Na na na na na na - Today is my birthday!

I have to start off by admitting that I stole my title from another boxing day baby's blog Linda (@Croneandbearit) and knew immediately that I must do the same. See - having a birthday the day after Christmas has to be, in my humble opinion, the worst day ever.  It is a day that has everyone too pooped to party. Last night as the DH was announcing "Leftovers tomorrow" I had to remind him that there would be NO leftovers because it was......  my birthday!

As I embark on the final year of yet another decade, things like leftovers on my birthday are just a no - no. I've had a lifetime of leftovers, combined gifts and just "forgets" so when my birthday rolls around, I like to celebrate! I don't blame anyone, people are tired, full and just partied out from the month of festivities. They are resting on the day after, trying to regain their energy for the new year's celebrations that are on the horizon.  I now know that I must take control over my day. Being humble just doesn't work when your birthday is the day after Christmas. When most people downplay their birthdays, most of us 12/26s embrace the day with gusto (because if we don't - nobody else will!). Having dinner with the bff and the DH's there was another birthday celebration and we noted that there seems to be a lot today. Counting back 9 months to the winter month of March (and cold night snuggling) not withstanding, Dec 26 babies like to party!

It reminds me of a day a few years ago... it was mid January and I was feeling a little pensive over the fact that another year my birthday just seemed to come and go, when I decided to call each one of my girlfriends and invite them to a really nice restaurant for lunch.  It ended up being about 7 of us... and they were all trying to guess why I had gathered them.  The popular bet was divided equally on pregnancy or divorce..  Of course, it was neither - I had declared that I decided to throw myself a birthday party and they were my presents.  It was one of the best times I've had.  That was the beginning of my new birthday mentality.

I must say, this act of being pro-active with the birthday is quite liberating. So liberating in fact, that I plan on riding it throughout the year. It's really a way of thinking, why wait for things to happen, when you can make them happen yourself. I am excited to start this next year.... won't you celebrate with me?

BFFs - really?

BFFs........
I had dinner tonight with my BFF....  I laugh when I say that because we've been friends for over 20 years...... and in those 20 years we have been through SO much together- but we've never been BFFs. We consider each other sisters (neither of us have), but we're not the call each other everyday, lets go shopping kind of friends.  We're the of "911" kind of friends - we have a pact where if one of us ever texts 911 it means that we need each other immediately - drop whatever you are doing, wherever you are - I need you and ONLY you because only you will understand the crisis I am going through.  Our husbands are actually the BFF talk to you everyday kind of friends.

We met as young women who thought we knew and had it all. We laugh at the girls we were and take pride in the women we've become.  We also confide in each other about the "BFFs" that come into each of our lives. (Ironically, my bff just text me). Our families consider each other family, she is "Aunt" and so am I. My parents consider her a daughter. They love her as much as I do.

We were deep in conversation tonight because my friend is currently going through a double mourning period. She is mourning one friendship- (we'll call her Lydia) and re-mourning her former bff  - (we'll call her Agnes) who she lost because Agnes felt that she had sided with Lydia (Agnes & Lydia had a falling out - my girl was caught in the middle). We were discussing the friends in our lives, how they come in, the depth of the friendship at the time, and how the friendship changes over the years. My friend considered Agnes to be the "sitting on the porch at the nursing home" friend - the one she would still be BFFs with at the end of her life. That friendship will never be the same....... and it causes my friend great pain.

I had a break up like that once. Another 3sum (not that kind of 3sum), and my 2 friends had a falling out, I was caught in the middle - and eventually had a confrontation with 1 of them.  After an uncomfortable meeting I called her on the phone and said, "Are you breaking up with me?" and she started screaming at me. And I screamed back. We called each other names.  It was brutal. And when the phone call was done, I hung up and sobbed like someone had died. And someone did - our friendship. It was the worse breakup of my life! Years passed, and we reconciled to the point where we can have coffee together about once a year - but that is it.... it will never be the same again.

Do I have one BFF? No.... I have a few..... Different BFFs for different situations. I love them all (and by all - I DO mean VERY few). I think they will be forever......... but if they aren't, they are at least for now!

Young heart, wise head... can the two play nice?

