In Excess

Clearly, I cannot be trusted.

Let me clarify.  I can be trusted with lower-level things, like secrets. I can be trusted with curriculum development, teaching young sprouts to read and inciting activism in college students.

I can be trusted with things like car maintenance and paying my insurance (which, in the interest of full disclosure, is set to automatic bill pay, like my mortgage) paying my mortgage, and in keeping people safe if they ever have need of extra security.  I'm handy with sticks and knives and can shoot passably.

Likewise, I usually feed my dog, and trust me, he ain't starving.  Neither is the little potato-shaped friend of his that belongs to my room mate.  And Eleanor gets her medicine twice daily like clockwork, though admittedly, she has a team of three looking out for her: me, Grey and my friend Cathy who sometimes watches her.

No, I can be trusted with that stuff.

It is other things that quietly suck the willpower from me.  They are the kyptonite to my SuperWoman-ess.  Take ice cream, for example.  I cannot keep ice cream in the house.  Grey doesn't fully realize that yet, that if there is ice cream and it is designated "mine" that it will be eaten within a reasonable amount of time, like fifteen minutes.  He lets his JUST SIT IN THE FREEZER. For weeks!  Then it has to thaw for 30 minutes and then he eats a couple of spoonfuls. Pppthhh!  Amateur.  I take off the top off the carton the minute I get home and eat that tub for dinner.  It's a sight too, I reckon: drippings running down my fingers dripping into the sink because I eat most of my food over the sink, and occasionally snarling at the dogs as they attempt to beg for a bite.  Getting a ring around my face from sticking my whole head in to lick the sides.  That's how it's done, y'all. Not pretty, but real just the same.

Same goes for barbecue potato chips.  Pop a family size bag in the freezer and leave me to find it.  I dare you.  That Gollum-like creature in the middle of the night that smells like a picnic gone wrong? That's me pigging out on my precious.

This also goes for foods with salt and/or sugar in them.  Except for chocolate.  I'm not really a chocolate fan.  I'll eat it, don't get me wrong, but it's not my favorite.  I know.  Don't shoot.  I'm still a woman. And I'll do anything to get out of grading by doing other very important things.  Like writing a blog post. Or reading other people's blogs, like smartasscripple.blogspot.com.  Mike is hilarious and satirical and altogether irreverent.

Really what you cannot trust me with are caffeine and my husband.  The husband part I'll just leave alone as your guess is correct, but the caffeine part is flummoxing.

I have been drinking coffee since I was 11.  It's an aspect of my culture and my quasi-addictive nature.  We aren't talking a nice, polite, 2-cups-a-day habit either.  There have been times in my life when I have drunk 3-4 pots of coffee a day.  Pots.  Of strong coffee, not that cheap-ass 7-11 or Denny's brew.  Hot, black coffee.  Because I like it, that's all. I like coffee. It is freakin' yummy.  I thought for a time that if you cut me, you'd get half-calf.

I have tried to quit before too. Not because of health or anything, but because I don't like to be addicted to stuff.  I obsess over things: bits of music, the smell of coffee, the view from the pier in Seattle, laying my head on Grey's chest.  It's how my brain works. I like routine too. I like getting up and doing the same morning stuff because it reduces the need to think: make coffee, check email and FB, drink coffee, yawn, stretch, more coffee, yogurt, shower, teeth/hair/etc and out the door for adventures.  You know?  It's normal.  And I can occasionally skip any of those behaviors except for the teeth part.  I am ok with my addiction to a new toothbrush every month and awesome tooth paste. What I am not ok with is the need, every morning since I can remember, of having a cup of coffee.  For three quarters of my life.

When I tried to quit, I went cold turkey.  From two pots a day.  Had a headache for a month.  My personality flattened out as the incessant storm in my head raged and screamed and howled.  At work people tried to be supportive and we changed to decaf coffee.  I was cranky and even more sarcastic than normal.  For the sake of everyone, it was gently suggested on the fifth week that I had a cup of coffee already as nobody loved me anymore.

So I decided to wean off this time.  I got down to about a pot a day for a couple of years.  I don't like change.  Then half a pot, where I have hovered for even longer.  I took a deep breath and told Grey I'd like to quit coffee.  We spend a significant portion of our income on coffee and coffee products.  I have enough coffee cups to use one every day for a year and never touch the same one twice.  He is a little skeptical, though he knows I can do it. And he's great at the Pep Talk. Since he drinks stronger brew than I do, I wonder at his own ability to just say "ok" and be done with something.  Me? No soy una persona en la manana sin cafe.

Sunday, I had one cup at breakfast and one in the afternoon.  Monday, I just had one cup all day.  It was awful and I was tired.  Yesterday I had to teach and had one cup in the morning, vowing to make it all day again.  And then next week cut it to half a cup.

I made it until 2:15.  Fifteen minutes of teaching and I needed, not wanted, a shot of caffeine.  I gave in because I wanted to. Because I feared I wouldn't be a good teacher that day. Because I wanted a soda.  I drank half of it and tossed the rest.

I considered lying to Grey and saying that I had made it without coffee.  That was technically true, anyway.  But I just can't.  Lying is a slippery slope. So when we talked last night, I confessed.  At least I can be trusted with the truth- a responsibility I try to hammer in to my students.  At least I am not a hypocrite.

