Hey! It's Valentine's day!

Happy Valentines Day to those who care.  It's not that we don't love each other but my husband and I decided not to exchange gifts this year.  We've been together for 27 years.  Our first Valentine's Day he took a chunk of hash and shaped it into a heart.  No, seriously.  Tomorrow I will go and buy myself a box of milk chocolate covered cherries (everyone else in this house thinks they're gross) which I love and I'll be happy with that.  Plus tonight my sister and I are making a shower for our niece who is getting married in April.  So that kinda kills any sort of romantic dinner but tonight is the only night we could do if we wanted to include my daughter who is home from university for Reading Week.  I love my kids.  I would do anything for them.  But going from clean and quiet to messy and loud overnight is a huge leap for me.  Before I know it they'll both be gone and I'll miss them all over again.

I have been mostly editing my memoir lately while binge watching a T.V. show from 2012 (I think) called Nurse Jackie.  I loved it and highly recommend you check it out.  The writing is slow going although.  I am at the part where I introduce the role my parents played in my illness and it's really difficult to write.  That's all I'll say for now, don't want to give away too much.  This is actually my third attempt at this chapter in the book which tells you how hard it is for me to write it.

In the meantime, I'm going to enjoy my kids and try to stay warm.  It's -40 degrees Celsius here.

So many plans

I'm thinking of changing the title of my book to "Just Breathe".  After about 3 weeks of feeling like crap I have now straightened out all my medications and seem to be better.  And I have such a long "to do" list that needs to be done this week!  Well, I'll have to pop an oxy and get to it.  One thing I did do was read my book from start to finish and did some major editing.  In between the "to dos" I will get back to work as well as keep submitting querys to publishing houses.  I just know that I'm going to have to self publish, through Amazon in all likelihood.  I do know a couple of authors who did so and the sales were so high that they got picked up by a publishing house.  I think that is the most I can hope for.  Once published (through Amazon or anyone else) I plan to send a copy to Dr. Oz and to Ellen Degeneres.  If I could get on either of their shows, well, a girl can dream.

More of the same...

I am so embarrassed that it's been over a month since I have written here.  I have a long list of excuses but it's not enough.  My kids were both home over the winter break.  Only one fight.  I think that's pretty good.  Unfortunately I spent the first week in bed with the flu which I seem to be getting a lot of lately.  Headache, of course, and like someone has punched me in the gut.  I haven't left the house in  a week now.  I long to be one of those moms who makes dinner every night, always has groceries in the fridge and goes out with my husband at least once a week.  My husband, if any one is a hero than it's him.  He wants to go and do and I just don't have the strength.  I'm going for another round of botox tomorrow, maybe that will help.

Too long

I am ashamed to see that I have not written anything here in a long time.  I am currently working on an article for The National Post (Canada's most widely circulated paper) about our health care system.  Our American cousins always comment on the free health care we enjoy here in Canada.  Well, nothing is free.  Our taxes are extremely high.  Plus, if you need to see a specialist or require a test such as an MRI or CT scan be prepared to wait at least three months. I recently had a doctor's appointment that lasted less than two minutes and could have easily been done over the phone but he brought me in. Why, you ask? So he could bill our government for the visit.  Anyway, I'm not gong to re-write my entire article here but it centres on our health care system and the additional strain it will be under once the Syrian refugees reach our borders.  I am not against allowing the refugees in, but they are being received in both Toronto and Montreal.  Our major airport is even undergoing a renovation in one of it's terminals to welcome them!  Guess who's paying for that?  Yes, welcome Syrians but please relocate them to a small city or province.  Toronto can't take it anymore.

Still the hardest chapter

I have gone over the chapter I have written about my parents role in my illness and recovery.  I have also spoken to a close friend in Edmonton whose mother is very good friends with mine.  Her advice echoed my sister-in-law's. "Don't try to start a relationship, you'll just be disappointed." Next I called my friend whose husband and mine have been best friends since they were 12 years old.  This woman, even though she is in her mid-forties, is probably one of the wisest people I know.  She says, "Fuck the email. Call her. Try to establish a relationship with her again. Because I know you. I know you think about your parents a lot.  It is also an excellent example for your kids. They will see that you are the bigger person, that, no matter what, family is family."  This advice I find very difficult to take.  First of all, my kids have grown up in a family that is now 21 people.  But when they were growing up, there were 7 cousins, 3 sets of uncles and aunties and their grandparents.  We eat together at least once a week. As they were growing up, before they started going to university (the eldest is 31 now and my daughter, at 19 is the youngest) we rented a cottage for the last two weeks in August.  A huge cottage where we all lived together. The kids did everything together.  As they got older we rented 2 smaller cottages, one for the adults and one for them.  If one of the kids was mis-behaving and neither of his or her parents were there at the moment, an auntie or an uncle had every right to punish them.  As we ate every meal together for 14 days, sometimes one of the kids or one of us would bring up something we were struggling with. Whether it was being nervous about going to high school or one of us starting a new job, opinions were sought at that table.

Today, two of my nephews are married and I am also proud to be a great aunt our first great-grandchild. My kids are the youngest but they come home from school at random, just so that they can go to their grandmother's house for a meal because they knew that is where their cousins will be.  My daughter is coming home in three weeks for a visit.  She's actually coming home a day early so that she can take her baby cousin to her music class.  So what I'm trying to get at here is my kids know the meaning of family.  Me trying to rectify things with my own mother won't change that.

The hardest chapter so far

I have been working on my book steadily and just completed what was the most difficult chapter thus far.  It's about my parents' role in my illness.  I don't want to give away too much but suffice it to say that they essentially abandoned me two years before my surgery.  I need to back and add more to it but to tell you the truth, I am dreading it.  I got my mother's current email address from my brother recently but have done nothing with it.  Should I just warn her that I am writing this memoir and she and my father don't come off looking well, to say the least.  Or do I want to re-establish a relationship with her?  I speak mostly of my mother because I don't think my father wipes his ass without her permission.  I want to talk to my brother more about this before I email her but when I sat down with my sister-in-law (who is more like a sister) she told me that if I do decide to try to re-establish a relationship with her I will probably, at the very least, be disappointed by her sometime in the future. But her true feelings are that my parents are not worth it, that their behaviour was disgusting. And this comes from a woman who never stays angry with anyone. Ever.  The fact remains that scarcely a day goes by that I don't think about my mother.  The fact that I am sad that we don't have a relationship and that she wasn't there to see my kids grow up.  I also have a few choice words for her that have nothing to do with me but reiterate her character.  Do I include that as well?  Right now I just don't know.

I am very embarrassed that it's been so long since I've written here.  It's kind of been one thing after another.  Jewish Holidays, a bout of the flu.  Also just plain laziness.  The other night my husband and I were lying in bed, it was about 2:30 in the morning and neither of us could sleep.  He whispered to me "I hate this.  No kids in the house.  It's too quiet." The funny part is he is whispering this to me even though we are the only two people in the house.  There must be something about being in the dark that makes us whisper.  "I didn't like it last year and I like it even less this year."  Maybe that's part of my issue as well.

Also, too much time feeling sorry for myself as I can't get past the chapter it's time to write about my parents.  Everyone thinks that because it's been 17 years since we've spoken that I'm over it but it's not true.  I think about my mother every day.  I'm going to try to write this afternoon.  Let's hope I'm telling you the truth.