The Dream

The combination of losing my dog and starting "Eat, Pray, Love" in the same week has made me want to get my sh*t together and stop procrastinating so much. So I tried to sit down and figure out what I really want from life. If I could build my dream life, what would it look like? Here goes:

Career- I'm actually okay career wise. I'd like to move into a position with more authority and less interaction with lawyers, property owners and state regulators but I like the basics of my current job. I make a good salary and have great benefits so I'm not really focused on money. I'd like to maintain the same flex time schedule that allows me to work from home and/or go to the office at my discretion and has most of my co-workers located in different cities from the one I live in. I never want to go back to the big office type of job where you don't get any work done because people are always in your business.

Fitness and Wellness- I will become an aerobics instructor so that I'm not so tempted to skip my gym workouts. I used to thrive when I taught karate and I feel like there isn't anything that can replace that feeling except for teaching. I have registered for a class that takes place next month and should be able to start teaching classes in October.

I give a lot of free advice to people (even though I don't necessarily follow my own). I think being a life coach and/or personal trainer would allow me to help more people get their lives together. This is probably a few years down the road, once I get myself together.

Neither of these jobs would provide me with the cash flow to be a full time job but I think it would provide me with a sense of purpose in life and interaction with people that is missing from my "real job".

I will get back into good running shape so that I don't injure myself every time I run a big race. If I could get back down to 10 minute mile pace, that would be great (I'm probably 12:30 right now) but I'm more focused on not feeling so crappy after I run.

Social Life- I will keep being active in my meetup groups because they do provide a great opportunity to socialize with people even if I don't develop any big friendships outside of the meetups.

I will find a way to speak Spanish on a regular basis. I have studied Spanish since I was three and studied abroad in college. I was almost fluent at one point but can barely communicate now because I haven't had to speak it in years. Maybe I will find a conversational Spanish group or join a Salsa group.

I will join a local orchestra. I started playing the flute in 6th grade and was a very accomplished flautist at one point. I know I'm not good enough to be in a symphony orchestra or anything but there are several community bands and orchestras that I have seen advertised that are open to new members. Music has always been a big part of my life and I'd love to get back into that.


A group of people that I can go out dancing with. I love to dance but that's definitely something that I can't do alone. Birthday parties, superbowl parties, going out to bars, dinner at each other's houses, and all the great stuff that comes with having a core group of friends.


I will challenge myself (and my husband) to try things that are out of our comfort zone. While I love our weekly dates to the movies, I think we might be in a little rut too. Plus, excitement in our social life could lead to a little more excitement in the bedroom and who doesn't want that?

We will buy an RV once we get rid of our credit card debt. I never completely relax on vacation because I miss my pets and my routine. I love the idea of an RV because I'm traveling but I still have many of the comforts of home. We rarely travel for more than 4-5 days at a time because I don't feel comfortable leaving the pets for that long and get frustrated with the hotel/friend that we are staying with. An RV would allow us to take longer vacations because we could take the pets with us but we wouldn't have to worry about staying in hotels or with relatives. We could really enjoy our RV life once we retire but I think we would really enjoy it now too.

Dream House- A ranch house with large rooms and lots of windows. Brick or stone construction. A very green house with recycled rain water, solar panels, etc. At least 2 acres of land. No cookie-cutter subdivisions with neighbors in your backyard. An old barn where we could have an arts and crafts studio and an indoor pool (really, this is important because it gets cold in Syracuse). A garden where I could grow herbs and vegetables to cook with. Not too far away from parks and lakes or a city. Lots of opportunities for hiking, kayaking and other outdoor activities close to home but less than an hour drive if we want to go to a concert or play. A wrap around porch with a big swing and a wood rocking chair. A gazebo in the backyard where I could read and write in peace.

Retirement- I'd love to own a bed and breakfast that caters to travelers with dogs. Over the years I have frequented these places and they have made my travel much easier but there are not enough of them around. I would become certified in canine massage so that I could provide a service to the doggie guests as part of their package. This would be a relatively small, intimate place that catered to only a few guests at a time.



So that's it.

Gone too Soon

This past weekend, someone I used to train with committed suicide. I hadn't seen or talked to him for the past 6 years but a mutual friend found me on Facebook and gave me the news. It's hard to define how I feel right now. I have lost several friends and relatives but never by suicide.

Rick and I were never really friends but we did spend a lot of time together. We trained together in karate for 4 years but we were more acquaintances than anything else. I always found him arrogant and was intimidated by his bravado. He was one of those macho guys who seemed to take pleasure in causing other people pain and embarrassing them. I imagined he kissed his biceps every morning when he looked in the mirror.

Like a lot of people who study martial arts (myself included) I'm sure Rick was driven by something in his past. Physical or sexual abuse? Shyness? Fitness? Self Esteem? Trying to cope with anger/loss? Hyperactivity? These are all reasons that people I know have given for studying martial arts. The decision seems to always stem from a decision to take control of your life and cope with or escape from your past.

Rick was a very accomplished martial artist, achieving a black belt in three different styles and gaining some notoriety on the amatur mixed martial arts circuit. He married his high school sweetheart and had a good job. He seemed to have it all together but obviously he had demons that none of us knew about.

I am surprised by how much I am thinking about him and reminiscing about the time we spent together. I keep going to his wedding website and old karate pictures where he is smiling and happy. I analyze episodes from our past together for clues of his depression and honestly I can find several but that always happens in hind sight. I know I wouldn't have been someone that he confided in. I doubt he was secure enough to show that side to anyone. I wonder if years of putting on a front and acting like nothing bothered him was too much for him. I wish someone could have stopped this.

