There are just some days when I have to laugh at where my life is and the things that come up during the day as I attempt to figure out what my next “plan” is. So here I am printing and completing the newsletter for my x husband’s business, which finds me in his office more than I care to be. (Lord where is that Knight in Shining Armor to rescue me from this Cinderella life I have created?).
So, I am missing Elisabet, and wishing I could figure out a way to move to Sacramento so we can work together and hang out. She, and Kb are like sisters to me with Elisabet behaving like the youngest, so exuberant for life. Both are Gemini’s, and oddly enough share the same birthday, along with my mother a Gemini. (Lord where is that Knight in Shining Armor to rescue me from this Cinderella life I have created?).
I am also working on her newsletter and sent the rough draft, which causes a day of back and forth phone calls.
They start like this:
Ebet: “Heeelllo dear how are ya?”
Me: “It’s been a month, are you on your way here?”
Ebet: (laugh) “No and wait until you hear why!”
Me: “No girls night?”
Ebet: “Not tonight, I have wading boots on”
Me: “Wading boots…?…is your husband home?”
Ebet: (her great giggle) “Nooooo, wait until you here the latest Ebet story. It will make you feel good about your Lucille Ball moments. Chris is here though, he is shampooing the carpet”
Ebet: “So you know how I worry about my daughter’s fish dying?’
Me: “Yes, so you don’t become the same amphibian murderer like me...”
Ebet: “Exactly.”
Ebet: “How is the burial plot these days?”
Me: “Luckily no new residences”
Ebet; (laugh) “Good, so I decided ON SUNDAY to transfer my daughter’s fish from a 10 gallon tank to a 20 gallon tank from the garage. Now I had to bring the tank from the garage in, clean it and prep it, then drain the 10 gallon tank and clean all the rock, and their little homes and such. Did all that and created a new home in the 20 gallon tank, filled it with water and rolled it over to the family room on this sturdy cart I use, The front right wheel hit the carpet (I gasp and cover my mouth) and the whole tank flew forward…”
Me “OH GAWD”
Ebet: “Yes, I created my own tsunami in my family room with 20 gallons of water and a tank that shattered into a thousand pieces” We both begin to laugh hysterically.
Me; “Oh lord that is something I would do”
Ebet: “I know…and it gets better. It took me three hours just to clean up the glass and rocks”
Me: “The fish weren't in it were they?”
Ebet: “No, that would be you and this story would end with a fish funeral and a burial in your garden”
Me: (laugh) “So true, so the w a t e r..?”
Ebet: “The water is still a nightmare. We used our wet dry vacuum from the garage, and all the towels in northern Folsom, and figured we got it all. We had to move the furniture into the dining room.”
Me: “So no Chris room”
Ebet: “No, and still no Chris room, you know why?”
Me: “Why?”
Ebet: “Well I did say Chris was home shampooing the carpet right?”
Me; “Yes, I was getting turned on at the thought of it”
Ebet: “We were letting the carpet dry and Monday everything was looking great, so Tuesday I wake up at my usual 5:30am…”
Me; “The ungodly hour”
Ebet: “Yes, and the dogs are waiting for me and as I come out of our bedroom upstairs this smell begins to permeate my nostrils”
Me: “Chris…?”
Ebet: “(laugh) This smell of like 50,000 pairs of used men’s sports socks”
Ebet: “It made me gag”
Me: “I bet that turned Chris on”
Ebet: (laugh) “Oh Cathi it was awful. The worst smell. I made Chris get up and come downstairs”
Me: “Of course you did”
Ebet:” So we open all the windows and it is freezing outside. I am thinking snow anytime and we have all the windows open”
Ebet: “So I tell Chris we have to tear up the carpet and probably get rid of the pad, now mind you this is our brand new carpet, so he says “Like hell we are” and he goes down and rents one of those big carpet shampooers”
Me: “So he is in charge now?”
We are both laughing hysterically.
Ebet: “After he shampooed it on Monday it seemed to work, and Tuesday morning when I got up it smelled great, but his morning…"
Me: “50,000 sock smell”
Ebet: “yep”
Me: “oh god, now what? Are you ripping up the carpet?”
Ebet: “Nope. Chris is shampooing it again as we speak”
Me: (laughing)”So this is why you can’t come see me?”
Ebet: “This is why”
At this point she has to take a call from clients andsays she will review the newsletter and call me later in the day.
Later in the day my x husband goes and picks up Brian and takes him to his tutoring and comes back to his office.
My x: “Guess who I ran into?”
Me; “Who”
My x: “Your friend Leslie”
Me: “Ah, was she picking up her daughter?”
My x: “Yes, and you are right, her daughter is beautiful”
Me: “Yes, she looks like her mother, Leslie is beautiful…”
My x “That’s why I asked her for her phone number”
Me: “To get the kids together?”
Myx:“No, to ask her out”
Me: “MY friend? You have now dated so many women in this county that you now have to look among my friends?”
At this moment Ebet calls me back.
Ebet: “OH MY GAWD can you talk”
ME: “Sort of”
Ebet: “Leslie just called me and she is furious because she thinks Terry just asked her out, when she thought he was talking about getting Brian and Olivia together.”
Terry leaves to go to the bathroom.
Me: “Yes, wankerman is now asking out my friends”
Ebet“OMG. Chris is over here shaking his head”
Again, Ebet and I start laughing hysterically.
Me: “You know, I don’t care, except once again it is his way of trying to access my life from every angle. This is the thing, his trying to be all in my life that drives me up a wall and then to the huge fights we have because he just doesn’t get it.”
Ebet: “Well Leslie wants him to call so she can go off on him and tell him he is a jerk if he thinks she would date her girlfriend’s x husband”
Me; “The bigger question would be why would she want to?”
Ebet: “Exactly”
Me: “Can I just move away today?”
Ebet: “Honey I know. I know. It is going to happen for you. I just know it. Just think, you could be living with us and we could be at lunch while Chris cleans the carpet” We both laugh.
Me: “If I was there, the fish might be dead”
Ebet: “Then we’d have wine with the funeral services”
And that my friend was today. I am still laughing, but I know I have to move this dream of mine forward so I can get the hell out of Santa Rosa, even if it is a home in Sacramento, and I stay at the apartment in town when Brian needs me here. I don’t know somehow it has to work where I can have a life where Brian doesn’t suffer. There has to be a way.Lord where is that Knight in Shining Armour to rescue me from this Cinderella life I have created?
Oh wait, I think that Knight has to be ME….damn! Thank God for good friends.
C
