The Landscaper Guy, Part 3 and a Phone Smarter Than Me
In The Holiday, this was a “meet cute.” Mine was not.
I had just pulled into my spot at the back of my yard after running errands. I had three gallons of milk in the back and it was hot outside. Out of the corner of my eye, I see white — a walking big white tee-shirt with a matching designed white scarf on his head.
The Landscaper Guy. See Not Digging the Landscaper Guy, Part 1 and The Landscaper Guy and The Female Chandler Bing Part 2.
Since my last post on the Landscaper Guy, I’d had some major emotional isssues (fall-out from the Ex’s pending remarriage) and minor medical issues (son’s surgery to repair a fractured thumb) keeping me busy.
The Landscaper Guy was not occupying my mind.
I do think he, as promised, called. But I also got a new phone in the interim as well. My old phone would register his call as “WITHHELD” whereas my new phone says something like “REJECTED” when it is an unreadable number. Me thinks my new phone is truly a smart phone, perhaps smarter than me, as it seemed to know that this dude should be and should have been REJECTED all along.
I did not answer any rejected calls and he never left a message and I let it go.
But today, there he was. Ambling down the alley behind my house. I was still with no makeup but I had on a fitted Victoria’s Secret Pink Tee and skinny jeans which seemed to empower me, somehow. He had on his signature tee-shirt and, of course, the sweat.
My choices were:
1. Slowly get out of the car and deal with him, or
2. Try to make a run for it.
Guess what I chose?
But, I didn’t make it.
Damn, I need some privacy plantings. As I walked briskly to my back door looking straight ahead (leaving the milk in the car), he called out my name.
Damn.
So, I ambled back down my walk and went to talk to him, hopefully for the last time.
Now that I got a better look at him, or maybe I felt a little better about myself, maybe it was my purple PINK tee, I don’t know which, and maybe you’re not supposed to say this, but, I’m out of his league. Sorry. Me with five kids, no make-up, emotional problems up the ying yang, yes, I’m saying it’s not gonna happen, not even to help me practice date.
We exchanged pleasantries. Then,
Him: “You been thinking about me?”
Me: “Not really.”
Him, shaking his head, “No, huh.”
Me: “No.”
Him: “So that means we can’t go on a date?”
Really? Is this guy serious?
Me: “No”
Him: “Why?”
Now, here’s where I wonder. Why ask why? It is what it is. Just make your exit, dude.
Then I repeated the supposedly magic words that I was told to say by a single relative of mine. Well, she’s my niece. I’m taking dating advice from my niece, the daughter of my sister!!!! (Channeling Marisa Tomei’s Oscar Winning performance in My Cousin Vinny. If you don’t know the reference, watch the movie. It is hilarious.)
Anyway, she said this would work, and I said:
“I’m just not into hanging out right now. I’m flattered, though.”
Game over — or should be, right?
Him: No, you’re not. (flattered, he meant)
Me: Yes, I am. (changing subject) So, are you on your way downtown?
Him: Yeah.
Although I didn’t ask, he goes on to tell me the date when he’s done school for the Summer (or court ordered community service, I suspect).
And then he asked, remarkably:
“So you want to give me a ride to the train?”
OMG — HE REALLY ASKED TO GET IN MY CAR WHEN I HAVE JUST TOLD HIM I DON’T WANT TO DATE HIM!!!!!
Me: You know what, I just got home, so . . . no.
We exchange pleasantries, much more awkwardly this time, and he went on his way.
The thing is, I’ll probably see him again. What are the chances he’ll just keep walking? I certainly hope he does.
I do feel good about saying, no, though.
Just Me With . . . a smart phone much smarter than me.
But wait, there’s more . . .
Almost a Runaway Bride
Charlotte and Trey, Sex and The City
Weddings are everywhere now. Movies, royals, my ex-husband, . . . everywhere. So I thought I’d write about my own bride story, hopefully not in a “I should have known” way, but just the facts, ma’am.
I was having an evening church wedding. My bridesmaids were my sister, my best friend, and two close friends. The rehearsal dinner was meant to be casual, pizza and soda/wine at my parents’ house. The rehearsal itself had gone pretty well, I’d done the “get someone to stand in for the bride” thing . . . so I watched.