It's so strange that I want to reach out to his family. I'm sure he never mentioned me. I had never mentioned him to anyone outside of karate before this happened. I probably wouldn't have ever thought of him again if he were still alive. But there is something about losing someone in this way that makes you appreciate that person's life more. It erases all the negative thoughts that used to come to mind when I thought of him. All I can think about is Rick, a misunderstood 32 year old man who couldn't beat his demons and a brilliant life over way too soon.

Someone Notice me Please

So I had a bit of a breakdown the other day. I started crying for no reason while explaining to my husband why I was in such a crappy mood. After hours of talking through things with the prodding of my husband's best Dr. Phil impression we got to the heart of things: I am still very much stuck in a rut. It's been 5 years in Syracuse now and I still haven't found my niche. I don't have a core group of friends, I don't have much of a social life and my flexible work schedule leaves me with hours of screw around time.

I am vain, I know this. I have always been vain. I have lived by the attention that I have gotten (good or bad) in the past. I have been very active in local meetups for the past year hoping to meet new people. If you haven't tried it, Meetup.com is a great resource if you're new to a place and looking to get a life. There are tons of clubs for every interest that you can imagine. I had hoped that through these clubs I would form friendships with people and start doing things with them outside of the meetups but that hasn't happened. The once a month meetups have provided me with a tease of what a regular social life could be. I wear cute clothes, fix my hair, put on makeup and just carry myself different when I go to these events. On a daily basis it's hard for me to get motivated to do much of anything.

Why get dressed up for work when I'm not going to have to talk to another human being in person for more than 5 minutes? Who cares what my hair looks like or if I'm wearing flip flops and dirty jeans? The lack of personal grooming is definitely a reflection of how I feel on the inside. I just don't care and it's getting harder to get myself prepared for those events when I am going to interact with people because of how different it is from my daily routine. No one here cares that I've gained 35 pounds since I moved here (they probably haven't noticed) but when I see my family and friends once or twice a year it's the first thing that they bring up. So I feel like crap for the week that I see them but then when I get back home it's hard to maintain a regular workout schedule because no one here is going to notice.

My husband thinks that I need to take a certain personal pride in my appearance. I should workout and dress up because it makes me feel good and not because someone else might notice. He's absolutely right, I should, but that's not how I'm built. I am an attention whore and I've been starving for it since I moved here. The solutions: 1. Keep putting myself out there and hope that eventually friendships will form; 2. Do more social events with my husband that get us out of our hermit routine; 3. Join a group that meets more than once a month and take on a role in that group where people are dependent on me and I have to show up, like a job, or I will let people down.

Some ideas based on previous activities and interests:

• volunteer work with kids, animals, the environment or the less fortunate
• get certified to teach a fitness class and/or go back to martial arts
• join a music group
• start a second career that gives me the social interaction that I'm missing from my current job but that I can do on my own schedule

I spent the better part of my Sunday researching different activities and think I have a plan in place to get moving on two of these this summer. In the meantime, I'm going to have to self-motivate because its good for me and I can't continue to walk around feeling sorry for myself. Because I have to believe that even though its lasted for 5 years, this phase in my life is temporary.

Remembering Our Wedding Day

My husband and I have four weddings to attend this year. As our two year wedding anniversary approaches, we have been reminiscing about our wedding day. It truly was the best day of my life. The days leading up to the wedding, the two week honeymoon, everything was almost perfect.

My husband and I had planned plenty of activities for the days before the wedding. That gave us the opportunity to spend time with our friends and family without having them sitting in our living room for 4 days. Everyone got along. The weather cooperated. Everything really was fabulous. But there were some hiccups...

My husband and I were hoping that each of our families would contribute to the wedding budget. We expected to spend about $15,000 and were hoping to get about $5,000 of that from my mom and his aunt and uncle. She had talked about contributing to the budget 18 months before the wedding when we got engaged but my mother has never been a saver and since my father died she has never been able to manage her money well. My mother was completely strapped financially and was living paycheck to paycheck by the time the wedding around. It was all she could do to scrape up enough money for the hotel, dress and 4 days of spending money. She paid for her and I to get our hair done as her wedding gift to us.

My husband's aunt and uncle are very comfortable financially and have bailed out all of my husband's siblings at various times throughout their lives. They never had to bail my husband out and he never asked for anything so we thought a check was probably coming our way. A couple months before the wedding we realized that no money was coming and that our $15,000 wedding was actually going to be a little over $18,000. So we took out a personal loan with a really high interest rate and maxed out our credit cards. We ended up getting about $2,500 in cash from wedding gifts (most of that coming from my husband's aunt and uncle) and were able to pay down our debt. We just paid off the personal loan this week and don't regret anything.

The violinist we hired to play for the ceremony was a diva who complained about how cold it was on our wedding day and how that was bad for his strings and his fingers. We live in upstate New York, we got married in the fall, you are a member of a symphony orchestra who has concerts outside through Thanksgiving. Shut up!!! But he played beautifully and everyone complimented us on the amazing atmosphere that it provided for our outdoor ceremony.

The hair salon where my mother and I were getting our hair done forgot about our appointments. We spent 30 minutes sitting in the parking lot waiting for the owner to arrive and then spent the better part of the next 4 hours listening to people gossip and handle their personal business. Our hair styles took about an hour but the styling time was split over the 4 hours that we were there. They didn't take credit cards so I had to walk to a sketchy convenience store around the corner to withdrawal money from an ATM machine that charged $3 for each of the 2 transactions that I made because they limited the amount of money that you could take out a time to $50. Why is it that all the best black hair salons are in the ghetto and that the stylists act like extras in a Tyler Perry movie that are doing you a favor rather than professionals? We missed our manicure/pedicure appointments with the rest of the bridal party (who were all white or Hispanic and had their hair done at a nice salon). Luckily the hair salon had nail polish remover and a nail file so we were at least able to make our nails look presentable. We rushed from the salon and went through a McDonald's drive through on our way to the ceremony. The look on the ladies face as I paid, full bridal up-do and veil in place, was priceless.

