A Real Man wouldn't Shoplift the Pootie from a Single Mom

says Rod Tidwell in Jerry Maguire

Argh - spare me the Single Mom stereotypes! My kids don't need a father figure, my kids already have a father, and other than being an occasional pain in my divorced ass, he's a pretty damn good father. And I'm a pretty damn good mother and don't need a man in my life to help me raise my kids, financially or otherwise.

What I do need from a man is all the things I can't get from my kids, my friends, my family, my job. I need sex. Preferably wrapped up in a package that includes affection, support, attention to my needs, willingness to care about the things that I care about, and the ability to accept the same in return. For the most part, I can get all those wrappings from my kids, my friends, my family and my job. Which gets me back to - I need sex.

Give me the same credit you give a single girl without kids. Just cause she wants to sleep with you doesn't always mean she wants to marry you. Of course, some girls are the "sleep-to-trap-into-marrying" types. If you're smart you notice the signs (her asking you to meet her parents on a first date is a good indication) and you stay away. Single Moms - no diff. If I start planning my family vacation around your availability, feel free to run the other direction. But until then, you can feel safe in assuming that I'm just into you for a good time.

So go ahead - Shoplift the Pootie. Or at the very least, don't let my having kids keep you from Shoplifting the Pootie. If I want more than sex from you, I'll tell you.

Drops of Jupiter

...She checks out Mozart while she does Taebo / Reminds me that there's room to grow hey hey. (Train)

Me: I haven't decided what I want to be when I grow up.

Kids: <rolling eyes> Mommy, you're already grown up

Me: <with a twinkle in my eyes> No I'm not

My children are growing and changing by leaps and bounds. And I'm growing and changing along with them.

A friend told me the other day "Nothing changes except that which is unreal". If that's true, then my list of things which are unreal include: my friendship and marriage to a man for 11 years, my close relationship with my kids, a list of friends and acquaintances that I rely on for support every day, my involvement in the community, my ability to play keyboards and (sort of) sing along, this blog and other things that I attempt to write, and my newly-moved-in-to apartment (as opposed to my old condo or my old house). All changes and choices I've made in the past 5 years. All seemingly very real changes.

I look back on who I was 20, 10 or even 5 years ago, return to places where I lived in those years, and ... I don't recognize myself in them. I recognize the places, see people I used to interact with, but the person I am today would interact in those communities very differently then I did back then. And I can barely remember who I was in them at that time.

And yet, I understand what my friend is saying. All our surroundings, all the actions we take in those surroundings, are unreal relative to who we are at our core. Who we are, our essence, our soul, doesn't change.

My children were born with a core essence. My job as a parent is to allow their essence to come through in everything they do. To bring out their likes and dislikes, help them discover their strengths and weaknesses, give them the opportunity to discover who they are and how they want to live their life to make it as fulfilling for them as it can be.

Who we are, inside, is what is real. Everything else is just trappings.

But damn it, those trappings seem pretty damn real sometimes. And figuring out who I am, just as my children are figuring out who they are, is pretty damn difficult in amongst all the trappings of homework, work deadlines, chores, friendships and family pressures.

So sometimes, I need to let my mind travel to Jupiter, away from everyone and all the day-to-day pressures, to sail across the sun / dance along the light of day. Until I'm ready to head back towards the Milky Way. In order to re-discover during that journey, who I am. And return, with drops of Jupiter in my hair, to the unreal world, ready to change my unreality as necessary to better be who I really am.