are you there, dog? It's me, kerensa

I am 31 going on 32 ( in just a few short weeks, 32 shopping days to be exact). This week, I got to be a ten year old again- albeit an incredibly stressed out and uber responsible one, but a ten year old all the same. Tuesday night was the pool party, complete with snocones, muscle floaties and bug bites galore. In celebration of the entire year, or perhaps nothing really in particular, a friend had the girl scouts out to her home, and the mothers (who declined to wear bathing suits, each believing they had a flaw to hide, and yet each knowing that of all groups, ours would be last to judge) sat in lawn chairs and discussed mother things like summer camp, teachers, and communicable diseases. The giggly gaggle of girl scouts, clad in vibrants tankinis, bikinis and skirted one pieces, flopped and splashed and dog paddled for hours, coming up only for air and slowly congealing pizza. I sat between the two groups, because as mother of little babies, one must be always on toes, always quick...

As I have said before, I am a PTA mom (and proud of it). I believe that when one thinks of a suburban mom/housewife, they think of a woman with peaces n cream skin and perfectly manicured hands. They drive spotless minivans, and often feed Koolaid in actual Koolaid pitchers to their overly attractive tweens and their numerous friends after an apparently successful soccer game. After which, she high fives them and they scamper to the yard. She is the mom who, despite having cleaned all day until there is somehow an audible shine to her counters and floors, shakes her head laughingly as her enthusiastically muddy child comes in, followed by a large dog covered in what appears to be massive amounts of shit. This woman is happily married to a handsome alpha male named Dan/Rob/Rick, who seldom makes appearances aside from fleetingly in the sidelines. This is the woman who will giggle and swat Dan/Rob/Rick on the hand after he says damn, for she is pure as the driven snow. She hums as she gr...

As I have spoken about before, I have an impending move on my plate. I will be going with my family to Raleigh, NC, to begin a new adventure. This is not the first time, though I hope it will be my last, that I have taken a leap of faith (in whatever I needed to at the time) and jumped head first into an unknown body of water (or lack thereof). At age 18, I had broken up with my high school sweetheart, both of my grandparents had died, and my parents got divorced, and the only logical thing there seemed left to be, was to move to Arizona. My mother rented a Grand Prix, and she and my sister and I hung my Class of 95 tassle on the rearview and drove...and drove...and drove...I stayed in Arizona for more than 4 years- with the first year and the last being incredibly difficult ones, and let's be honest, so were the middle two. Jake and I stuck Rhiannon in a moving van ( a 14 footer, I believe) and drove suddenly to Tampa, Fl, without jobs, without a home, without a plan. With the exc...