i hate that christy is in so much pain. i hate that she left out of here mad. angry with me, with herself, with morgan, with life.
i know how hard it is to part with a pet, let alone several. it breaks your heart, when they've become such a part of your family. i've had to do so myself. and i learned my lesson the hard way with the realization that people should not get pets unless they are fully equipped to deal with everything that entails. you see a cute puppy or kitten and your brain short circuits and turns to puddles on the floor. what you don't think about, is food and housetraining and exercising and vaccines, and animals going into heat. let alone allergies, breed behaviors, unforseen medical issues and just plain how they'll fit into your life and vice versa.
i read somewhere that anyone thinking about having a child should first have to adopt a diabetic puppy and see how that goes.
i think the same is true for prospective pet owners.....
i do not like chaos, and i can't stand mess. i'm anal that way and i admit it. i love animals. but i do not like all their baggage. i like cats because they're low maintennance. they come around when they feel like it and provide random moments of cuteness and entertainment. we are not dog people and we learned this long ago. so don't even begin to ask me how we ended up with a dashchund. its a long story that has less to do with my momentary lapse of brain function, seeing him as a substitue for the 2nd baby i have yet to concieve, and more possibly to do with the tolerance of my husband and our 2 older male cats. somehow, despite all odds, frank fits. it helps that he is a miniature weenie and as our cats are both bigger than he is, they've never had a hard time getting along or establishing who's boss, and he, in turn, doesn't mind one bit being the baby around the house.
last night my good friend melissa called. we used to be very close, but since her baby was born, she has called me twice just to chat. otherwise,she dissapears for weeks and months on end until she needs me to babysit. in her defense, i know her life is just as full of all the *stuff* that we all face, day to day, but i won't sit here and tell you that doesn't still hurt just a little. that said, the baby is innocent in any of that, and i, of all people, am familiar with what its like to have a baby and a job and desperately in need of affordable,child care in a pinch. and how easy it is to forget what that might feel like to the receiving end.
even so, i have struggled in the past little while with being taken advantage of. i think, at times, that people rely on me a little too much for their comfort, their well-being, their safety net. and that's entirely my fault because i somehow can never seem to say no.
bleh. anyway.....so i didn't even want to get up this morning. i was tired and cranky and woke up with a headache. i hate those kind of mornings. i dropped bella at school and came back home to slice up my beef tenderloin and start the marinating for stir-fry tonight. christy's landlord phoned, and right afterwards, morgan. christy was immediately up and out the door.
i don't really ask, and she doesn't so often tell, these days. i know they're both sorting thru what it is that they need to do, in the aftermath of their breakup, and i know that i want to be as helpful as i can without getting in the middle. we've offered our home and the truth is, thats going to be a little messy no matter how hard you try. christy has been with us nearly 2 weeks now. and its still a process, trying to all live around eachother. our house that once seemed so big, is just a little smaller now.
i know she's hurting so much and trying so hard, which is never easy, taking one thing at a time. she's been more than helpful around the house, helping with groceries and even giving us some $ for letting her stay which was a lovely blessing but certainly not expected. the truth is, i wonder what lesson it is, that God expects me to learn, sometimes.
christy and morgan lived in a very small apartment. and in that small apartment, they had 7 dogs and 8 cats. it was too much and too many, and if you went to visit you were knocked over by dogs climbing and jumping all over you, and, i will be honest, the smell. you can't help but smell that many animals no matter how hard you try to keep things clean.
i know that they loved them. but the truth is, they would never have had that many to begin with, if morgan could've stopped herself from collecting every baby, every stray she came into contact with. if they would've had them fixed. if christy would've said NO.
i was just in the middle of fixing a bottle for the baby this afternoon, when christy came back with 5 of the 7 dogs. i had placed an ad for her the other day, per her request,when it became apparent that they needed to officially move out of their apartment. the landlord had threatened eviction and animal control and gave them a week. so i advertised the dogs for her and she got a response almost immediately ~ a woman willing to take ALL of them.
but somewhere in the process of me trying to do good will, morgan decided she wanted to keep the puppy and one of the females who, incidentally, is now pregnant. and christy decided she didn't want to part with her favorite two. nobody discussed any of that with me. christy had mentioned she'd be taking the dogs out to meet the woman that had called. instead, she arranged for the woman to come to our house.
our dog has been very sheltered. when christy asked if she could bring her cat of some 14 odd years with her, we reluctantly said we'd give it a try, figuring the cats would be the biggest obstacle. thankfully, the introduction went off without a hitch, with our 2 mildly curious, but mostly disinterested. frank could care less.
so when 5 dogs came running into franks' domain this afternoon, our house turned into a freakshow. there were dogs barking and growling and jumping everywhere. spraying/marking on my toilet, my tub, my trash can, sodas, my broom, my couch. frank about hyperventilated on himself and i'm standing there holding him in one arm and a startled screaming baby in the other, going, "what just happened??"
