both tattoos and visible body piercing, for which I am eternally grateful. While wearing an eyebrow ring through the hallowed halls of my high school may have made me stand out from the crowd, ten years later, that pesky hole would drive me bonkers.

Being quirky as an adult is kinda awesome. It means that people who meet you after reading your blog think that you’ll probably de-pants them while eating a hot dog, humping their now-naked leg, while yelling, “EYE OF THE TIGER BABY!” Imagine their surprise when you do neither.

My middle son, Alex, he’s always been a character. He’s the guy who you’ll find hanging out at frat parties, double-fisting cheap keg beer while breaking furniture just to make you laugh. He’s a non-coke addicted Chris Farley in toddler form. At least, I HOPE he’s not addicted to coke – he’s been told “no recreational drugs until he’s twelve,” but you know kids these days.

Anyway. Alex is the epitome of different – he’s quirky and charming.

His Halloween costume for three years running now is a butterfly costume. Why? Because the kid loves butterflies, and why the fuck not?

(no, the wings are not some weird PR stunt – the kid just likes butterflies, and why the fuck not? They’re fucking awesome.)

He’s the first in line to get his nails painted – fingers and toes – and while he’s as rough and tumble as little boys can get, he’s happily in touch with his exuberant side.

Who the shit doesn’t love silver fingernails?

This Friday, on our weekly pilgrimage to The Target, I strong-armed my daughter into picking up some new underwear (she potty trained herself, which just figures). She, being related to me and somehow sensing that my very first training bra was a Wonder Women bra, gravitated toward not Dora. Not Diego. No. BATMAN.

Because obviously.

(I’d totally wear Batman undies if I could find ’em in my size.)

While we were in the undies aisle, I grabbed a couple more packs of undies, including two packs of My Little Pony undies – one for her, one for her brother. I *knew* he’d get a kick out of them.

And he did.

But Sunday morning, he wandered over to me, and asked me in the very serious way in which a five-year old who thinks a lot can, “Mommy, will you kill me if I wear girls underwear?”

My heart dropped a little bit.

I wrapped him in my arms, and said, “No, baby, you wear what you want to wear – just look at your sister!” She stood next to him, adjusting the crotch on her Batman skivvies, the flap that normally covers the twig and crackle-berries sadly vacant, and smiled.

“Alex,” she said. “I love your My Little Ponies underwear.”

And they scampered off, hand in hand, and I sat watching them, hoping the rest of the world will be as kind.

When I moved out to the suburbs back in aught seven (or was it aught six?), I didn’t expect that I’d blend right in. While I do live in the area in which I was raised, being an adult is much different than being a child. Mainly because you have to remember to take out the recycling bins every Tuesday, and who can remember THAT shit?

(answer: The Daver)

I was a young mother. Not like Teen Mom style, but birth-control-fail-whale and happy-twenty-first-enjoy-your-bottle-of-baby-formula, kind of young. In some parts of the country, having a baby at twenty-one is more normal than it is here in Saint Charles, IL (NOT MO). I’ve never been looked down on, per se (unless the person in question was taller than I), but I’m definitely the odd one out when I take my kid to Jr. High orientation, and not just because I’m wearing a shirt that says “HOORAY BEER” on it.

So the house in the suburbs, that seemed pretty okay with me. I mean, it beat Oak (no) Parking, which is so beyond liberal that me and my boring biological child (not a baby I adopted from some exotic country) well, we were breeders. I was never gonna make it there as a parent.

But here in St. Charles, well, people here are NICE. Within five minutes of moving in, two sets of my neighbors had brought over brownies and cookies for us to eat. It was incredible, considering that, in my condo, the last thing I’d gotten on my doorstep was a bag of dogshit.

My neighborhood is so overrun with kids that when mine go out to play, I can barely identify them in the swarming masses of swirling kids clamoring for money for the ice cream man. It’s fucking great. No, seriously, it is.

Until I go and fuck shit up.

Now when I moved in to my house, I hadn’t realized how piss-poor the landscaping job was. It was like the original owners hired landscapers and every owner since just sorta threw up their hands and decided that rather than “maintain the bushes,*” they’d just wallpaper the bathrooms in every possible fug ass pattern. I imagine it went like this:

Old Owner #1: “Man, those bushes need to be trimmed.”

Old Owner #2: “I’m thinking a three swatch pattern for the bathroom. The room’s only 4×2 – that should make the three patterns POP!”

