To my sister, on her birthday

So today is my sisters birthday. Steph and I are separated by nine years, which might seem like a yawning gap but was actually a lovely number growing up. She was old enough to have sufficient perspective on what I was going through, yet close enough in time to understand why I might be weeping over, say, my mother not allowing me to go to prom. "Jen," she would say as I howled into the phone about the unfairness of it all, "it might seem catastrophic now, but at least you're not going to be pressured into putting out for some loser with pimples and have pictures of you in what I'm going to assume is a hideous dress." She had a point. It was the early 90's, after all, and grunge was at its peak. Thanks, mom!

Regardless, she was my voice of reason through childhood, and I like to think that I prepared her to be a mom, since she had me constantly tugging at her sleeve going "Where are you going NOW? Can I come TOO?" And often, she WOULD let me and my brother Steve tag along. When she was dating her now husband, Tim, I can't count the number of nights that they took us out to dinner first, I think allowing us to escape the difficulties that our parents were going through. She shielded us through a lot of that while trying to navigate the tricky waters of high school and then life during her college years. She was an excellent older sister - I highly recommend getting one yourself.

She continues to be a great sister and an amazing friend. I stand in awe of her, watching her raise her three children with so much grace and order. I know "order" seems like a weird thing to throw in there, but anyone who can work, run a household, home school, and run after her two year old, and get her two daughters to and from all of their social engagements and always have a house in PRISTINE condition is worth hating just a teeny tiny bit. I get overwhelmed by having to go grocery shopping. She's clearly more German than I am.

So, I love you Steph. I hope this year is filled with a myriad of blessings and joy and a lot of time together. And margaritas! Remember the ones I made at that birthday party years ago? Where we couldn't remember much the next day? Here's to many of those in 2009!

This deters me from breeding

It’s not been a good week, people. I added up all of the hours of sleep that I have had since last Friday night and that sum total is 13. Hours. In a week. Without the aid of meth. The fact that I am not swimming in a pool of my own drool at the moment is astounding…an act of God.

I knew things were bad today when a client, who I had put on the reformer with the command of “Do ye leg presses!” looked up at me after what was presumably a very long while and said “Um…how much longer do you want me to do these?” her quad muscles bulging under the strain. I looked at her, snapped out of my stupor and was all “Oh HI! When did you get here?” Clearly, I need a nap.

Ambien has failed me. Deep breathing has failed me. I am so tired that I burst into tears today when I couldn’t unscrew the cap off of a particularly tight bottle of water. The shadows beneath my eyes have taken on a bruise like purple. I should not be operating large machinery as I went whipping by my exit on the freeway this morning and only realized it four miles later when I was provided with the option of heading to Santa Cruz on 17W. What, HO!

So this weekend I am dedicating to rest. Which is really very boring, but necessary, otherwise I believe I’m going to end up wandering the streets of Mountain View, rending my garments and clutching at people’s ankles going “WHY CAN’T I SLEEP?! SWEET GOD WHY?” But first, I’m going to pen a letter to my mother, thanking her for this particular genetic trait. I called her earlier this week to wail into the phone about my fatigue. From the other line, I heard her take a long sip of her tea, pause and then say “Well, child, just think, this is doing wonders to prepare you for motherhood!”

In which case, I’m totally getting my tubes tied.

Gimme some MALT LIQUOR!

I sometimes wonder if, perhaps, I do not fall into Interventions target demographic. I've been using scenes from the show to boost myself up, an intention I'm sure the producers were not going for.

I'll hear, "Honey, did you forget to pay the AMEX bill?" to which I'll bark back, "Well AT LEAST I'm not following up my methamphetamine injections with a chaser of heroin and malt liquor!!! Can you GET some perspective here? GOD."

Intervention may have hoped to give their viewers understanding and compassion. My take away has been a pretty righteous superiority complex. And who DOESN'T want to work "Malt Liquor!" into conversation at least once a day?