Momma's alright.

My mother doesn't get a lot of credit on this blog. I know that, and she never really has been given much credit on any of my blogs -- often, she's the butt of jokes; such classics include her angry, ranting, crazy voicemails transcribed and posted to the world wide web for everyone to read, along with the rest of my blogs that generally embarrass and outrage her.

She doesn't know about this blog, which hopefully it will stay this way; not because I don't want to hurt her feelings, but it's more comparable to not wanting to poke a grizzly (or gristly, per Matt Pagel) bear with a stick. You don't really care if the grizzly bear doesn't want to get poked, or if poking will hurt the bear's feelings, but mostly because you just don't want to incur its crazy wrath and have the crazy bear rip off your arm and shove it in its crazy mouth.

To be fair, my mother is crazy. She is a raging bull in a china shop of emotional stability. She is politically and socially ignorant conservative, she is narrow-minded to the end and she has pushed every known button I have for as long as I can remember.

But as another school year begins, this is now the third consecutive end-of-August in which I am not going back to school. So sometimes I get a little wistful. I could tell you about moving into the dorms my first year of college, and watching my father's face turn a brilliant shade of crimson as we drove past the frat houses with sheets hanging from the porches that said, "Dads, Thanks for Dropping Off Your Daughters!" (and that was relatively tame... and I did pass out in a few of those frat houses later on). But instead, I'll tell you about my college orientation, and the night I realized, as a pseudo-adult, that my mom is okay.

College orientation took place about a month before the school year began for freshmen. It was a two-day process, day one being placement tests and day two being scheduling, and random pointless orientation and icebreaker shit in between. Because I lived about an hour and a half from my college, my mother and I stayed overnight in the accommodations provided by the school -- which was in a dorm room.

I went into this thing expecting that I would share a room with my mom. Lame, but whatever. I didn't want to be there; a tornado ripped through campus earlier in the day of my first day of orientation and basically wrecked the campus, and I missed my McDonald's manager boyfriend back home. I was in the gifted program and all the other kids I had to mingle with at the gifted orientation were too smart and didn't talk to me, and I just plain didn't want to be there. Then I found out my mom would be staying on the "moms floor," sharing a room with another mom, whereas I would share a room with another female orientee.

My mom and I are cut from the same cloth in that we are not social people. I'm just not. I'm sorry. So there was a look of panic that shot over both our faces when we realized we wouldn't be sharing a room, and would have to actually *gulp* socialize with strangers. But it was what it was, we accepted our lot, and bid each other good night as we went to our separate rooms on separate floors.

My "roommate" wasn't in the room when I got there, and the only indication I had that I even had a roommate was a duffle bag with size XS Abercrombie and Hollister shit all over the other bed. There was no TV, I didn't know anyone, I didn't feel like going out, so I called my boyfriend to whine about how much it sucked and tried to fall asleep. Eventually, I drifted off to sleep.

I woke up eventually by what felt like an earthquake. My twin sized bed was shaking. I laid stone still trying to figure out what was going on, until I heard the moaning and, after I tried to convince myself this was not happening, realized that my "roommate" (whom I had not met, nor seen, and couldn't pick out in a 2 person lineup) was having sex AT THE FOOT OF MY BED, while I slept.

Again, may I pause to say, there were two beds in this dorm room. She had her own bed she could have done this on. Furthermore, it begs the questions, 1.) Who gets drunk and picks someone up at college orientation? 2.) Who fucks on another person's bed while they're asleep?

I laid there for a minute listening to the giggling and moaning til I realized that I couldn't do this. I flew out of bed, turned on the lights, saw two very naked strangers having sex across the foot of the bed I was just sleeping in, and grabbed my bag (which, conveniently enough, was packed), and stormed out the door while snapping at her, "YOU ARE FUCKING PATHETIC!" I didn't even hear a reaction, perhaps because they were too busy HUMPING ON MY BED, and stormed to the common lounge of the floor, with my duffle bag, and slumped onto the stiff industrial-strength couch. And I sobbed. Fucking. Sobbed.

I hated college. I didn't want to be here. This place sucked. And I just had two strangers fucking on my bed. I hated college. I wanted to quit and I hadn't even started.

So I did all I knew to do. At 3 am, I called my mom's cell phone, and prayed she would answer. She did.

In the end, my mom came, sat with me on that ridiculously stiff couch, held me while I bawled my eyes out and promised me I'd love it here eventually, she had loved it here (yeah, she had also gone to school here), and it would be okay. Knowing I couldn't go back to my room, I begged her to let me sleep with her in her room. She shook her head solemnly as she explained that her roommate was asleep and she didn't want to wake her up. I figured my entire night was shot all to hell when she told me to wait a minute, went and got her stuff, came back, took my still-hysterical ass to the car, and then, at nearly 4 am, checked us into a hotel for the four hours we'd be sleeping before I had to be back on campus to schedule classes and finish orientation.

And to her credit, she was right. I (amazingly) returned to campus later that summer and would come to have some of the greatest experiences and memories of my life there.

That night I shared a king size bed with my mom in a hotel room and slept knowing that my mom, despite of all her insane tendencies and instability and rants and raves, loved me.

The only thing that would give me more satisfaction than I had that night would be knowing that girl got a raging case of genital warts. Which the STD rate of that campus is something like 50%, and I know I made it out of college clean as a whistle, so by law of statistics, and in the name of karma, I bet she did.

Pause for Cuteness.

I now take a break from my virginity-losing stories and tales of toddler tantrums to remind you again that I have a kid who is, ahem, fucking adorable.