The bakery misunderstood our instructions and our cake looked like it was for a kids birthday party and not a wedding. At least they got the flavors right. I picked the cakes up on my way to McDonald's so obviously there was no time to argue. Once again, another great look from a cashier as I paid and then rushed out the door with my veil blowing in the wind.

Our wedding planner didn't set up the room that I had picked for the bridal party to get dressed in so we all crammed into a public restroom at the state park where the ceremony was. The wedding planner did an awesome job saving us money and setting things up for us. But the hours of A Wedding Story and Whose Wedding is it Anyway? had told me that my wedding planner was going to be my best friend, my right hand man, my go-to-gal and she definitely wasn't any of those. She was actually kind of cold and not overly helpful with anything that we didn't ask her to do directly.

For example, all she would have had to do was tape paper on the windows at the park lodge and my bridal party would have had a nice space to get dressed in and store our belongings but when one of my bridesmaid's asked her about this she indicated that I was going to do that when I got there. Right, after rushing from the salon and picking up the cake I was going to buy a roll of paper and tape it up. Like I said, she did her job, but she didn't overextend herself. If you've watched any of these wedding shows you see the wedding planners adding little touches to the wedding from their personal arsenal of bridal accessories and going out of their way to make sure everything is taken care of so the bride and the groom don't have anything to worry about except for getting married. My husband and I paid everyone, planned and booked all the activities outside of the wedding, bought all of the decorations and put together the favors ourselves. We couldn't have gotten married without our planner but she could have definitely taken more of the responsibility on herself to earn the 10% of our budget that she charged.

I forgot the marriage license so a friend had to go back to my house to pick it up. It only delayed the ceremony for about 30 minutes but I felt like such a jerk since I pride myself on being super organized and always on time.

Then there are always the family things: having the rehearsal dinner at our house stressed out me and the pets and cost more money than a sit down dinner at restaurant would have cost, my mother's family had never seen the house before so they invited themselves over the afternoon before the rehearsal dinner and lead to us spending additional $ on a family meal from KFC to feed them all, the bridal party hung out at my house for 4 hours on the day before the wedding instead of leaving after breakfast while the men went out to play golf- we watched TV and stared at the walls while I should have been going to the florist and the caterer and making final arrangements for the wedding, my husband ended up handling these errands while I prepared the house for the rehearsal dinner.

Looking back on things now, I should have spoke up and told my family they couldn't come to the house the day before the wedding and asked the bridesmaids to leave the house because I had errands to run. But really, these things aggravated me for a a very short amount of time. I was floating on air for much of that month and loved every minute of it. Our wedding is often talked about as the best wedding any one's every been to and I love that. My husband and I have discussed renewing our vows or having a big anniversary party every 10 years because a party that good shouldn't only happen once in a life time.

How to Keep Your Bridesmaids Happy

l. Let them pick their own dresses. You pick the color but let them pick the style. Everyone's body is shaped different and nothing will piss people off more than buying a dress that makes them feel uncomfortable. People will tell you they can have the dress altered and will wear it again but they aren't going to do that. If you must have your bridesmaids dressed like identical Stepford wives then get their input on the dress that you pick. At the bridal store they can tell you "this isn't flattering on my body or I hate this dress" without having to worry about pissing you off. If you've already picked the dress without any input from your bridesmaids you are not being a good friend. You wouldn't want someone else to pick out a dress that you had to wear for 12 hours. Not too mention have it preserved in pictures forever.

2. Plan activities for the wedding weekend. People are spending hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars to participate in your big day. No one wants to spend four days in your mothers living room staring at the wall. Planning activities doesn't mean paying for them. Even if you don't feel like doing anything, many of your friends and family members will. Put together a wedding website (you can do it for free) with links to local attractions and give your wedding party some free time so they can check out these attractions. Once again, you don't have to participate if you don't want to. Your wedding party will have no problem going out and having a good time without you and this time out may lead to new friendships and relationships.

3. Provide your bridal party with a schedule well before the wedding weekend. This will make it easier for them to plan any activities that they may want to do outside of the wedding activities and will help them figure out when they want to arrive and what to pack. The night before your wedding isn't the first time your bridesmaids should find out that they have a 9 am hair appointment for your 4 pm wedding.

4. Make sure your bridesmaids will be able to see the ceremony or will be able to sit if it is a long ceremony. I have been in weddings were I have not been able to see the bride or the groom for the entire ceremony because of the setup of the church and the placement of the bridal party. I didn't spend $1000 to listen to your wedding. And I certainly didn't spend that money to pass out because I was standing in my 4" heels in a hot church for 90 minutes with my knees locked.

5. Taking into consideration any special accommodations that you need to make for your bridesmaids. You should know these people really well or you wouldn't have asked them to be in your wedding. If one of your bridesmaids is black and you and all the other bridesmaids are white don't expect her to get her hair done at the same salon. Even if you have checked with the salon to see if they have someone who can do black people's hair it will take a lot longer for her to get her hair done than it will take for the rest of you. And, realistically, she's going to want to check out the salon on her own before hand to make sure she is comfortable going there. A bad hair day for her could take months to undo and will only reinforce that she is different.

If one of your bridesmaids is a vegetarian don't plan an all you can eat beef smorgasbord for your rehearsal dinner. If one of your bridesmaids is obese or doesn't work out regularly, that wedding day 5K might not be such a good idea. If you want to be friends with these people after the wedding then you need to act like a friend when you plan the wedding.

The More Time I Spend with Women...