Old Owner #1: “But the shrubbery must be maintained! We cannot see out of the windows!”

Old Owner #2: “You’re right! We should put a faux wood toilet seat on, too!”

Old Owner #1: “But! We look like recluses!”

Old Owner #2: “What do you think of an angel theme?”

It was February of Aught Six when we moved in and I didn’t know anything about the shrubbery except that there were a number of fake flower beds planted in the front of the house. Oh, and the old owners had been kind enough to leave us a hanging basket of fake flowers that looked like it had come over on the Mayflower.

It took walking into my backyard after the snow melted to note that there was, in fact, two gaping holes in the lawn as well as a number of bushes so overgrown I wouldn’t be surprised if we were on the FBI’s watch list.

“The Serial Killer Next Door,” tonight on Fox News Chicago.

(please ensure, Pranksters, that you find the picture of me with a chain saw to accompany that particular news segment. OH! And I want Tori Spelling to play me in my Lifetime Original Movie.)

I applied this bizarre mix of shredded paper and grass seed to the gigantic spots on the lawn, and oddly, grass grew. Apparently, you grow grass by putting newspaper on it. Perhaps print media ISN’T dead!

But the shrubbery? That was a different ballgame. Two years, two busted ankles, a couple of trips to the Serial Killer Section of the hardware store, and eventually, all of the fug ass evergreens were replaced by daintier azaleas and rhododendrons. Flower beds with REAL FLOWERS were planted and sometimes? They even LIVED.

The problem started here:

I bought Mark Zuckerberg.

Yeah, I know, he’s not the ultimate in tacky and he and I aren’t speaking terms because HELLO, he had a wedding and didn’t invite me. HOW DARE YOU, MARK ZUCKERBERG, HOW DARE YOU?

Once I bought Mark Zuckerberg, I realized he needed some friends. Sure, you can’t have a million friends without making some enemies, but I suspect Mark Zuckerberg has very FEW friends.

I introduce to you, The Bros Winkelvoss, or, as I like to call them, The Winkelvii:

Now you may be saying, THAT’S FLAMINGO ABUSE, or, if you’re my mother, “I raised you better than that.”

But what makes these flamingos even awesomer? THEY’RE SOLAR POWERED.

Yes, that’s right – I have light-up flamingos that I named after the ALMOST Founders of The Facebook.

I decided that this wouldn’t do. It simply wouldn’t do. It needed MORE.

It needed THIS:

I’m thinking these may be Tom from MySpace (that dude was EVERYONE’S friend), Justin Timberlake from Napster, and the guy who put together Friendster.

Who doesn’t want a prop-filled backyard filled with Internet People?

Jimmy Wales – you and your eyes that watch me wherever I go, silently judging me for looking up “Why is orange a color and a fruit” on Wikipedia – You’re NEXT.

You’ve been warned.

*giggle-snort

Edited to add: Here is the link to where you, too, can purchase Zombie Gnomes!

P.S. The flamingo one is next.

I’d just sat down to build my 105 floor on Tiny Tower, which I’d planned to name a jaunty “Cyber Sex,” when my kids got home from their grandmother’s. A couple of times a week, they visit my mom’s house, where they happily can eat cereal from plates and annoy my parents with their incessant chattering while I sit at home in my underwear, playing Tiny Tower and watching videos of dancing snails.

My eldest son burst into the house, a whirlwind of knees and elbows, and clomped out to the family room, where I was sitting on my iPad playing a pixelated game and pretending that I wasn’t as lame as, well, I am.

(shut UP)

“MOM,” he yelled. “WE HAVE TO GO TO SCHOOL NOW.”

Um. I’m not wearing pants.

“Why?” I asked, cautiously. There’s something in that child that turns every minor request into an earth-shattering conquest – like we were going to have to climb a mountain, drink our own urine to stay warm, and nosh upon whomever was not up to the challenge in order to get to his elementary school.

“IT’S MY SOLO TONIGHT!” he nearly took my face off with his screams.

Aunt Becky say wha??

That was the first I’d heard of a “solo” a “concert” or a “trip to school after hours.” I try to be up-to-date on all things kids-related, but this child, well, he’s as organized as a, well, okay, he’s not very organized. We’re working on it.

(and by “working on it,” I mean that when he hands me a stack of ancient papers for events we’ve already missed, by hair falls out)

The kid was SOL – Alex has an ear infection, Dave’s out of town, and I, well, I’ve had a migraine that makes me wish I could plunk out my eyeballs with a spoon just to stop them from quivering unpleasantly. The Guy On My Couch was going to have to take over for me for the night – I couldn’t send him to school with the kid, much as I wanted to.