Things Punk has been taught recently that I may or may not condone:

● Cheerfully chiming, "Don't get raped!" instead of "Good-bye!" as she waves furiously when we leave a place/situation, which includes but is not limited to grandparents' houses, Target, and kind passersby who smile cheerfully at her in public. I guess it is pretty sound advice.
● Openly referring to her dirtiest baby doll as "Dumpster Baby" -- to the point that you can now ask Punk where Dumpster Baby is and she will bring DB to you.
● The appropriate response to a vacuum cleaner is to scream, sob with huge, gigantic tears, and hide. I wish I could too, kid, I wish I could, too.
● The fluid motion of flipping people off by flicking off under your chin. I did NOT teach her this, that was my 19-year-old brother, her beloved Uncle Ham. But I can't de-program it from her, for the life of me. Thanks Uncle Ham.

Tantrum

Punk has become a huge fan of the Temper Tantrum, and it is making me want to kill someone.

Her tantrums don't just involve yelling and crying. They involve this shrill, banshee scream, one that I'm fairly certain has led the neighbors to believe I routinely kill her. You take away the scissors she's magically attained, or re-adjust her baby gate, or tell her no, and the screaming begins. And when you ignore that much, that's when she sprawls out on the floor and continues to scream while writhing. If you ignore the Tawny Kittaen-on-a-car-hood writhing, she then proceeds to assault you, smacking with tiny hands and biting if she's able to get a good grip.

My friends, I have a toddler on the cusp of the Terrible Two's.

What's the return policy on this thing? Usually at Wal-Mart, I know even if I bought something beyond the return policy, if I'm super nice to the customer service rep, and mumble something about "I know I've got the receipt somewhere" while pretending to shuffle through my purse, they'll let me return it as long as it's not too beat up. Can I do that with this child? Is it too late to say, "Ya know, thanks, but turns out we didn't really need it, and it's still practically new?"

Things that have spurred tantrums in the last 48 hours:

● Punky wanted to put her shoes on. However, with the futility that is Toddler Motor Skills, she was unable to do so.
● I had the audacity to offer to help her put her shoes on.
● I then attempted to take her shoes away so as to STOP THIS FUCKING MADNESS.
● Not putting the right kind of juice in the sippy cup.
● Having the audacity to expect her to eat a granola bar.
● Taking away a spatula that was being used to beat the dog
● Stopping her from stabbing herself with scissors.
● Idiotic and narrow minded conservatives spreading false panic about Obama's healthcare plan
● The cashier at Target looking at her
● Vacuum cleaner
● Diaper change
● Drew Carey on the Price is Right.

Dear God. I'm seriously, seriously going to lose my goddamn mind in 4...3...2....

Cherry.

If you're sitting there wondering if I'm really going to discuss what you're afraid I'm going to, based on the title, the answer is yes, yes I am. Sometimes in life, you stumble back upon people from your past who bring with them memories you've tried to forget/drink away/kill with lots of drugs/talk out with your therapist. Within the last month, I've been remembering my first real boyfriend in high school, J. Ah, young love.

I was a sophomore and J. was a junior when we dated. He was on the football team, drove a Chevy S-10 and could take me to prom, so based on these qualifications alone, I decided not only was he boyfriend material, but he was also the dream boat that I wanted to lose my virginity to. I came to this conclusion, however, while watching Carson Daly announce the newest Backstreet Boys video on TRL and sat in smug satisfaction at the sheer uniqueness of my belly-button piercing, so, you know, good judgment was really all in context.

I lost my virginity to J. in the cab of a Chevy S-10 while Creed was playing on the CD player, under the stars, parked in the middle of nowhere on a Tuesday night in August after a CYO Dance at St. Mike's (because church dances make me hot and bothered, apparently). I had a seat belt thing in my back the entire time and kept hoping we'd finish up in time for me to get home before curfew. It was what it was, and about what you expect for the situation. I gave him my class ring, he gave me his, and while listening to "With Arms Wide Open," we swore we'd spend our lives together.

A few days later we were at the county fair when those damn teen hormones kicked in again. J. had met me at the fair with one of his friends, with whom he had ridden over. He asked the friend if he could borrow the keys to his car, as he wanted to go get his sweatshirt for me, which was in the friend's car. What ensued was us going at it in broad daylight in the backseat of a 1990-nothing Chevy Cavalier at the county fair. I was smitten with this Romeo.

The kink in this hose is that apparently my hymen didn't break on the first go-round. It did, however, on the second. So there was now an unavoidable amount of blood on the backseat of his friend's car.

Like some sort of virginal squid, I'd left the backseat looking like a homicide scene. Which I was unaware of until the entire school knew about it, because said friend told everyone. EV-ER-EEEEE-ONE. So not only did the entire school in my conservative Christian town know I'd had *GASP* sex (SIN!), but they also knew (or believed) I'd lost it in this guy's Cavalier at the county fair and had bled all over everything in sight. It's funny and makes good writing material now (if you have no shame, which I don't), but at the time, it was devastating.

Sometimes, when I think it'd be nice to go back to my roots, I sit, and remind myself that my "roots" are basically two dueling banjos shy of Deliverance.

Though I'd say the fact I could have sex in a Chevy Cavalier, while not a testament to my classiness, does speak volumes for my flexibility.

But had it not been for those initial acts of teenage promiscuity, I wouldn't have embarked on the series of chain events of self-loathing and poor decisions that would eventually lead up to my 22nd birthday, where, drunk out of my mind, I became pregnant with the shamelessly adorable embryo that would become the shamelessly adorable Punky. So I wouldn't change a thing. It's like a slutty version of the Butterfly Effect.