Probably not the best idea.
On the five minute ride from the church to my parents’ house, I was driven by my college best friend, discussed in the I Don’t Go To Weddings and Always a Bridesmaid posts.
I got in the car and said to her, simply.
“I’m not going to do it, you know.”
My Bridesmaid was very calm, and, after she’d gotten me to clarify and repeat my confession that I was not going to get married, she replied,
“It’s nerves, it’ll be okay.”
My response,
“Oh, I’m not nervous. I’m just not doing it.” As if I was talking about getting on a ride at an amusement park.
What could she say? I think she just said okay. She must have felt horrible. I was so matter-of-fact about this huge statement. I went through our rehearsal dinner, and it was, as I’d wanted it, informal. My husband-to-be looked so veryhappy, I remember. Still, I didn’t say or do anything that revealed my discomfort. I did love him. Something was pissing me off, though. For a fleeting second I felt like he’d won, he “gotten” me, clipped my wings.
The next day, I did the whole wedding day prep thing, got my makeup and hair done, put on the big white dress. I guess I thought I was over it. But I wasn’t excited.
Once we were at the church, we realized that someone forgot to bring the flowers for the flower girls. Silly to have little girls with nothing in their hands. Someone had to run back to the house to get the flowers.
This gave me time. Maybe too much time.
As we all waited in the vestibule at the back of the church, I walked myself and the big white dress into a corner . . . way into the corner . . . facing the corner.
Later, my bridesmaids told me that at first they thought I was praying. But I wasn’t a praying kind of girl, not in a room full of people, anyway. Maybe praying is what I should have been doing. What I was doing was seriously considering making a run for it, big white dress and all. I pictured myself running out of the church, across the busy street, and through town, like in a movie.
A Runaway Bride
Awkward. I heard the bustling around me, wondering if anyone noticed that I had put myself in time-out and that I wasn’t speaking to anyone. Ironically, the big white dress — with a train– created a physical barrier from everyone. I was hard to get to. My body was in the corner, my face was down, the dress fanned out around me. Still, I think I was waiting for somebody to do . . . something.
It started to get uncomfortably quiet.
Finally, my best friend slid herself between the wall and my dress to get close enough to me to say,
“Are you all right?’
“Yes,” I replied, curtly, but I was not a happy bride. I think I might have told her or even waved her to go away. I didn’t speak much.
I was thinking, though. I was thinking that if I did this, got married, I mean, it was for life. I didn’t believe in divorce, not a religious thing, just not an option for me (at the time). I was thinking I didn’t want to hurt or embarrass anyone. I was thinking that if I ran, well, that would be bad.
Someone came back with the flowers for the flower girls.
At the last minute me and my big white dress turned around and got married. And, by the way, he was so nervous, he did not even look at me while we took our vows. I joked later that he really married the minister, not me.
Does anyone remember Charlotte’s first wedding on Sex and the City? Charlotte expressed second thoughts to Carrie at the back of the church (because Trey couldn’t perform). Though Carrie at first responded that it was just nerves, she eventually told Charlotte that she doesn’t have to get married,
“We can go get a cab and everybody will just have to get over it“
Sex and The City, Season Three, Episode 12, “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.
I have wondered over the years — what if someone had said to me, “You don’t have to do this.” I’m not sure if it would have changed anything. Like Charlotte, even the most ambivalent of brides would probably go through with it anyway.
Still . . . it makes a girl think.
This is in no way a criticism to my bridesmaids for not uttering the Carrie words. We we all so young. None of us knew what we were doing. I was the first of our age group to get married. It takes a very mature person to actively assist a runaway bride. So I know why they didn’t say it.
But what if someone had?
The institution of marriage should not, as the preacher says, be entered into lightly. So for all you bridesmaids out there, who have promised to wear the coordinating dresses and walk ahead of the bride down the aisle — don’t forget to look back to make sure she’s there. Well, actually before that, let her know that, if need be, you will run out to the street and hail a cab for her . . . big white dress and all.
Just Me With . . . a bride story.