“Sorry, kiddo, but we’re going to have to skip it,” I replied, and before I could continue to explain myself – inserting neatly an object lesson in telling people what you need them to do BEFORE you demand that they drop everything and do it for you – he began to scream.

“BUT MOM, THEY’RE COUNTING ON ME!” The teeth gnashing had begun.

“Ben,” I replied. “We have 14 minutes to get you dressed and ready to leave the house. Do you even know where this concert is?”

“NO,” he said, again yelling my face off. “BUT I GOTTA BE THERE, MOM. I GOTTA.”

The maternal guilt began flowing freely, dripping from both my eyes and ears. I knew it was a lesson he had to learn – had I been given a couple hours to plan, I’d have been able to find someone to take the kid, but with 14 minutes to go? I was fucked.

And OMFWTFBBQ the guilt.

Even now, well after the fact, I’m stewing in a nice puddle of maternal guilt. I WANTED the kid to get there – I wanted to SEE him play his solo. A GOOD mother would’ve made sure her kid got there and I couldn’t do it, therefore, I was clearly NOT a good mother.

To make a long, drawn out, histrionic conversation short, we didn’t go. When I stop feeling like shit about this, I’ll let you know.

I sent his teacher an email, explaining that I was very sorry, that we were all sick, and no one was around to help with Ben’s siblings. The guilt oozed from my fingertips as I wrote it.

After I hit send (carefully removing links to my blog from the bottom of my email signature), the guilt flooded me. I had to watch some Prison Break just to remind myself that I’m not THAT much of a failure. In hindsight, I should’ve watched Jersey Shore –  Michael Scofield would’ve made an elaborate plan including both tattoos, the sun’s gravitational pull, and a single red Twizzler to make sure the kid made his solo WITHOUT being taken out by The Company.

This morning, I awoke to check my email to find she’d written me back, wishing to talk about my son’s future in music with me.

When I stop panicking, I’ll let you know.

I’m a grown-ass woman, and I’m STILL afraid to talk to a teacher about my son’s organizational problems.

If you need me, I’ll be under the bed, sneezing up cat hair and looking for my missing whore pants.

0) Rebranding myself a “social media maven.”

1) Listening to John C. Mayer croon about my body being a wonderland.

1) Decoding passive aggressive Facebook status updates into anagrams about zombies.

2) Finding that bitch Carmen Sandiego.

3) Eating mayonnaise by the spoonful.

5) Trying to figure out why my phones have been tapped.

8) Blogging about my fake dead cat Mr. Sprinkles.

13) Watching a cooking show without rolling my eyes and/or trying to poke out my eyeballs with a spoon.

21) Understanding the origins of the word “teh.”

34) Bathing a light socket with my tongue.

55) Retaking Calc 3.

89) Trying to figure out Pinterest and StumbleUpon

144) Delivering a baby in the back of a moving taxi (or city bus) using only a 12×14 box, a blue felt-tipped pen, and a strawberry Starburst.

233) Dressing in a giant squirrel costume, occasionally throwing myself into the road to signify “roadkill” or “the denigration of society and it’s inhumane treatment of roadkill.”

377) Traveling from office to office delivering singing telegrams to unwitting executives.

610) Becoming an interpretive dancer. See also, “SOMEONE DO A DANCE AS A SALAD! QUICK! YOU’RE THE LETTUCE. NOW YOU’RE THE TOMATO!”

987) Rewatching Season Three of Glee: Who Gives A Shit About Plot? LET’S DANCE, MOTHERFUCKERS!

1597) Listening to anything ever produced by Katy Perry and/or Avril Lavigne.

So what’s new with YOU, Pranksters? TELL ME ALL THE THINGS!

(scene, 11PM, just returned to the couch to watch another episode of Prison Break with Guy on the Couch. The Daver watches Deep Space Throat Nine Downstairs)

Aunt Becky: “FUCK, I just knocked over my Diet Coke.”

The Guy On My Couch: “I got the paper towels.”

Aunt Becky: “No, I mean, like FUCK!”

The Guy On My Couch: “Um…okay?”

Aunt Becky: “There should be a law against this.”

The Guy On My Couch: “…”

Aunt Becky: “No Diet Coke shall spill after 11PM.”