The more I love men. I've never enjoyed hanging out with large groups of women. Slumber parties where we do each other's hair and talk about boys? Not a chance. All day at the mall to shop and giggle? I'd rather have a root canal. The conversations are always about things that I don't care about and there is the inevitable cattiness and low self esteem that just make me sick.

It takes me 20 minutes to get ready in the morning whether I'm going to the gym or a wedding. If it takes you longer than that, we can't hang out. I love sports, I love food, I swear like a trucker and I love a good dirty joke. I've never had any desire to watch Grey's Anatomy, Friends, Sex in the City, The Bachelor...the list goes on. I know a lot of you women feel the same way and I'm happy to be friends with you. I don't know if we are in the minority but it definitely feels like it.

I recently went to a bridal shower for my friend Jessica who is marrying her girlfriend of 10 years. They met playing softball in college. So you'd think this was the perfect atmosphere for a girl like me. Not so much. Their softball team (at least 75% lesbian) was very cliquey and only talked to each other. Her high school friends had all become soccer moms and sat in the corner in their Ann Taylor dresses talking about their children and husbands and how they were dying to get some makeup on Jessica to accentuate her cheekbones (not making this up). I am a social person but people were not open to meeting anyone new and were pretty blatant in ignoring me and the other outsiders. It seems that no matter what the situation the default is the bitchy rudeness when you get a group of women together.

I've experienced the same sort of cliquishness in my quilting and aerobics meetup groups. I thought the point of meetup was to meet new people. Every event I have gone to only reminded me that I was not part of any of these little cliques and, short of someone new joining who was also an outsider, I wasn't going to ever belong. I continue to go to meetup events and look out for new meetup groups that match up to my interests because I'm not going back to my hermit phase. But it's hard to push forward when after 5 years in Syracuse I still find myself looking for a place where I belong. If I didn't have my husband and my out of state friends and family it would be a very lonely existence.

Where is My Pond?

I will admit that I have always been a big fish in a small pond. I was never popular on a large scale. No one voted me to be anything in my yearbook. In my school of 2000+ people a lot of people probably didn't know who I was. But within my small cliques I was the top dog. Up until 7th grade I attended small private schools. I was very outgoing and enjoyed being the center of attention. I was downright obnoxious most of the time but I loved the attention that I received. Even when I switched to a different private school for 6th grade it didn't take me long to establish myself as the alpha there as well.

Things changed when I started going to public school. There were hundreds of kids any many of them had known each other since nursery school. I didn't know anyone and I felt like I had nothing in common with these people. But it didn't take me long to realize that through smaller group activities I could be the center of attention again. Through music, sports and clubs I was able to once again be the big fish. The transition from intermediate school to high school was fairly easy. All of my friends from intermediate school went to my high school. My circle of friends continued to grow through my involvement in extracurricular activities. I loved a lot of things about high school. It was great for my self esteem and made my already over sized ego grow even bigger.

For college I went to a school that none of my friends were going to. I was two states away from home and everything that was familiar to me. I was very homesick at first but by the end of the week cliques had formed in my dorm and I was the big fish again. I really came into my own sophomore year when I became involved in a lot of extracurricular activities. College was even better than high school. By the end of college I knew who I was and had the confidence to go out and start my adult life. With every move after that I was able to maintain the same social success. My entire social life developed from friends that I made in sports or at work. Even though I always started at the same place (new town, no friends)I always managed to develop a great social life. But New York has been different.

For the past 5 years I have essentially worked from home and I have not found a karate school in my style or other sports group near me. I have no opportunities to make friends. I have tried different groups here but nothing leads anywhere. I'm proud of myself for putting the effort out and actually leaving the house but sometimes I feel lonelier when I'm among other people than I do when I'm at home alone. Sitting in the back of Zumba class watching everyone chatting with each other and feeling completely invisible makes me feel very embarrassed and small. I don't like that feeling. At least when I'm home no one is watching me and thinking "Why doesn't that girl have any friends?" or some of the more damaging thoughts that come into my head when I'm feeling sorry for myself.

When I first moved to New York, my old friends were super excited when I came back into town. There would be a dozen people waiting to go out to dinner with me and hang out. People also came up to New York to visit me a couple times a year. We would go out dancing and party like old times. Over the years, I have lost touch with many of my old friends. The few that I still associate with seem to be busy when I come into town. I usually end of eating by myself and hanging out in my hotel room. Or worse, when they are available the night out doesn't live up to my expectations. We seem to have less in common and a lot more awkward moments. We never have as good a time as I remembered us having in the past. When I first moved to New York I was excited that I had to travel to Pennsylvania regularly for meetings and conferences. It was a great way to catch up with people without dipping into my own money. But now its just a reminder of how much things have changed.

Okay, so I'm done feeling sorry for myself. I have to believe that at some point one of the activities that I try will lead to me having a social life. I have to try harder and step outside my comfort zone more. I don't have to be the queen bee again but it would be nice to at least belong to a hive.

Consequential Stangers

Yesterday I saw my neighbor Steve return home after weeks in the hospital. My husband and I weren't sure if he had passed away or not so we were happy to see him come home. He was brought home by ambulance. Two hospital supply vans unloaded a wheelchair and various medical supplies to turn his house into a makeshift nursing home. My husband and I have both been there before with our parents. You are happy that your family member is well enough to come home from the hospital but you are also sad because you know that your home life will be forever altered to accommodate your new patient. When we saw another ambulance pull into Steve's driveway this afternoon we wondered if it was all too much for them and Steve's family decided to send Steve back to the hospital. Unfortunately Steve's wife had taken ill and the ambulance had come to take her away. Two car loads of family members followed the ambulance down the road. Some of them carried plates wrapped in aluminum foil with hopes of salvaging their Thanksgiving dinner once they arrived at the hospital.