Funny, when my now ex-husband got re-married, I was just The Nanny. But I did have dinner with one of my former bridesmaids that day. Perhaps she didn’t know what to say when I got married, but she knew what to say when my divorce was final. My relationship with her has stood the test of time, hopefully, until death do us part. See To My Best Friend On Mother’s Day
The Landscaper Guy, Part 2, and the Female Chandler Bing
Well, the Random-Alley -Walking- Wanna-Be Landscaper Guy called again. See, Not Digging The Landscaper Guy — Part I. I let it ring. Number WITHHELD, no voicemail. The next time he called, approximately three minutes later, I picked up. Immediately he tried to set up a date. I suggested that we talk for a bit. I asked him to tell me about himself. His reply, “What do you want to know? My age? What I do? ” Well, I asked what he did for a living. He replied that he is an iron worker for concrete installations, plus, he volunteered his age. I hadn’t asked.
Then, he did what I really hate. He asked me my age, if “you don’t mind, telling.”
I replied, I thought in a light-hearted manner, “Well, I kinda do mind telling.”
His response, sounding a bit annoyed,
“Why don’t women want to tell that? I told my age. I just want to know if you are older or younger.”
(Lately, I’m always older. sigh). Still, forcing a conversation about age is another pet peeve of mine. Men: if I don’t volunteer my age and especially if I refuse to answer the question, don’t ask again.
Anyway, this is what I learned from the Landscaper Iron Worker Guy:
By “I’m in school” he meant, he’s doing some sort of required periodic training program for his craft, which is putting in rebar (pieces of steel) for concrete installations for large structures like bridges.
He’s in the union. Which pays well, according to him. (I told him I knew the difference between a union and non-union skilled laborer, as I have experience dealing with unions.)
He has two grown kids, living out of the area.
He lives with his elderly grandmother, but that won’t be for long.
Starting next week he’ll be out-of-town all weekends until August 4th.
When I asked what he did for fun, he said he likes to play basketball and baseball, but, because of work, he doesn’t do much other than play Play Station, well really X-Box lately. He said he hasn’t been bowling in a while and he always wanted to go horseback riding. He likes to walk, and is trying to lose a couple of pounds.
Things that bothered me:
*Asking for my age more than once.
*Admitting the video games thing.
*Asking why I’m single — again.
*Telling me (again) that I look good for five kids.
*Saying that someone offered him a phone but he didn’t take it. Not telling me that he is actually going to get a new phone.
*When I asked about the number WITHHELD thing, he said he’d change it but that it is his grandmother’s phone number.
*Pushing me for a face-to-face date after I said I’d like to talk for a bit first.
* Asking for music lessons.
*Saying he has lived in the area for a few years but not seeming to know about anything outside the neighborhood.
* When I talked about working on my house, he asked, “Couldn’t you use having me around to help you with all that?” I joked and asked him, “Where were you last year when I was putting down that heavy flagstone?” He said he was “around.” But it occurred to me that I should have met him before. I don’t remember him speaking to me before or even seeing him around — he must have been in the house playing video games.
* Asking me why I don’t have anyone, whether I’ve had anyone since my husband and I split, and whether I’m just waiting for the perfect man. “What you gotta have a particular kind of man?” His attitude revealed a sense of insecurity, maybe he knew he wasn’t doing well with me.
*Anyone who says that they are busy weekends — all weekends — for a defined length of time — well, it makes me wonder if it’s not a weekend jail situation. I’m suspicious that way.
All in all, sounds like a no-brainer, right? Well, did anyone ever see that Friends episode where Chandler was seeing Rachel’s boss, didn’t like her but at the end of each date still said,
“Well, that was fun, we should do it again sometime. I’ll call you.”?
Chandler had no intention of ever calling Joanna, yet he didn’t know how to end the interaction without saying he would. Well, I’m the female version of that. (Season Three, “The One With The Dollhouse”)
So, even though I don’t want it, I have a phone date with Landscaper Guy next week. I’d call him to tell him that I’m not interested but I don’t have his number, remember? — number WITHHELD. During our conversation I tried to tell him that I wasn’t looking to meet anyone, I was just working in my yard. Sounding a bit defensive, he insisted that neither was he and he wasn’t asking for anything physical. He also asked, “What, you have too many friends?”