The Guy On My Couch: “…”

Aunt Becky: “Why are you staring at me like Michael Scofield? YOU’RE NOT IN PRISON. YOU DON’T NEED TO BREAK OUT OF IT.”

The Guy On My Couch: “…”

Aunt Becky: “What are you waiting for? CALL FEMA! CALL THE NATIONAL GUARD! CALL AARP! CALL NAACP! CALL THE BLACK PANTHERS! This is a fucking emergency situation.”

The Guy On My Couch: “…”

Aunt Becky: “And tell them to bring Funyons. I’m hungry.”

The Guy On My Couch: “…”

Aunt Becky: “I’d be okay with Chex Mix too. Just, you know, if Doctors Without Borders is out of Funyons.”

The Guy On My Couch: “…”

Aunt Becky: “THIS IS A DIRE EMERGENCY.”

The Guy On My Couch: (rolls eyes)

Aunt Becky: “Can you stop giving me the Michael Scofield stare, PLEASE? To circumvent your next question, I do not have a fake-gold crucifix with which to help you turn off the electricity.”

The Guy On My Couch: “I think there’s more footage of Michael Scofield staring out the window than any other scene in the show.”

Aunt Becky: “It’s signifying that he’s working something out. You know, how in House, MD (pauses for a moment of silence), they’re always walking with House and talking as a way to show plot progression?”

The Guy On My Couch: “…”

Aunt Becky: “If he just was all, ‘I need a 12×14 cardboard box, a blue felt-tipped pen, and a pink starburst,’ it’d be all, ‘where the shitballs did that come from?’ Looking out the window gives his plans some credence.”

The Guy On My Couch: “What would Scofield use those for?”

Aunt Becky: “The box would be to send a message via carrier pigeon and the blue pen would be a red herring – the pink starburst? That’d be because they’re delicious.”

The Guy On My Couch: (laughs)

Gimmie the Pink Starburst and NO ONE GETS HURT!

Aunt Becky: “Well, they ARE. And where the shit is AAA to clean up my Diet Coke? You DID call them, right? You DID stress that this was a NATIONAL EMERGENCY, RIGHT?”

The Guy On My Couch: “…”

Aunt Becky: “Maybe the IRS can help.”

The Guy On My Couch: “What, are they gonna give you a tax break or something?”

Aunt Becky: “You never do know…” (gazes into the distance)

(several minutes elapse)

Aunt Becky: “If I made a baby with Wentworth Miller, would it cry in a British accent?

The Guy On My Couch: “You’re fired.”

Aunt Becky: “So are you. Where the fuck is the Red Cross?”

If I could tell the world just one thing…

The January air was cold, crisp, the sort of Chicago winter that seared your boogers to the insides of your nose and made your eyes water, your tears freezing as soon as they emerged from your tear ducts. I was just crossing the river, the grey of the cold January afternoon oppressively suffocating me as I noted the chunks of ice floating down the river. I wished I could fall down there with them, and wake up to a new day, a new life.

I was driving my dad’s old car, the roads wet and icy, the salt making a jaunty click-click sound against the bottom of my red Acura Integra, the one I’d inherited to replace my del Sol for something, well, with a backseat. A backseat that held one tiny infant, with a shock of black hair who squalled and cried, even as we drove. I hadn’t slept in days. To keep me awake, and to drown out the sound of my tiny sons wails, I put on one of my most favorite Christmas albums.

….it’d be that we’re all okay.

I was baffled by my new baby.

His dislikes included me, air, food, being touched, the world, gravity, the universe, and, well, life. Babies are supposed to love this shit, right? If babies are supposed to love this shit, then it’s clearly some character flaw of mine that he couldn’t even look me in the eyes.

In 2001, autism wasn’t The Thing – no one walked, or ran, for a cure – no one really knew much about it. And I certainly didn’t suspect that he had a problem.

He was just…temperamental. And he probably sensed that I was a bad mother, a piece of shit person, and could tell that he’d drawn the shitty card when he was born to me.

In the end, only kindness matters.

My heart was as heavy and oppressive, like my mood.

I’d waddled back home at twenty, pregnant with my young son, tail between my proverbial legs. My parents graciously allowed me back into their home and helped me set up a nursery for him, but, like any other kind deed, this one came with strings so long that I nearly hung myself on them. And my son’s father, angry that I’d had the audacity to get pregnant while on birth control, (while we get along now) well, he wasn’t particularly kind to me.