Steve lives directly across the street from me so it is difficult not to notice things going on at his house. But I make it a point to notice; I have an interest in Steve's well being. I have only had a few conversations with Steve over the years. I'm guessing that Steve is in his early 90's. He likes to sit on his front porch and observe the neighborhood. I wave to him when I walk my dog and when I pick up my mail. We exchange a few cordial words about how great/terrible the weather is now and again but we are essentially strangers.

Steve is a consequential stranger in my life. I heard a story on NPR a few months ago that described a consequential stranger as someone that you barely know who has a big impact on your life. The mailman, your favorite waiter, the guy that waves to you every time you go to the park- these are all consequential strangers. You might not even know their names but they become a part of your life.

When I had storm damage to my house a few months after moving in Steve came over and introduced himself to me. He gave me some pictures that he had taken of the damage, a piece of paper with his phone number and extended an offer for me and my pets to come over to his house if my house wasn't safe to live in. Most of the other neighbors just slowed down and stared at the house as they drove by. A few came over and knocked on the door but it was just to give me their business cards and try to make some money off my situation. Steve was the only one who seemed to genuinely care about how I was doing. Ever since then he has been my favorite neighbor. I have become accustomed to observing his daily routine through my picture window. I missed not seeing him for the past few weeks while he was in the hospital.

Now Steve is too sick to come outside and sit on the porch. We see nurses and family members going in and out of the house but we don't see Steve any more. I know that it is only a matter of time before he passes away. The thought of never seeing Steve again makes me sad. Eventually his kids will sell the house and some young couple will move in but it will always be Steve's house. On this Thanksgiving day, I am grateful for my friends and family but I am also grateful for the many consequential strangers who touch my life every day.

One Uppers and Fake Questioners

You know the people that I'm talking about. The people who couldn't listen if their life depended on it. The people who are so geared up to respond to what they haven't listened to you say that they often start talking before you're done telling the story. I can't stand these people but I am surrounded by them and, at times, I admit that I am one of them.

I am not a person who opens up to people very easily so when I decide to confide in someone it hurts my feelings when they don't listen. It makes me less likely to confide in them or any one else in the future. The most recent situation that I encountered was with another German Shepherd rescuer. He complimented me on my dog and asked me where I rescued him from and what his story was. I barely got one sentence out before he told me about a German Shepherd that he had rescued that was in worse shape than my dog at the time of rescue. He might as well have said "Oh yeah, I can do better than that." If you just want to talk about yourself then go ahead but don't try to justify it by pretending that you care about what I have to say. This is a pretty mild situation but it is a perfect example of the one upper. Everything that he has been through is worse, more difficult, more gruesome, more trying that anything that you could have ever been through.

This annoys me a little but what really hurts me is when its more serious topics. My weight, my father's death, his illness, racism, sexism and abuse that I have suffered, person tragedies that my family and I have been through, etc. These are the topics that people frequently steamroll me on to tell me about their dad who died from cancer or how their babysitter hit them when they were a kid. I'm not saying that your feelings are less valid than mine but I'm not going to talk about myself when you need a shoulder to cry on and you shouldn't either. People often claim that they are empathizing with me by telling a story that they think relates to my situation but they aren't. They are one-upping me and not being a friend.

I don't understand why its so difficult to just listen to what someone else is going through. If you have some unresolved issues that you haven't dealt with then do that on your own time. If I come to you to cry on your shoulder then you should be available to listen to what I have to say. Nothing that you say in response should be about you. How you dealt with a completely unrelated situation does not help me deal with my situation. It devalues what I'm going through and that is not cool.

The fake questioners are a little trickier to spot. Sometimes it seems like they're asking a question that is harmless like "Do you always rinse your dishes before you put them in the dishwasher?" But really its just setting the stage for them to criticize you. When I responded to this question from my former roommate she went on for 5 minutes about how wasteful it was to wash the dishes before putting them it in the dishwasher and why did I have a dishwasher if I was just going to wash the dished by hand and how her father did this and it was a completely obsessive compulsive behavior that drove her mother crazy, blah, blah, blah. My former roommate is the queen of the fake questions. Everything to how you drive, picking up your dogs waste, the type of clothes you wear, etc. are all subject to her criticism because she is perfect and everything she does should be emulated. She will usually try to comment on it in a joking way so that if you tell her she's being an ass she says "Oh I was just joking, why are you so sensitive?"

I've gotten pretty good at preempting the fake questions by shutting down the line of questioning the moment it starts and calling the person out for their behavior. If you want to criticize or make fun of the way that I do something then have the nerve to do it without any false pretense. But be aware that what you think about how I live my life is not important to me. You live your life the way you want to and stay the F out of mine. If my habits are so annoying to you that you can't spend time around me without being critical of me then go be somewhere else. Your lack of self esteem and need to be critical of others is your problem.

Relatives aren't Automatically Friends

My wedding was fantastic because everyone partied together. I think it was the first time anyone in my family saw me drink and dance (that tells you how fun other weddings have been) and the only time I wasn't self conscious about my behavior around them. A wedding is that unique, once in a decade (in lifetime in some families) setting where all bets are off. You can sing the lyrics to Baby Got Back at the top of your lungs while doing the lambada with your high school boyfriend 10 feet away from your grandmother and no one will blink an eye. My wedding was the best party that I've ever attended. Everyone told me it was one of the best parties, not just weddings, that they'd ever been too. The problem is the familiarity that some of my relatives are trying to establish with me post-wedding as a result of the success of the wedding.