Now, if I wanted a new non-physical friendship, it would have to be with someone I found interesting– maybe someone who shared my interests. If I was looking for a physical relationship with or without friendship, I would have to find him attractive — which I don’t (He’s not cute, not ugly — just not offensive — there’s a big difference).
Plus, he’s starting to just piss me off.
Yet still, I, like Chandler Bing, told him he could call me next week.
What the hell????
Just Me With . . . another phone call coming my way. It’ll be the last, I hope.
Clearly Chandler cannot say no to Joanna, as somehow he ends up handcuffed to her chair.
There are no handcuffs in my future with The Landscaping Guy.
See The Landscaper Guy, Part III and a Phone Smarter Than Me
Related, sadly, He Lives With His Mother?
A Rat In My House
It was like a horror movie.
I was in law school. Or, actually I was done with law school and studying for the bar exam. In my infinite wisdom and with a splash of arrogance I decided I did not need the assistance of the bar exam prep courses everyone else took. No, I put myself on a home private study regimen. My husband and I had no children at the time, we were living in our little starter home with our adorable Labrador Retriever.
I would study most of the day, take a break in the evening when my husband got home, and then do a night shift of studying after he went to bed. My mini-split level had a pseudo downstairs den and a small damp room which I used as a study. There were sliding glass doors from the den opening to a small yard and beyond that, a wooded area. We hadn’t been in the house long. The previous owners used to leave the sliding doors cracked a bit so that their small dog could come and go, which, of course, allowed other critters to become accustomed to coming into the house. We, of course, discontinued that practice, kept the sliding doors closed, had the place exterminated, and didn’t have any problems with pests — or so I thought.
One night, during my late night study session downstairs, long after my husband had gone to bed, something ran across the room. It was NOT my adorable lab. No, this was smaller than a lab, bigger than a mouse, too fast to be a possum and had a long hairless tail.
A freaking rat. A huge gray rat!
A RAT!
I gasped so hard, I almost swallowed my tongue. But, I’m a tough girl. Bugs don’t bother me. I’ll get dirty outside, I have a strange interest in serial killers and I seriously considered becoming a mortician at one point in my life — but vermin? — not my thing.
I sat completely still waiting for it to come back. Afraid that if I moved it would come after me. I heard scratching; it was still in the house. So I did the responsible thing and ran up the half flight of stairs, through the kitchen, rounded the corner to the next flight of stairs, turned into my bedroom, closed the door and jumped in bed. May have done it all in four steps.
Studying done for the night.
I woke up my husband, told him we had a rat. He didn’t get up, said he’d look for it in the morning. I had nothing more to do but wait for the sweet release of sleep, behind my closed bedroom door.
Rambo
My husband went to work very early. As usual, he got up before me. Before leaving, however, he woke me to exclaim that he’d killed the rat with an arrow — he had hunted it down and stabbed it. He asked me if I heard it screaming. I had not. He was so proud. But, he added, it had gotten away and he’d have to find it when he got home because he couldn’t be late for work. Huh? I was half asleep, murmured, “Okay. Thanks.”
I woke later. Looking down the stairs, I saw my dog’s butt. She was on her haunches staring into the kitchen.
This can’t be good, I thought.
I was right.
I slowly descended the stairs and peeked into the kitchen. My dog looked up at me as if to say, “Um, we have a situation here.”
Rosemary’s Baby
There, on my kitchen floor, was a quite large, dead rat. It had apparently been wounded and emerged from its hiding place and did a death crawl to the middle of my small kitchen. Entrails hanging, a train of blood and guts behind it. It finally succumbed to its wounds equidistant from the kitchen sink and refrigerator, blocking the steps to the downstairs den and study where my books were.
My study regimen for the day did not include disposing of a dead rat. My knight in shining armor did not complete the job.
I freaked. Of course I did the mature thing and went back to bed.