The last person I recalled being truly kind to me was one of the nurses in the hospital as she wheeled me out to the car with my new baby.

Five months before.

Not to worry, because worry is wasteful and useless in times like these.

Since I could recall, I’d dreamed of going to medical school and becoming a doctor. I’d never considered having children, never thought that I’d be a parent but here I was. And there he was.

I couldn’t figure out what next. If I wanted a life with my son, I’d have to give up on the only dream I’d ever known – becoming a doctor. If I didn’t want a life with my son, well, I could go to medical school, see him on weekends and in between rotations, living with my parents until I was forty, but despite his dislike of me, I was pretty fond of the little guy.

Stuck between a rock and a bigger rock, the future a black question mark of yawning uncertainty, I drove aimlessly around, trying to make the kid sleep, trying to outrun my demons, trying to figure out what next.

I won’t be made useless.

I’d never not had a plan before. It was like waking up to realize I’d lost the right half of my body. I’d dreamed of medical school since I was a toddler – the dream was over. But what to fill it with?

I didn’t have that answer. I didn’t know where to look for an answer. I didn’t know what to do next. The emptiness was overwhelming.

My hands are small I know, but they’re not yours, they are my own.

Everywhere I turned, someone else was telling me what to do. What not to do. How I was ruining my child. How I needed to do this or that. How I shouldn’t ever think of doing this again. I was twenty-one – there was no one in my corner telling me that I could do it if I just got all EYE OF THE MOTHERFUCKING TIGER about it.

I’ll gather myself around my fears.

Maybe I wasn’t the most qualified of people to raise my son; maybe my brother and sister-in-law were (my mother had asked them if they’d adopt my son should I “go off the rails on a crazy train”). Maybe he was better off without me. But he wasn’t going to get that chance. Whether he liked it or not, I was going to parent the SHIT out of him. I was gonna get him a family and we were going to make it.

For light does the darkness most fear.

The dark days outnumbered the light ones for a good long time. I had to learn to smile and nod as I was told that I was doing a bad job at parenting. Every jab, every poke, every complaint about me, I learned to smile and nod. “Yes, that’s right, I am a bad mother, you’re so right.” I ground my teeth into nubs and smiled.

Soon, my path veered dramatically. I entered nursing school, found a new plan and met the man I would marry. The man who would encourage me, after only reading emails I’d sent, to write.

I won’t be made useless.

Maybe my “plan” was gone – so what? The world was a big place – plenty of room for new plans. I would not be made useless. I would do something to make my small boy proud. I’d get him the family he needed, I’d get away from his father, and I’d give him the siblings that helped the autistic child emerge from his own world to join ours.

I did. I found my words as he found his, and together we were able to carve out a new plan – a better plan.

I won’t be idle with despair.

There have been months, years full of despair, sadness. My heart, however, has never been as empty as it was that day, crossing the mighty Fox River, me against the world. If I could tell my former self that day that, “hey, your life will be nothing like you thought it would be, but that’s okay,” I would. I’d give that girl a hug. I’d let her know that it was okay to be scared. It was okay to feel weak and powerless because, well, she was.

But not deep inside. Deep inside, there was a drive, a dream, to become more. To be better. To do something with herself.

And she has.

And I will.

I am never broken.

When my eldest was five, I was beyond delighted to find that they still manufactured EZ Bake Ovens. I, myself, had often begged, borrowed, and wheedled my mother about buying me one. Her response was two-fold:

A) They cook the cakes with a lightbulb

2) You can use the REAL oven.

Of course, she, being wiser than I, never allowed me within ten feet of an oven. I give you Exhibit A:

Actual attempt by Your Aunt Becky to create a fancy cake. At age 29.

Pranksters, tell me that cake doesn’t look like semen layered upon bubble gum and a sponge.

Anyway, it was with great gusto that I bought my son an EZ Bake Oven. And promptly realized that my mother, in fact, had been right all along – the thing was a piece of junk. The “brownies” we made tasted like water-logged cardboard.

When I noted the 80’s clothes coming back, I groaned, the same way my own parents groaned when I clomped into the house wearing platform heels and a Dashiki. As if leggings and pajama jeans weren’t bad enough, now grown-ass women can wear whimsical overalls?

WHY, o! WHY would I want to wear those overalls? They look like they’d crawl up your cootch and hang out there, not only making you uncomfortable, but also giving you a massive case of camel toe.

Alas, I digress.