For the first time in a long time I am coming off of a 3AM night out. I've done lots of 1 and 2AM nights futzin around on the computer.....  but I haven't had a late LATE night out in a long time. Granted, it was for a birthday party but I've been thinking about the days of old when 2 and 3AM meant time to hit the diner for some breakfast after a night of partying. I was reminded of this because one of the 'young' ladies who was at the party asked that very question at 3:15 when we were dispersing for the ride home - "Aren't we going to the diner for breakfast? ha ha"  Ha ha? All I could think of was how good my pillow was going to feel.

And.........  it was a good decision to come home.  After sleeping in (as much as my body allows me to sleep in these days) I awoke to coffee (because the wise head in me said 'stay up 5 minutes longer and set your coffee up for the morning - you are going to need it') and a VERY tired looking face. And a tired body. 

OH - and did I mention that the coffee isn't cutting it?  Oh no - I am a tired girl this morning. 

I knew this was going to be the case though. That is the difference between the young and experienced. Back in the day I would go hard and never give the next day a thought.  I would wake tired but ready to tackle the day. Now I go into an evening anticipating the next few day's events because I know that the young heart in me directly affects the way I do things the next few days. Although I have a free day today, I have a long work day tomorrow and I went into last night thinking about how late I would sleep in, how tired I'd be - what my plans were for tonight and if I would still be feeling it when I get ready for work tomorrow. I chose to keep the drinks at a minimum and the water at a maximum.

As I read this though I sound like an old fart. Really I'm not. Actually I have the heart and spirit most days of a gal in her late 20s, early 30s. I feel young in my heart. In fact, I like to be the life of the party. I have had many memorable evenings which my friends love to bring up when we're together. This is probably because while my friends were partying in their 20s, I was raising my family. I had a rebellious couple of years recently that would make any 20-something gal proud. The problem is - I'm not that 20 something gal and the consequences are not worth it.

So how do you live with a young spirited heart when your wise head says PROCEED WITH CAUTION?!? Just like I'm doing. I look for opportunities to have fun and seize them. But I also anticipate what those opportunities will cost me and act appropriately instead of with wreckless abandon.

I can still party with the best of them.............  but BOY I love my pillow when it's over!!!

                                                                                               

The Procrastinator - That's ME!

Ah yes - this is SO me. I promised a month ago that I was going to write everyday of my vacation. 2 weeks came, and 2 weeks went and not a word was written.

I can't say that it's because I am SO overhwhelmed that I don't have time. I have always been this way. I have an illness - it is called procrastination. The first time I realized this was innocent enough - it was in high school and I was working on a term paper. Of course we had all quarter to work on it, and yet, there I was on a Friday night - working through the weekend to be able to turn it in on Monday. I slept little, worked hard and felt exhilerated and exhausted as I handed it in on time. The result was a "A". Next quarter - same deadline, same routine. You would think I would have learned. Last minute came, worked hard all weekend, handed it in and received an "A". Enough I thought........ I made a vow to myself that the next quarter would be different. And it was. I planned out my time, research and writing each week. Not only was there no last minute crunch, I finished a few days before the deadline. I felt good. Not exhilerated, but good. I handed in the paper. Imagine my surprise when it came back with a "B". WHAT? Oh no...... what went wrong? It was at that moment that I realized was that I needed the thrill of "last minute." I've never looked back........ it is my life. I accept it and I plan accordingly.

You might be asking - what prompted today's post? I registered on a site where I had to put my blog address in. The thought of someone new checking out the blog without a new post was frightening. A deadline presented itself and I obliged......... Til next time

Liar, liar pants on fire........

So my last blog post was on April 3rd...... oh yes - I remember the promise. I was going to blog regularly. Well once every 5 months is regular isn't it? Seriously, I can't blame it on anything other than lack of focus. There are lots of things that have happened over the past 5 months that were quite blog worthy. I also have the next week off so I am promising now that for the next week I hope to blog about a major event in each of the past 5 months, or the musings that were in my head for each. Of course, sometimes I can't remember what has happened yesterday so who knows what I'll remember, but it will be fun to try.



I've been off since Wednesday and I've had 2 one on one dates (okay - so yes, now you know I watch the Bachelor/Bachelorette), one with my daughter and one with my son. More about those at another time. For now, I am off to the showers so that I can have a totally productive day that I can blog about 5 months from now ;-)

How can you mend, a broken heart???

