mommy is a super-model

Got the Victoria's Secret Swimsuit Clearance catalog in the mail. I'm flipping through it and Tagg points to this picture and shouts, "THERE'S MOMMY!"

I love that I look like this in my son's eyes. I wish I could make glasses or a mirror out of his perspective. As you'll notice, I am not including a what-mommy-really-looks-like photo. That way I can come back to this photo and this post at any time and remember that in the eyes of my 3-year-old son, I am a super model.

what is family?

I was watching a Teen Mom adoption reunion special tonight (shut up...there's some reality TV I just can't say no to) and (A) my mascara is running down to my chin, (B) I'm baffled that only 3 of all the 16 & Pregnant girls placed their babies for adoption, and (C) why, why, why aren't more girls considering adoption as an alternative to keeping babies with immature, unhelpful baby-daddies, no jobs, no school and gobs of stress?

I'm not going to get into a big "you should place your baby for adoption" thing. But there was only one couple who seemed really at peace with their decision - Catelynn and Tyler. And their relationship with their adoptive parents is a lot like ours. Very open and supportive, and the teens seem to be doing about the best of most of the kids featured on this show,  and they talk about their relationship almost like it's family.

And that started me wondering...in this day and age, when "family" means so many things - half-brothers, step-sisters, live-in boyfriend slash father figures, grandparents parenting, part-time Brady bunch families, siblings as caretakers, who knows what all - what is a family? Isn't it really just having a connection with people? Something that starts with respect and is amplified by love and a common interest in...happy. Seems pretty basic to me. So why does having that "adoption" label make everything so different?

For us..and I think for Catelynn and Ty and their adoptive parents...family is something really different and special. I think the relationship starts somewhere awkward and a little scary and unique and then, if you're lucky, it grows over time until these people and their families become like nieces and nephews, or special aunts and uncles. Friends. Family. They are people who love you and want nothing but love and joy and success for you and yours. Of course, they do. They have a vested interest in your life.

And you have the same feelings for them. Kids...You had better finish high school. Get your degrees. Fall in love and have the family you were meant to. Enjoy life. Be successful.

And for our kids, they get to know that they have all kinds of family. And that the choices that were made were hard, but they were made out of love. And they'll know that because the people who made them are part of their circle of family.

30 days

A friend of ours threw down a challenge last month: blog every single day for the entire month. Of June. We didn’t do it. Good intentions but you know right where that path leads! So Natalie and I decided we do our own “contest” during the month of July. At least one blog post every single day. And I think we’ve been pretty good. Not every post has gone up on the exact day but I think collectively there is a new post for each of the 11 days of July.

I am currently sitting here in the Apple store waiting for a genius to bring my iPhone back from the dead. It’s insanely hot and muggy and swarming with people. I want to buy one of everything. I want someone to bring me an iced coffee. I want one of these guys to teach me how to make killer videos with iMovie (I’ve been teaching myself and frankly I’m not a very good teacher. Or student.) I want to sit here or somewhere like here and be inspired to write my screenplay, or that trashy romance novel I’ve been meaning to finish, or maybe just 20 more blog posts. 

If my phone had been working, I would have taken a picture of the Apple store. Unbelievable.

trash can of shame

I have a white plastic garbage can in my garage just outside the back door. It’s where I throw my shame. All of the crap I collect in my car during the days – gum wrapper, abandoned goldfish crackers, random receipts, empty mint containers. Okay, sometimes it’s weeks, maybe months worth of crap goes in this garbage can. And my fast food wrappers. Yep. It’s true. I may be a half-marathoner and a triathlete (haha), a Cooking Light subscriber who actually likes vegetables and fruit, and a relatively healthy person but I’ll admit that I likes me a little Chik-Fil-A. 