That didn’t last. I was afraid my dog would play with it. Really, though, the dog was like, “I’m not getting near that thing.” Plus, it was summer and we did not have central air. The only thing worse than a dead rat in my kitchen would be a rittingbdead rat in my kitchen.
My husband was unreachable, this was before cell phones and he worked on the road. I hadn’t made friends with any neighbors yet. I was on my own . . . and I needed to study. I considered grabbing my books and heading out to the library, my parents’ house, anywhere, to study for the day. But my books were downstairs, through the kitchen. My husband wouldn’t be home for hours.
I cursed him. I cursed him like I’d never cursed him before (of course events in later years have elevated my cursing him to an art form, but I digress . . . ).
How could he go all Rambo like that on the rat and not finish the job — leaving his wife to dispose of the body?
What kind of man was he to leave me with this mess?
Oh, he must have been so proud running around stabbing this rat and then walking off into the sunrise, leaving the corpse to me, a sleeping student suffering through the stress of the impending bar exam.
Damn, him. Damn. Damn. Damn.
Cursing him to myself did not help.
The dead rat was still in the kitchen.
I’d taken my dog out the front door and around to the fenced back yard.
The dead rat was still in the kitchen.
I cursed my husband again.
The dead rat was still in the kitchen.
I’d have to get rid of it, without looking at it, without feeling its weight, without dropping it. I still shudder.
Damn him (husband), damn the rat.
The whole disposal operation took me about two hours. I had to rest between tasks. My study schedule was ruined for the day. Once the carcass was removed, I disinfected the floor to a level beyond operating room clean. Many trees lost their lives to make the mound of paper towels I used. Lysol was my soul mate.
But I don’t think I ever went barefoot in that kitchen again.
When my husband came home I was a raving lunatic. He laughed. He thought it was hilarious. At some point much later I was able to laugh about it, too. But I still cursed him. I still do.
Clean up after your kill, man. Clean up after your kill.
Just Me With . . . a dead rat, paper towels, a shovel, Lysol, and trash bags.
See also, Tales from The Bar Exam
Craigslist Angels — One Man’s Trash is Another Man’s Treasure
My house wasn’t this grand, but it was somewhat similar.
My Marital Home was large Victorian fixer-upper still in progress. I had accumulated a lot of children and stuff over my years there. One of my forms of therapy has always been to get rid of things and rearrange furniture (I know, a little weird) . Consequently I’d been cleaning crap out with a vengeance after my husband left (so much so he thought I was moving way before I even thought about it).
When the real move was on the horizon, I was faced with moving from this big house to my new little project where Piss Man and his GF were living (See Piss, Puke and Porn). So I basically decreased our belongings by — my guess — around two/thirds . . . Mind you the kid count was remaining the same and they were/are growing by the minute and although some days I’d like to sell them, I’m aware that generally this is frowned upon. Consequently, other stuff had to go.
Since I’m a purger by nature I drop by Goodwill often; they know me (even got hit on there). But since I was already doing this massive move by myself, including getting the Marital Home ready for sale and fixing up the new old hoarder’s house, I was quickly tiring of schlepping my stuff to Goodwill. I also tired of selling individual items, you know, meeting strangers at inconvenient times, etc. to maybe or maybe not make a sale. (Sounds a little like dating, but I digress.) I’ve never had luck having yard sales. So I started posting things for free.
We’ve all seen those ads, “Free Stuff” “Moving” etc. Well, I became one of those people. I decided to give away everything I could on one beautiful weekend. I took pictures, posted them on Craigslist and said FREE — come get it . . . first come, first served.
When living in a smaller space you don’t have the luxury to store certain things, one of them being holiday decorations. I’d already gotten rid of much of that stuff, but I was ready to let go of almost everything else. I told myself, and I was right, that I probably wouldn’t miss it and if I wanted more decorations later I’d start fresh.
My kids’ babysitter (now a good, good friend) had given them these beautiful angel decorations — you know the kind with the velvet gown and fur and whatnot — I had four of them for the girls and she’d given the boy a big nutcracker (heh heh). The angels had looked beautiful in my formal dining room when I had my Christmas sing-along parties. But, that life was . . . over. Still, even for me, it is a bit harder to get rid of items that were thoughtful gifts from a loved one– so I struggled a bit.