the next 2 hours were hell. i literally shut myself off in the bedroom with frank and the baby. when the woman finally came, she left with 3 of them and christy came back into the house, crying. i went out to comfort her and she begged me to let the other 2 stay.
i told her how sorry i was that she's having to make all these choices so fast, and that i know its got to be painful. that i wished i was more in the position to help, but the truth is, i'm not....i don't have the kind of house that fits multiples of dogs and cats. the only animal we've allowed in bella's room is brimley, who sleeps with her every night. frank finds the wonder of her toys entirely too intrigueing, and runtz is a little too interested in her frogs. where christy has more or less taken over bella's room, she'd have to understand, the dogs couldn't be in there with her. and then there's the fact of my 4 lb shaking mass of scared spitless weenie wuss thats barking incessantly during this entire conversation. i can't have the neighbors complaining and in turn my landlord upset. i can't do that.
i hoped so hard she'd understand. but she just sat there, looking dejected, not speaking. she left, shortly after, and took them with her. 'said she was going to start packing.
and i found myself just mad. which has unfortunately stuck with me the rest of the night. is it wrong that i find it entirely unfair and innapropriate that she would just assume she could bring them all into my home and we would be ok with that? and when we weren't, that it was somehow turned on us and i'm the bad guy?
this is combined with other things that have been eating at me and aren't neccesarily anything i need to talk about but i will.
i know she feels like her world has crumbled around her feet. and i've tried to give her space and love and encourage her. but there's a limit to what i can do for her. and i have. i really have. i accept people as they are, with all their baggage and bruises. i don't judge. and we all have loved her. despite the issues jason and i ourselves are dealing with. we've held her up and tried to pry her out of her depression. we've included her in our life and helped her every which way we can, out of love. and instead, we've had to work our life around her. bella can't play in her room when she wants to, because christy sleeps until she feels like getting up or she's laying in bed, depressed. she doesn't appreciate my rule of no smoking in the house but reluctantly complies. however, she thought nothing of bringing weed into my house, leaving her pipe in plain sight and then smoking it in bella's room. after morgan called me every name under the sun, for "taking christy's side", she continues to call here at all hours of the night and its gotten to where i just shut the ringer off when i'm home anymore.
where do you go with that? i get tired of shutting my mouth. i expect more out of the people i care about. i expect better. and i don't expect to feel like the wicked stepmother just because our life works a certain way and i ask that you pretty, pretty please with cherries on top, respect that.
she left, awhile ago. after i'd said we couldn't have the dogs, she brought back one anyway. so i bit my tongue, and hard. frank did manage to get over his initial heart-attack after awhile, and the night, tho awkwardly quiet, progressed as ok as it could. until she went to bed. she came out shortly after and talked to jason. said she couldn't stand to think of her dog sitting outside the door, crying for her. that she was taking him back to morgan. jason apologized, saying we don't allow any other animals in bella's room, so there's no accidents, no half eaten barbie dolls......he asked if sleeping on the couch where she could be with the dog would be better?
but no.
so i've been going around viciously cloroxing everywhere her dog marked, during his brief stay here. the couch, the entertainment center, the guitar..... and the more i scrub, the more the whole thing just makes me mad, dammit.
christy is better than that. she has to want to lead a better life than that. doesn't she? what better time than now, to get yourself healthy and happy and figure out what direction you might want to head..... yesterday she was talking about getting back into school...seeing if her credits would transfer. after i'd said my peace about the mj, she'd stopped. things were looking up. she got her depression meds switched and scheduled a time to talk to a counselor. and now i'm afraid that because of a dog, she's going to wallow in this hell that has been her life, some of which is self-made, and dive right back into the thick of it. she is haunted so much by her past. by the way she was raised and the fire and brimstone God she believes has already damned her. by her inability to accept herself, or her sexuality, let alone anyone else. she still mourns the loss of her first love and after 4 years with another, her morgan left her the same way as the first.
when she called me crying, so broken, i wanted nothing more than to be her safe landing. i know i can't rescue her, patch her all up and wave a magic wand. but i thought, maybe here, she could have some breathing room. time and space, to face some demons head-on. demons that she has been tortured by, perhaps her whole life. i've tried to draw her out....to talk about the deep things that we try so hard to hide.
but the thing is, she has to want to fix herself. face her demons. only she can answer for herself, the question of her being gay and her relationship to God. noone else can. people are going to condemn you in some way or another no matter what you do or who you are. but only you can know where you're at with God.
rrrrrrgh. and i care entirely too much. God help me, i do. so much for separating myself from the lives of those around me. she's just so incredible. so talented. such a beautiful, beautiful soul. i guess i'm just wondering at what point do i end and does God take over.
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