About once every week or so, I save cows by eating more chik’n. I do love the 3D billboards and will admit they influenced my original dining behavior. Now I think they put some addictive substance in the chicken, like Coke does, so you just have to have it. Plus, Chik-Fil-A has bendy straws and waffle fries. I mean, come on. I am also hooked on McDonald’s diet coke. I don’t know if the rumors are true that they have a secret formula but it wouldn’t shock me. The line there is also much faster than Starbucks and you can get a super big Diet Coke for a buck when a venti latte is like 5 (plus I have to tip – you really should, poor baristas stuck at the drive up make waaay less in tips) and since I’m usually late for work and sorta broke, that kind of makes a difference. And if I’ve managed to run out of time for a healthy, homemade breakfast, I can get an Egg McMuffin which is on the Zone diet so it must be okay for me and my eternal diet, right? And I can eat it on the way to work! But then…I have to hide the evidence. Yellow wrappers, empty Chik-Fil-A box of nuggets, 32 oz drink cups. So where do they go? The trash can of shame of course.

And then there’s the drinking. If we drink during the week (which, let’s face it, does happen) and kill a bottle of wine, where does the bottle go? Not in the kitchen trash where the nanny can see we’ve been boozing it up on a weeknight. No, no, no.  If there are a few beers downed in an evening, what to do with the cans? They can’t go in the recycling bin with the magazines and cardboard organic pasta boxes. Nope. Out to the trash can of shame they go. Usually with some kind of camouflage on top…like a paper bag or a newspaper. Oh, the trash can of shame. I’m starting to think I might put some of my too-tight jeans and trashy romance novels in there too. Just for good measure.

13.1 x 10

I ran my 10th half-marathon yesterday. It was a total last-minute, impulse, insane thing. I was supposed to have run 13 miles last weekend, and 11 this weekend in preparation for the Napa Half Marathon next weekend - what was to have been my 10th memorial half. That's a good one, right? Wine country, a killer medal, free vino at the end.

But since we got back from Mexico, I've been having a tough time getting motivated to run. So on Wednesday, my sister sends me a newsletter from South Jordan about soccer and swim lessons and stuff and - boop! - there it is. There's a half marathon on Saturday and it's only 40 bucks. Boo-yah! My motivation is right here! In email! Sign me up! But not until I've convinced my equally-crazy friend, Natalie, to off-the-couch this half marathon with me. And, of course, she says...hell yah! Sometimes I really hate her. Can't I have one friend who is the voice of reason? So we sign up on Wednesday for a half-marathon on Saturday. Christi says...you have the biggest balls of any chick I know. Big balls or little brains. It's one or the other!

Luckily (or not, depending on how you look at it), we didn't look at the course before we signed up. Or picked up our race packets. Quote from the race director the night before the race: "Be ready for hills, hills, and more hills!!  And just when you think it is clear running...there is 1 more hill!" Oh shit. Natalie and I haven't run more than a couple of miles at a time in 3 weeks. Mayday.

So we show up for the run, and there's literally no one there. Hi, little teenage sullen volunteer girl, how many people are running? "Uh...there are 67 registered." SIXTY-SEVEN? Are you kidding me?! Huntington has like 13,000. 67?! Like less than 100? Judging by the little pod of people clustered at the "start line" (it gets quotes because the obligatory balloon arch was absent), this might not really count as a race after all.

I struggled through the run. No lie. I felt under-fueled, it was hot, it was a headwind no matter what direction we were headed, that dude was not lying about the hills, and with no people-watching to distract you thirteen miles is like a fucking eternity.

But we finished. In two hours and 45 minutes (exactly what we guessed, for the record). We weren't last. We think we beat at least 5 or 6 people, although they may have been ill or had nice friends who picked them up in a car and took them to breakfast. So we were congratulating ourselves on making our guess-timated time, and finishing the highest place in any race ever (must have been like 54th and 55th although this race apparently does not publish results). And then the race director came over and asked us if we got LOST. Seriously, dude? Seriously!

But my favorite part of the whole run was Natalie. Not only is she a ball to run with, even when I'm pussing out and walking more than I should but as we're gingerly folding our sore, salt-lick bodies into the car afterwards, she hands me this medal (the 40-dollar registration fee apparently did not include medals for back-of-the-pack participants). "In honor of your 10th half-marathon, you deserve a medal. We both do!" She got these fabulous runner medals engraved with "OFF THE COUCH SOJO HALF 2011". Super cool. That girl is, as always, one of the coolest chicks I know.

So, good training run. Glad it's done. Not sure about signing up for that one again although I am kind of determined to actually run up those hills, not walk them. I do love a challenge. Apparently that's what happens when you have balls.