I knew I couldn’t store the angels and I knew that in the new old house I wouldn’t have a place to display them at Christmas . . . so . . . I took a picture of the kids’ pretty angels, posted it on Craigslist and put them out on the street, convincing myself that my friend would understand. It felt kinda like giving away my four girls, except my girls aren’t always angels . . . but I digress.
Christmas Angels
After posting, I got an email right away from a guy wanting to know if I still had them. I checked outside and they were still there. He asked me to hold them until he could get to my house.
Alrighty.
I mean, they were pretty, but I didn’t know they’d be hot property — in June. I moved them to a more secluded place and told him where he could find them. He came and got them right away. I never saw him.
“Cool,” I thought, “My stuff is going.” It’s amazing how you can’t sell something for a dollar but if you offer it for free — it’s gone.
A couple of hours later I got an email from the man who took the angels. He thanked me for the them, telling me that they were for his mother who was going through Cancer treatments and having a pretty rough time. She didn’t get out much, he said, hardly ever. But when she saw the picture of my Christmas angels she wanted them so badly that she rode with him to get them.
He said those angels made her so happy. He was thrilled to be able to make her smile.
He just wanted to let me know how much I’d done for the both of them.
I almost cried. I’m lying, I did cry.
Oh wait, it’s Just Me With . . . tears in my eyes . . . again.
For what happened when I prepared the Marital Home for sale, see My Panty Drawer/Your Panty Drawer
For my purging of marriage related material, see:
My Wedding Album, Time to Reduce It — Perhaps by Fire
Wedding Leftovers — What To Do With The Dress?
and for what I wish would happen with Craigslist, see, A Craigslist Fantasy.
Piss, Puke, and Porn
Piss, Puke and Porn. Ahhh, my new house. Just Me and the Kids had been living in the marital home since the Husband moved out. I couldn’t afford it. I couldn’t take care of it. But I have five big kids so it’s not like I could hole up in a one bedroom apartment. Plus, the kids and I loved their schools and I did not want them to have to change, for academic and emotional reasons. So, I bought this little house because I could make the bedrooms work and my kids could stay in the same schools.
But the house was in deplorable condition (which is how I could afford it). The people living there had owned the house for generations but had done no maintenance. Plus, they were sick and poor. The house looked like it should have been condemned. Actually the back part of it was condemned by the county and had to be demolished.
I couldn’t even tell the kids about the house because it looked so bad it would have been too traumatic for them. We drove by it every day and the kids had no idea. The prior owners rented it back from me for 6 months and I worked on the outside of it when the kids weren’t around so that it wouldn’t look so bad when I told them.
Meanwhile, the marital home finally sold. I would have two weeks from the time the prior owners/renters left the new old house before I had to move the kids and I there. The prior owners were heavy smokers, and I say this with no judgment, just the facts — and nasty. I knew that I would be undertaking an extreme makeover but . . .
I get that it was a tough move for the prior owners. Their family had lived there for over 60 years. I stopped by on move out night and they asked if they could leave a couple of boxes to pick up the next day. Sure, I said, because I’m nice that way. But when I went over there the next day and could see in broad daylight what was left behind, it made me sick.
These people kept cats but did not take care of them. They left me litter boxes with cat poop and no kitty litter. The boxes merely had newspaper lining the bottom of the pan. They also left used wet cat food cans. This was late Spring, people. Temps were in the 80’s and rising. Also, there was cat poop that didn’t make the cat box at all. They had apparently kept a cat locked up in what would become my room. The cat had yacked numerous times and they hadn’t cleaned it up. Add that to the cat urine which had soaked into the floors and the remnants of wet cat food — the smell was indescribable.
But the third floor attic bedroom was even worse. A grown man (like in his 40’s) and his girlfriend had lived up there — like hoarders. The side of the attic which was used for “storage” had clothes and debris thrown over there, not in boxes, not in bags, and another cat had free rein up there. Think about it. The storage area was nothing but a big litter box.
Do you see the cat?