Don't get me wrong, I think its really awesome that people bring up my wedding every time I talk to them even though it was over a year ago. But I shouldn't have to sit in my uncle's living room for hours because he wants to hang out with me because we danced near each other at my wedding last year. I don't know how dancing until you were drenched in sweat and your feet were sore translates to sitting on the couch and having conversations about nothing while the TV drones on in the background. The guilt trips that I have been receiving from my family members about not spending time with them or talking to them on the phone forces me to either give in to their requests and be miserable or be a bitch and blow them off. It's not like they're inviting me to an event. They seriously just want me to sit in my car for 6 hours to sit at their house and do nothing or, worse yet, they want to sit in their car for 6 hours and invade my house and disrupt my life.

Up until 5 years ago, I lived no more than 3 hours away from most of my mother's family (my father's family has not been in my life since his death). So I attended almost every wedding, baby shower, holiday dinner, picnic, etc. without being too inconvenienced. At the time I was single and my dog was younger and healthier so traveling to all these events wasn't' that much of an imposition. Also, a lot of my friends from high school and college lived nearby so I could do the family thing for a few hours and then go out and party with my friends. My husband and I have been together for 4 years (three of those years living together), my dog is almost nine years old and has a number of medical problems and I live at least 6 hours away from my closest relative. All of my close friends have moved to other states; the friends that are left really are more acquaintances than friends and are as much a pain in my ass as my family.

When my family went from seeing me multiple times a year to seeing me once a year or less, they freaked out. Suddenly they didn't know me and were desperate to spend time with me to maintain these imaginary relationships that we had. Now really, they never knew me and they still don't but for whatever reason they associated seeing me regularly with knowing me. I could ask my family 10 random questions about me that any one of my friends would be able to answer with ease and my family wouldn't get a single question right. But the wedding made them think that we were pals and they want to see me and talk to me all the time to relive the fun they had at the wedding. No way is this okay.

One of my cousins had a baby last October. I have not met that child, I did not attend the baby shower and I'm not sure that child even knows that I exist. Another cousin has a 6 year old child that I haven't seen since she was 2 years old, the last time I went home for Christmas. I'm pretty sure that child doesn't know I exist. My cousins do not care about this any more than I do. We are not close and they do not really expect me to be a part of their lives. Many of them have not met my husband and did not attend my wedding. They are thirty somethings like my husband and I and have their own lives; they get it. Their parents and my other older relatives do not get it. They think it is a travesty that I have not met my newest cousins. They frequently reference how close the family was when they were kids and how they spent all this time with their extended family, blah, blah, blah.

I am close to some of my relatives. I talk to my mom and my brother all the time and see them at least a couple times a year. I am close to three of my cousins and attend their special events and keep in touch with them. But we all have things in common and go out and do things when we visit. We have things to talk about and don't experience long awkward pauses in our conversations. We often commiserate with each other when we discuss how tedious it is dealing with some of our other relatives. I wish I could just say to my other relatives " DNA in common does not mean that we are bosom buddies. Get a life and leave me alone!" But of course I can't do that. I must walk the line between my happiness and their neediness and compromise much more than I'd like to. My husband and I joke that we should move even further away so its even more difficult for people to visit us (believe me they aren't really psyched about coming to Syracuse) but that will just make it more difficult when we have to come visit them.

Breaking Up is Hard

Phil, my boyfriend from 9th grade. I'm a jerk. I'm sorry I wrote you a note and broke your heart. But you had to know that you were just the rebound boyfriend from Jared and that I was just using you to boost my self esteem. Because of you, I put up with people's crap much longer than I should because I fear that they to will accuse me of being a liar and quitting without really trying. Steve, Adam, Christian, ditto. Just insert a different ex-boyfriend's name.

Shortly after Phil, there was Lisa. My best friend in intermediate school. We definitely went in different directions in high school but she still told everyone we were best friends. It wasn't hurting me and really, I was no where near as cool as I thought I was. So why did I have to write you that note spelling it out, sending you crying from the lunch room. To this day her family hates me even though Lisa and I made up just a couple years later. Popularity is fleeting. I wish I were a better person back then. It is because of you that I will never turn down a friend request on Facebook no matter how brief my interaction was with the requester.

Sure, I told my freshman college roommate that I would room with her again sophomore year and then went to the housing office and changed my preference but that sort of passive break up is much easier on the soul. For most of my late teens and 20's I just let relationships get to the point that they were complete crap and then the other person ended them. I would always be surprised when they ended the relationship like it was some tragic loss. I was sad because I had lost something familiar, not something that was valuable in my life. A couple days later I always realized that the relationship had been gone for a long time and that I'd been wasting my time for years. Then I was angry at myself for being the victim and not taking the initiative to end it myself. Of course, I repeated this cycle over and over again. I'm sure a therapist would have a field day with this.

Lately, the people I have collected would best be described as acquaintances. These are people that you meet by chance or circumstance that you don't really consider your friends but they somehow find a way to weasel themselves into your life. The girl at the gym who always says hi to you who one day asks if you want to sit together when you bump into her at the food court. You say yes because it seems harmless and then spend the next 4 years of your life trying to unfriend her. Or better yet, the woman who you meet at a business conference who finds out that you both have dogs and like to run and is suddenly planning play dates and races. One week later you find out that you have nothing in common with this girl (seriously, how many people in the world have dogs and run, that's really not the basis for a friendship) but somehow find yourself going to parties at her house and dragging your husband to dinner with her and her miserable husband for an uncomfortable evening of bad conversation and nervous laughter.

Is there a target on my back that says "Please become excessively clingy to this woman and feed on her like a parasite"? The funny thing is I'm really not a nice person. Sure, if we're friends I am nice and compassionate but to the outside world I am bitchy, sarcastic, opinionated, obnoxious, inappropriate and loud. But that seems to be what attracts people. "Oh Denise you're so funny" or "You are crazy" are said to me on a regular basis. No really, I meant it when I told you to go away and I can't stand you. It wasn't a joke. How can I let my guard down when I meet new people without worrying that I'm going to end up with another leech? It's almost impossible not to be mean to these hangers-on because they just don't get the subtle comments. But I probably won't be mean. I'm all talk at this point. Maybe two out of every 10 leeches will get released. I'll just deal with it until one of us moves or they get the point.