A broken heart can be caused by so many things; a lost love, a parent dying, the end of a friendship, shattered dreams- really anything you lose that is important to you.

I don't think that anyone ever truly recovers from a broken heart. You cry your tears, walk around like a frog with swollen red eyes. You mope, don't eat (or eat too much). You cry some more. You try to keep yourself busy - try to occupy the mind that wants to dwell in the past. You call your friends, you clean, you purge, the busier the work the better.

And then one day, you realize that you didn't cry. Somehow the deep pain you are so used to isn't as deep anymore. You start to notice the beauty in your life without shedding a tear. The sadness slowly starts to evaporate. One day you realize that there's joy back in your day.

The pain starts to fade away, but the thought is always lingering - as far away as it goes. The heart mends, but the scar remains forever.

Doing the right thing - sometimes it BITES!

I got tickets for the Fleetwood Mac concert months ago. DH and another couple - very dear friends of ours. It was actually my friend who called and said, "Come on - let's go." She is my concert buddy and we've gone to see some great concerts together - The Police, Paul McCartney down in Tampa, Prince. So yes, this was a no brainer. Fast forward to a few weeks ago, new project at work. I'm brought in and looking at the calendar pick a date for our kick-off. Yeah - you guessed it, the same night as the concert. Now - for whatever reason, the concert never made it to Outlook, google or the iPhone. It didn't even occur to me that they were on the same night until a week ago when my friend called to confirm the plans; dinner first then the concert. Yikes - I tell DH and start thinking of ways to sell the tickets. That's when DH says, "I think I'm still going to go." Now - I don't care that he went with them, I'm glad one of us got to enjoy it. BUT... was tonight appreciated? I don't think so!!! In hindsight, I could have gone to the concert and the evening kick-off would have been fine without me.

I came home to cry in my Fleetwood Mac songs. DH brought me home a t-shirt!

The art of ducking people

I can't take credit for the title of this post, the credit goes to @Central Nassau, but I am an expert. I call it my "phone voice." It comes from a lifetime of being told I yell. I don't yell. I am Italian and Spanish, extremely passionate in communicating and well - LOUD. I also grew up playing make believe. I loved to pretend to be someone else. There are many times in my life when that love of make believe came out. My family would call me "Sybil" because I would change personas depending on the situation. And then came cyberworld...... AHHH the ultimate playground for make believe. This brings me to........... the phone voice.

I worked online for 12 years and my online persona was quite different from my SAHM persona. Eventually I would be working on and offline outside of the home, but that phone voice came with me. Depending on who I was talking to on the phone from online, I would change my phone voice. Sometimes sexy, sometimes uber snobby, sometimes geeky.

Okay - so the art of ducking people? We've all pretended not to be who we are when a bill collector calls. Also telemarketers. I revel in the different personas and voices I've used when discussing either. Once when I bill collector called I cried on the phone about how my husband wouldn't let me touch the checkbook (which of course, is a lie). I also told him I had no idea about the finances - PLEASE give me advice. He said, "Have the Mr. call me." ha ha Those are obvious avoidances. What happens though, when you are at work and answer the phone (my secretaries were busy) and someone starts talking and there is no reason to reveal who you are. Suddenly, the conversation turns to you - and the person is talking about YOU. This happened to me, I had someone in my office at the time and I am talking to this person. Conversation is going along until they start talking about me. Thank goodness it was good so naturally, I agreed with the person. This would have been no big deal except, at the end of the conversation, the person said, "Who am I speaking to?" Holy crap........ I said, "This is AnnMarie." I hung up the phone and the person in my office is looking at me perplexed. "YES - I LIED" I said to them.

Getting started

So - much like life, the way to get started is to announce you are doing something. By announcing it, you are holding yourself accountable. Today I joined "Twittermoms.com" and actually put down this blog address as my blog. On the outside chance someone is actually going to look at my profile, I have decided it is time to get this puppy off the ground. I wasn't sure what direction I wanted to take this - daily musings or my "alter ego" but instead of debating about it, I am just going to put the fingers to the keyboard and see where they lead!