Anyway, after the move out there were some boxes and debris left there. Well, okay, I thought, they said they’d leave some things and be back to get them. But I had to inspect the property anyway and start to clean. I had to.
This is what I found: bags of trash, well, actually garbage, including used tissues and vintage porn with sticky pages, more cat poop and litter boxes without litter, an adult diaper (used), little green baggies (which I’m told was crack), and, 2-liter soda bottles — a lot of them strewn about, in boxes, under debris, etc.
These soda bottles were not empty — but no soda, either —
I found approximately fifty 2 liter bottles of HUMAN PISS!
Understand that the bathroom was always in working order. Understand that the guy who lived up there, though collecting disability, was not immobile — he could walk, climb stairs, etc. Understand that he was not developmentally disabled to the point that he was incontinent. In other words, he was capable of carrying his lazy ass to the bathroom and knew that’s where people are supposed to urinate! Understand also that he had a girlfriend who must have allowed this!!!! (What kind of woman would . . . ??????)
That whole Hoarders TV show — finding piss collections? Turns out it is very very real.
Part of the Piss Collection
Let me say it again — 50 bottles of human piss — in my new house. I knew I’d have to do major renovations, but piss removal?
Thank goodness the kids weren’t with me when I made this discovery. Even my therapist said she’d never heard of anything like this. (This was before the show Hoarders was so popular.) I stopped looking through stuff. My daughters’ future bedroom was a toilet, literally. And people, this was an attic bedroom — in June! It was ten degrees hotter up there than outside. It was nauseating. Truly. And I was going to move my kids in this house in a matter of days. Looking back on it I still shudder. Yeah, I’ve been through some crap . . . and piss.
Just Me With . . . 50 Bottles of Piss in My House, 50 Bottles of Piss . . .
For more new old house stories, see:
Toilet or Kitchen Sink — Who Can Tell?
What Happened In My House? Murder?
Fertile Myrtle — I have a lot of kids
Yes, I had twins, twice — back to back, plus a singleton.
Yup. Yup. Yup. I can’t count how many times I’ve said this. It never gets old. Sometimes I have to say it to myself just so that I believe it.
The husband and I had been happily child-free by choice for years, but it was time to have some babies. Because of job issues, we wanted to have two in a row, God willing.
We had one, a boy. According to plan, by the time our son was 11 months old I was pregnant again. All was well until I had some spotting. I was terrified. Before my son I’d had a miscarriage and I was really afraid of having another. I didn’t want to relive that pain of being told they can’t find a heartbeat. I felt okay but because of the spotting my doctor sent me for an ultrasound immediately. I went alone. I was thrilled when they showed me the heartbeat!
And then . . . they showed me another heartbeat!
It was twins!
Twins? Twins. Two strong heartbeats. The spotting stopped and I had full-term fraternal baby girls. The boy was just 19 months old when the girls were born. I didn’t get my tubes tied on the table because it was a vaginal birth. My husband didn’t get snipped, which he would never do anyway. I wasn’t planning to have more children but I guess I wasn’t ready to make that an impossibility. I did know that after having gone through a twin pregnancy and childbirth I didn’t want to go through a separate procedure to get my tubes tied. So, I didn’t.
When the girls were about six months old and the boy was two there was trouble in paradise: my husband had an affair.
It was more of a fling that I found out about — immediately. He voluntarily ended it. It was a difficult time. I did not take it well, but I had three kids in diapers, two of which were nursing. It was an incredibly challenging time, parenting-wise, having a toddler and twin babies. Frankly, I needed my husband’s help.
Months passed, and we hadn’t really reconciled. We hadn’t really dealt with it, the demand of having three little ones took most of our focus. My husband was still sleeping in the guest room. I was still nursing the babies, but less often. They were getting some solid food.
Then one night, I was feeling amorous. Who am I kidding, I was so freaking horny out of my mind. Bow-Chicka-Bow-Wow. I should have known I was having some sort of major hormonal surge. I just had to have sex. Had to. I told my husband that it didn’t mean anything it was just about the sex. I simply required his services. (I’m so romantic.)
We’d both been tested by this time . . . so . . .