This morning, I took Charlotte in for a medical test that she had to have anesthesia for.  Got up at 6 a.m. with no time for coffee. Wouldn't matter anyway, I reasoned, since I purposely ran out.  I took her in and had time to kill, so I crossed to Braums and had an oatmeal and a weak cup of coffee.  I bargained with myself: don't drink all of it and have a cup of tea later.

And this tea is really damn good.  At least it's not an entire pot. Because you know I have to go grade some stuff and would like to be able to do so in coherent English.

I'll keep trying.

Why I Will Always Love Rednecks

Life sometimes takes us to unexpected places. I could list here- and I am certain you could too- a plethora of unexpected events that have taken place in my life which has changed its course dramatically. Not all of these things are good and not all of these things are bad. But they are significant.

I never expected my life to be the way it is right now. I'm a doctor, even if it's not the helpful kind, and I'm at a conference in Boston, Massachusettes. My school asked me to go. Apparently I am sort of responsible. Um, ok. It's a great conference, actually, on the creation and maintenance of the PLC or professional learning community. In our off time, we have visited some historical sights and eaten lobster and scrod. Scrod isn't as cool as I thought. Beyond its function as the pluperfect subjunctive form of a slang term for sex, apparently scrod is the fish equivalent of veal. I found this out after I decided it was delicious and now it will take some time to forgive myself. Like I said, life is strange and you never really can be prepared for the unexpected.

I have a boyfriend. Completely unexpected. We met online. Yes, that sounds bad. But we have a mutual friend and were making fun of him online and it just went from there. I think I mentioned him in my last post. Really good person. I will spare you, dear reader, from my twitterpated ramblings but he has possibly read more literature than I have and he is a better vegetarian than I am as well. Or more strict; not sure about the "better" part. Also unexpected. I have only ever dated meat eaters. Grey is also kind to just about everyone he has ever met. You can tell a lot about someone by the way they treat people who cannot do a thing for them.

Not everything in life is rosy, of course. And that's the purpose of this writing. Because life doesn't have much to do with the word "Deserve". If we all got what we deserve the world would be a much different place than it is today. When I taught in the prison system, I saw the effects of a broken justice system every day. I think most people know that. But what might not occur to people is that prison is where people go when they have no access to mental health or drug and alcohol treatment facilities. Another place where unexpected turns just sort of happen.

I have a friend- a cloe friend of many years. He is sick. Very, very sick. He's got an addiction problem. I have seen his life fall apart from successful, bill-paying, working, car-driving responsible guy to something else in a rapid downward spiral in no time flat. I love and respect my friend and will spare all of us the description, but suffice to say that addiction is an ugly, ugly disease and he needs help. Now.

And there was nothing there. Nothing for him to get help.

I was there in the gallery when our Oklahoma legislators decided, in their infinite wisdom, to cut funding for drug and alcohol treatment centers. Most of them has closed in the last two years. This is a deplorable state of affairs. In order for my friend to get help, he either needs to commit a crime and get arrested, find hundreds or thousands of dollars for inpatient treatment, or die. And from what he told me, in a lucid moment, was that to be honest, if he had hundreds or thousands of dollars for treatment, he'd just put it in his arm. He hadn't eaten in awhile so I brought him a sandwich. Honestly, I had stopped by that night hoping that he wasn't dead and too afraid that he was not to go check.

Shame on you, Oklahoma. I vote, and when I can, I vote for more public assistance, not less.

And God bless rednecks.

I called a friend at the behest of my dear friend. He is a really good man. A big old redneck friend who is also a long-time member of Alcoholics Anonymous. I said "Can you come help?" He did not say "Does he have money for treatment?". He did not say "is he in jail?" and he did not say "I have to worry about myself first." He said "Hell yeah. I will be there in 15 minutes."

True to his word, fifteen minutes later he pulled up in his pickup truck. He is a giant of man, eaily towering over me (and I'm 5'8"). I have always felt very safe with this man. He rides a Harley and when I pulled up with my red zebra-striped scooter he asked for a ride. "Ridin's ridin'", said my friend, and he said he'd be seen with me and my girlie scooter any day of the week. Yes, he came when I called. He brought help with him. Three other men just as burley and hardened as he is. If anyone can help an addict, it's another addict. And it was time for me to go. But first I threw my arms around that big old redneck and kissed him on the cheek. "You are my hero. I mean that." Then I left, before I started crying again. If anyone can help, it's them.

I don't know how things will turn out. It's out of my hands. If there was something I could do, I would have done it already. Hell, I would've gotten sober for him if I could. So would his mom or any of his other friends. And it's frustrating and heartbreaking that there is nothing I can do.

So I'm doing what I can do. Trying not to worry. Trying not to hover or dwell too much on the how or the why of addiction that robs people of their dignity, their health and their relationships. It's a cop out to say that these are the choices that people make. Addiction kills people. Alcoholism is a disease like any other and deserves treatment. It's public perception that blames the addict and allows them oftentimes to die. How would you like it if you had cancer and someone blew off your necessary treatment because you couldn't afford it- or worse yet, blamed you for having a tumor in the first place?

Me, I've done what I can and have to trust others to take care of the rest. If there is a God out there, please let her send more rednecks because we need all that we can get.