Oh John, you were a horrible personal trainer. That's why I kept cancelling our appointments. You are a total meat head who spent more time looking in the mirror and flirting with the skinny girls than you ever spent on me. You never even listened to me talk. I'm glad that you no longer work at Bally's so I don't have to worry about hiding from you when I'm in the mall. Just because I'm not skinny doesn't mean that I've never worked out before. You talked down to me and made me feel like crap and I hope that someone tells you this before you ruin someone else's self esteem.

Is it me?

Lately I feel like all of my old friends are getting on my nerves. I don't know if its me that's changed or them but we are definitely drifting apart. Do people just start all over once they grow up and make brand new friends?

I have a friend from intermediate school that refers to me as her best friend but I don't think she knows anything about me. I think we are just really good at keeping in touch and managed to keep up with e-mails and letters all throughout college and find ourselves still friends 20 years later. I have known her longer than anyone else but she definitely knows very little about me. I guess it's harmless to let her call me her best friend no matter how untrue it is. We don't have any of the same interests but she still lives in the town where I grew up so whenever I go to visit my family it is inevitable that we will spend an awkward night together. And at least once a year, she wants to spend a weekend with us which is just torture since her and her husband enjoy watching paint dry while sitting on the couch. My husband and I have decided to plan an entire itinerary for their next visit so that we don't want to poke our eyes out by the end of the weekend.

I also have a couple of girlfriends from college who were my dancing and workout buddies. We went to clubs on the weekends and worked out together and had a great time. For some reason I don't find either of them very interesting any more. I wish that we still went out dancing or worked out but it seems like all they want to do is sit around and drink. I don't think I'm more active than I used to be. I think that I just didn't realize that I never really spent time with them when we weren't being active. Sigh.

I wish I could put an personal ad in the newspaper to find fun, active people to hang out with but, knowing my luck, this would just lead to some creepy pervert thinking I was looking for a different kind of good time. I will just continue to try new activities in hopes that I make new friends. In the meantime, I will try to limit my exposure to the young and lazy friends that I have collected and plan ahead so that I can suggest some fun things to do when we're together. I know, I really do need to get some real problems.

Bridesmaid Take Four

I enjoy going to weddings as a guest. I'm always up for a big party. I rarely enjoy being a member of the wedding party as much as I enjoy being a guest (except for my own wedding of course). I was in two weddings when I was younger but I don't really remember them so I guess I shouldn't complain. As an adult, I have been a bridesmaid three times and am signed up to be in two more weddings next year.

The worst part of being a bridesmaid is definitely the dresses and accessories. In the first wedding that I participated in as an adult, the bride choose designer suits for all of us to wear. She was 19 years old at the time and the entire bridal party was in their late teens to early 20's. The best way that I can describe the suits is that they were burgundy with a curtain print and a lace collar. These dresses would have been suitable for the mother of the bride, not for a group of teenagers. So it's spring break, and every inch of our bodies is covered with long sleeves, a high neck and a tea length suit all topped off with burgundy shoes dyed to match. We all looked horrible next to my friend in her handmade ballgown. The marriage lasted for less than a year but I still have the dress in the back of my closet.

The next wedding was my college roommate's. She chose a designer and a color and allowed us all to pick whatever style dress we felt suited our bodies. While I don't think I will ever wear the royal blue dress again, at least we all look great in the pictures. We did have to buy royal blue gloves to match the dresses but that's a lot better than having shoes dyed to match. I don't understand why anyone would want all of their bridesmaids to wear the exact same dress. Everyone has a different shape and not all dresses look good on all shapes. Usually, one bridesmaid looks really good in the dress, a couple look okay and one looks horrible. I have yet to see a dress that suits all body types. Unfortunately, my college roommate's marriage ended in divorce but she is getting remarried next year and I'm excited to be in another wedding party for her.

For the next wedding that I was in, the bride thought it would be fun for all the girls to go to David's Bridal together to try on dresses that came in sea foam green (her chosen color) and pick a dress together. Luckily, sea foam green doesn't look good on anyone so we all settled pretty quickly on a very simple dress and then headed off for lunch. The wedding was kind of a drag but all the partying before and after the wedding were great. The pictures of us in our shiny pastel green dresses that show every bulge and imperfection are pretty funny. We know we look bad and we just don't care. We're about to rip off those dresses, pull on some jeans and head to the bar!!

For my wedding I had everyone wear red and white, the colors of my wedding dress. I didn't given anyone a particular dress style, just the color codes. The two girls next to me wore red; there were more than 30 dresses in my shade of red for them to chose from. The next two girls wore the mix and match two piece sets. They each ended up choosing a red skirt and a white top but in completely different styles. They also chose to accent their dresses with a satin shawl (one in red and one in white). The last two girls wore white dresses (more than 50 to chose from) and added a red sash. My flower girl wore a white and red dress similar to mine. Everyone had dozens of choices and they were all able to pick dresses that they felt comfortable in and that flattered their bodies.

One of the bridesmaids from my wedding is getting married next year. At my wedding she told me how great it was that they all got to choose their own dresses and that she was going to do that at her wedding. Last weekend all the bridesmaids for her wedding got together, at the brides request, to watch her try on dresses and to pick out bridesmaid dresses. I am not a girly-girl. I like to dress up but most of my friends are guys or non-girly girls so shopping with a group of girls isn't high on my list of fun things to do. I chose my wedding dress by myself in less than a hour. No one saw my dress until the day of the wedding. I like to go shopping by myself. I have never enjoyed hanging out at the mall or hanging out with the girls. I usually get to the store the second they open so I can get in and out before most people wake up. This past weekend we were dress shopping from 10 am to 4 pm.