When I saw that Strawberry Shortcake was making a comeback, I’ll admit that I got pretty excited. I mean, that doll used to smell like AWESOMENESS and hell, it’s better than listening to fucking Dora talking about her stupid fucking backpack or Ruby telling Max all bossy-like, “Now, Max…”

WHERE ARE YOUR PARENTS, CARTOON CREATURES?

But then, they took on the Smurfs and made Katy Perry – who appears to actually be a smurf in real life – and did a creepy animated Smurf movie. When I stop weeping, I’ll let you know.

My children’s latest obsession is with something that, as a young lass, I, too, loved: My Little Pony. Oh, how I loved My Little Pony – nearly as much as the Pound Puppies and the Barbies that I was not allowed (my hippie mother didn’t want me to grow up thinking women needed to be 7 feet tall with double FF’s and blond). I watched the show as religiously as I could, considering I was allotted an hour of television each day – unless it was PBS, which is how I learned that the art of cooking is this:

“Throw a bunch of shit in a pan. Don’t measure. More ingredients = better. Then order takeout.” Thank YOU, Jeff Smith for that misconception.

I was all excited when the kids stopped watching Phineas and Ferb and began to watch My Little Pony. My middle son, Alex, is extra-specially fond of the show, which I found to be adorable until…

…I realized that they’d redone the show.

I mean, it’s not like the ponies are like all sexified and slinky or anything, which, after seeing the Bratz Dolls, I count as a win, but what was so wrong with the original cartoon? I ASK YOU TELEVISION EXECS, WHAT WAS WRONG WITH THE ORIGINAL?

Sighs.

I guess I should go back to my Matlock reruns – interspersed, of course, with episodes of Murder, She Wrote – chug some Geritol, fantasize about getting a cane to trip random walkers-by and yell at the damn kids to get off my damn lawn.

Oh wait.

Those are MY kids on the lawn.

When people used to say things like, “Oh, I can’t WAIT for the fall TV lineup,” or “I have EVERY NIGHT’S TELEVISION SCHEDULE COLOR-CODED and in a GRAPH!” I’d do one of two things:

1) Wonder what a chart of pies would look like (rather than a pie chart).

B) Seethe in jealousy because WHO HAS THAT KIND OF TIME?

(answer: not me).

I started getting into watching television when I was pregnant with Alex, and everything – including the ice maker making ice slowly made me vomit, then cry, then vomit again. Dick Wolf lured me in Law and Order: Their Life Is Worse Than Yours So Suck It Up, Cupcake because, well, no matter what time of day it was, there were at least three episodes currently playing.

(when, much later, I got a DVR and tried to record some of the Law and Order: Fuck You And Your First World Problems, it wheezed, groaned, then laughed at me before refusing to record anything Dick Wolf ever created)

(sidebar: I cannot decide if Dick Wolf is the world’s perfect name or the world’s worst name. Either way, he’s a brilliant, brilliant man who should probably pull an Oprah and have his own television channel)

Eventually, I watched most of Law and Order: Being Out of Seasalt Is Not The End Of The World, and realized I needed another distraction, some way to turn my brain off from 11 to a nice solid 4. And, based upon what my friends were saying, I should try this House, MD thing.

I did.

It was there, through medical jargon I so desperately missed, that I found someone like me; someone who wasn’t perfect. Someone who had issues and bad hair days and wasn’t glitz and glam – someone who was broken.

Someone who was broken.

Someone who was broken like me.

House made it okay for those of us just left of center, those of us who are fragmented, those of us who fight to be normal, to be, well, who we are. House made it okay to use biting humor to mask my feelings because, well, some things are easier said while dripping with sarcasm.

He made it okay to be an antihero.

He gave me the strength to write things like this, things I’ve never before said aloud because they seemed too scary, too real, like if I gave them the airplay, my life might implode.

I’ve watched him painfully go through rehab, recovery. I’ve watched as he lost his mind, then found it again. I’ve watched him be brilliant and I’ve watched him as he fails. I’ve found myself crying, nodding because there was finally someone out there who was just like me. Maybe – just maybe – I wasn’t alone.

Tonight, House, MD, will run it’s finale.

Before I watch it, box of tissues in hand, I wanted to say thank you, to you, the brilliant writers of House, MD, for giving me a character who has helped me confront my demons. Who made it okay to be broken. Who made it okay to be weak. Who reminded me to keep taking that one step forward.

Who made it okay to be me.