A few weeks later I was missing something — but I was still nursing, my body was not yet my own, let alone my cycle. Still, something was up. In addition to missing my period I had the signs. Frequent urination, I was even nauseous and starting to show — strong and early — just like with the twins. My best friend the gynecologist brought over a pregnancy test for me when my husband was out. I couldn’t face the possibility on my own and couldn’t deal with my semi-estranged husband.
Like so many women before me I engaged in the peeing on the stick ritual. It was positive. Right away, no faint line. It screamed PREGNANT! Of course.
I couldn’t tell my husband. We were barely talking. My pregnancy symptoms worsened, and they were heightened just like with my twin pregnancy. That’s the thing about pregnancy, it just keeps going, even if you don’t tell anybody.
Then we got a very strange phone call. My mother-in-law called and told us she had dreamed of fish — twice. Well, there is an old African-American wives tale: when you dream of fish, someone in the family is pregnant. She’d had this dream before, and it was accurate last time. Shortly after my mother-in-law dreamt of fish my sister-in-law announced she was (accidentally) pregnant. But this time, no one else in the family was reasonably likely to be pregnant so . . . she was checking on us. After all, she had dreamed of fish —- TWICE!!!!
Twice.
When I finally told my husband I was pregnant and described how I’d been feeling, he laughed and said, “I bet it’s twins.”
(What a prince.)
I retorted, “No, that doesn’t happen.”
I don’t necessarily believe any of those old superstitions, but my mother-in-law’s call, my husband’s teasing, my overwhelming pregnancy symptoms which were so similar to my last twin pregnancy, along with the scientific fact that pregnant women have no patience and suddenly become very superstitious — well I just had to know.
I begged my doctor for an ultrasound. There was no real medical reason for it, really. I wasn’t spotting or having pain and it was early on. Still, for peace of mind and to ease my anxiety I just needed to know that it was not twins. I needed to know. Plus, it was time to tell folks that I was pregnant — and I wanted to assure them that it was just one baby this time.
My doctor prescribed the test.
When I went to the ultrasound (again by myself) the technician asked me why I was having the scan. I told her “to rule out twins” — since I had just had twins. “Oh.” She made small talk and asked me how old my kids were (2,1, and 1). But once she started the scan she got very quiet. Small talk was over. Even though the pregnancy wasn’t planned, I didn’t want to lose the baby. I didn’t want to relive the heartbreak of not being able to find a heartbeat. Deja vu.
Again, I was terrified. The technician left the room without saying a word. This was unnerving. I was so scared, pregnant, emotional and laying on that table in the room alone, without a clue as to what was going on.
A few minutes later, the technician came back — with her boss.
I asked them, “Is there a heartbeat?”
“Oh yes, there’s a heartbeat,” said the boss lady.
Phew.
Then they showed me the screen. “Here,” she pointed, and . . . “here,” she pointed again. Deja Vu . There were two strong heartbeats — again.
After I dressed, with mind reeling or alternatively in complete denial, I called my semi-estranged husband from the exam room and left him a voicemail, “Yeah, it’s twins.”
Months later, I gave birth to full-term fraternal twin girls — again. This time I had to have a C-Section and at my request, they performed a tubal ligation while I was still on the table. No more babies, and that’s alright with me.
So there you have it. This is how I ended up with five children in about three and a half years.
Because of the circumstances of their conception, I sometimes refer to that second set of twins (behind their backs of course) as “Oops and Uh-oh.”
Oh yeah, and my first-born Singleton Boy? He started out as twins. My hormone levels had been high, I was measuring large, and was sent for an ultrasound after my doctor said, “You might have an army in there!” By the time I had the test done, it showed that his twin had been “absorbed” in utero early in the pregnancy. I didn’t think much about it — at the time. Sometimes I call the boy “Jeffery Dahmer” though, (you know, because he ate his twin and all). Ha! 
I had conceived twins three times in a row, like a boss.
Just Me With . . . almost twins, twins and twins.
I asked my doctor why this kept happening. She simply said, “I don’t know.”
See also: Five Kids, One Table, Rope, Six Chairs, and a Plan — How to deal with lots of little kids.
Just Me With . . . 