You would think that with 5 hours of shopping (we did break for lunch in the middle) at two different bridal stores we would have everything wrapped up. Nope. My friend couldn't make a decision on what wedding dress she wanted or what she wanted us to wear. The color, style, etc. of all dresses is still up in the air. The bride was constantly questioning the 6 of us that she dragged with her about what dress we wanted her to wear and what we thought looked good on her. We all told her that this was her day and she should wear whatever she wants. She didn't like this answer and kept pressing for our guidance in choosing a dress. By the end of the day we were all pretty snippy and bored out of our minds.

The worst part of the day was that she had us shopping at these little boutique bridal stores. You know those stores that have every dress in one size (usually and 8-10) and one color and where all the employees are snotty and condescending. Apparently these guys didn't hear the news that the average American woman is a size 14. I tried looking for dresses in one of these stores initially for my wedding. I ran for David's Bridal as quickly as I could after I was told that most of the sample sizes were 8's and that they could pin the dresses on me to give me an idea of what it would look like in my size. I wear a size 16; I couldn't get most of the dresses over my hips. They told me they would be glad to order a dress for me in my size but after I ordered it I owned it. The big stores have most of the styles available in the store from size 0-32 so that you can see how the dress fits your body. You can usually leave the store with your dress that day (I did with my wedding dress). If you do have to order the dress they tell you it will take 3-6 weeks to come in. I have never waited for more than a week and a half for a bridesmaid dress.

My horrible dress shopping experience did wonders for my self esteem and I recounted this story to all of my close friends, including my friend who I went shopping with. Eight months ago, my friend would have gone through the same experience that I went through because she was a size 16. Now she is a size 10-12 and could fit into most of the sample sizes. Apparently losing 20 pounds included the loss of her compassion for her bridal party. There are five bridesmaids. One girl is a 00 (I'm not joking, that's her actual size), another girl is an 8, I am a size 16, another girl is an 18 and the last girl is a 24. We range in height from 5'1 to 5'11 and in bra size from nearly A to H cups. There is no dress that will flatter all of us but the bride has now decided that we should all wear the same dress and none of my bridesmaids waited for longer than 3 weeks.

Last weekend she had all of us go into the dressing room and try on every dress that she liked so she could see how it looked on each of us. After the first few dresses didn't go over our hips, three of us gave up and left the fitting room fun to the size 8 and the size 00. The size 8 is short so while all the dresses fit her body most of them made her look stumpy because the length and cut of the dresses. The size 00 was swimming in the dresses and even with the store employees pinning the dresses as tight as they could she still looked like she was wrapped in a beach towel in every dress that she walked out in. We tried on every color from fuchsia to light blue to black and she still doesn't know what color she wants. Did I mention that we also range in skin color from porcelain white to Puerto Rican tan to chocolate brown? Hopefully we won't take any pictures at all.

I don't understand why you would want everyone to wear the exact same dress. It makes for boring pictures and an unflattering day for all. It's the equivalent of dressing all your children in the exact same outfit even though they aren't twins or twins still dressing a like when they're in their 30's and no longer look alike. In the next few weeks I will have to order my bridesmaid dress because at the little boutique shops it takes 6-9 months for a dress to come in. So i will give them my measurements, get a dress that doesn't fit and spend at least as much money on alterations as I did on the dress. I can't wait.

Clean the House Before Company Arrives

A very good friend of mine, who I have known for 18 years, is coming to visit us for the weekend. She has seen every place I have lived in from the house I grew up in to my dorm room. She was a bridesmaid in my wedding and, I suspect, I will be a bridesmaid in hers one day. I am confident that she will be part of my life forever. So why did I spend the last day and a half making my house spotless!?!

This happens every time someone comes to visit. I clean parts of the house that guests probably won't even see!! My husband and I are very neat people- one of the benefits of both of us having pack rat mothers is that we are completely the opposite of them. Even when we haven't cleaned it for a while, the house is still pretty clean by most people's standards. There is the occasional build up of pet hair that comes from having 130 lbs of dog and cat in the house but between Glade Plug-ins and Febreeze you probably wouldn't know we had pets unless you went in their room (yes, my pets have a room that they share with the exercise equipment).

I can't remember ever going into someones house and critiquing how neat it was and I don't think any of my friends would do that either so I'm not sure where this obsession came from. I know that one of two things are going to pop into their head when they walk into my house: "Where's the bathroom?" or "What's for dinner?".

I am not Martha Stewart by any stretch of the imagination but suddenly pictures that have been waiting to be framed and closets that need to be cleaned are done immediately before a house guest arrives. We had our rehearsal dinner here the night before the wedding and I spent the better part of the week hanging pictures and accessorizing the house in addition to all the cleaning. The day of the wedding was the most relaxing day of all because I knew no one was coming back to the house!!!

I even clean the house before we go out of town because I don't want the petsitter to think we're messy people. From what we can tell we pay her to sit on the couch and watch TV while spoiling the pets and eating (the trash can is always full of empty treat and fast food bags when we get back). I clean parts of the house that she definitely won't be in just in case she gets curious and decides to explore. I know, I'm neurotic.

So tomorrow morning I will rake the lawn and clean the inside of my car before picking my friend up from the airport because the last thing I need her thinking is that my car smells like dog and my lawn is a mess!! Five minutes after she arrives I will be so excited that she is here that I will completely forget about what the house looks like and focus on having a good time. I think my brother in law is coming next month. I better stock up on cleaning supplies....