My Mom Doesn't Say "I Love You"

I may not like my mom most of the time, but I will always love her. I'll love her no matter how long I go without speaking to her because I can't handle the criticism, I'll love her through the endless rants about how fat I am or how tattooed I am, or how I can't do this or that  the right way.

My mom is a wonderful and devoted educator. She wins awards for her great efforts, knowledge, and patience. Kids years later seek her out, as someone that played an important role one year in their lives. She spends so much time and energy making sure her students receive the best education she can provide.

She's strong. Too strong for her own good. She doesn't let anyone see her falter, she doesn't share any details of her life that could make her seem weak or vulnerable when it counts. She may cry at a sappy tv commercial or that time she cried watching Wheel of Fortune, but when the going gets tough, she's as stoic as can be.

I didn't discover until I was into my 20s that it was weird that my mom didn't hug me or show me affection. I can't remember a time that my mom put her arms around me. I'm sure she did it when I was tiny, as there's pictures. But graduating from any schooling, life achievement moments; it just never happened. I shared hugs with a few relatives I didn't see often, or for friends on occasion. But my mom? Nope.

I remember trying to hug her once, when a coworker of hers passed away and I came home to the news, and a visibly shaken mother. I immediately became nervous, because my mom just didn't show emotion like that. I tried to give her a hug and it was the oddest moment ever. She shook a bit and backed away and got angry.

There's days I want so badly that mother daughter relationship that I see on tv, or hear about from my friends. I want the emotional relationship that only a mom can provide. I often wonder what happened in her life before I came to be that has caused the shut down. I've searched myself, our family. What's wrong with me that she won't talk to me other than to belittle or correct me? What made her not be able to see the good stuff too?

Then there's that L word. It just never comes out of her mouth. Ever. I just don't remember it being said to me at any point in my life, not even as a small child. Maybe I should try to say it some time, but I just can't ever seem to spit it out.

A Little Bit of Cemetery to Keep us Going

This summer has flown by, and I suddenly realized at the end of July that my cemetery posts were definitely lacking. A Saturday became Cemetery Saturday, and I ended up checking out a graveyard not too far from where I currently live. Boyfriend and dog in tow, off we went.

The cemetery I actually intended on checking out turning out to be boring. Luckily enough, It was connected to another cemetery that was pretty amazing. One of my favorite things to check out, as I'm sure it is for many, is dates dates dates. The older the better, right? The oldest I could read dated back into the 1850s, many unreadable. Hopefully you enjoy my mediocre photography below, and Rudy's photobomb in the final picture.

The Story of Rudy

In March of 2012 I was finally in an animal friendly apartment, and I knew I wanted a dog. Growing up, there was the dreaded "FISH ONLY" rule. So finally living somewhere that actually provided poop pick up bags and had a dog park in it just seemed like a sign that it was time. Plus lets be honest, I was kind of lonely.

So over the next few weeks Petfinder was my homepage. What kind of dog did I want? Male or female? Old or young? The only thing I did know was that I was rescuing a dog, whether from an actual rescue organization or a shelter. I wanted to give some dog a second shot.

I started out at the humane society. I bonded with a beagle named Doofy, who was as sweet as could be...and a little, well, doofy. I knew I had to think on it, and if he was the right dog for me. I arranged to come see him a few days later, and the day of I got a call from the humane society letting me know Doofy went to his forever home with a nice couple earlier in the day. Talk about mixed emotions. In the end, I was so happy Doofy was happy and not caged up anymore.

I went and met other dogs, not quite sure what I was looking for, not quite sure what I wasn't looking for. All of these dogs totally tugged at my heartstrings, but I wanted to make sure the right one came home to live with me. Who knew that picking out a dog would be such an ordeal? Oh wait, this is me. Of course it was an ordeal.

Then one day on Petfinder I stumbled across a little dachshund named Rudy. He was a cute little guy, located in Indiana. I thought it was hilarious he was from the Illinois Doberman Rescue (they have "plus" dogs as well). I drove out to Indiana to meet Rudy. I was really nervous all the way there, worried about finding another dog I'd feel bad for but not fit into my home.

I pulled in to a house with a fenced in back yard full of dachshunds! Okay there were only two, but I was still overwhelmed. When I looked at the two dachshunds in the yard I felt kind of sad, because I had that gut feeling they weren't what I was looking for. Then the foster mom opened the door with a little red dachshund  barking away at her ankles. Come to find out, the two dachshunds out back were her own, Rudy was her only foster. I suddenly got really nervous and shy. Yes, me, shy. I was almost scared to touch Rudy a lot because I didn't want to hurt him or scare him.

Foster mom Elaine and I talked about his demeanor and habits, all the while I just kept staring at Rudy in awe. His back story was that he was given up by his original owner's family when said owner had to go into a nursing home for Alzheimer's. For the last few months of his life with that owner, he was neglected, because of the owner's disease. For being a standard dachshund, Rudy weighed in at a measly 16 pounds. His foster brother and nemesis was a standard coming in at 26 pounds.

I knew from the minute I laid eyes on Rudy that I wanted him. After all of our discussion I assumed that I would go home and they would let me know if Rudy was mine or not. To my elation Elaine told me Rudy was mine that night if I was for sure I wanted him. So, paperwork was signed, Rudy was packed up to go. Elaine got a little teary eyed as we left, which I thought was the cutest.

Rudy soon became the king of my humble castle. From the first night home he slept in my bed, got evening belly rubs, and more attention and love than I've ever put in to anything. A few weeks after he was with me, I woke up at 6am to Rudy shaking uncontrollably. He was having a grand mal seizure, and I had no idea what to do. After the seizure and my hysterical crying, we got into the car and headed off the the ER. Rudy continued to have seizures randomly, and eventually was diagnosed with epilepsy.

As soon as I found out what Rudy had, I did what any neurotic crazy lady does, I headed to the internet to learn and worry and diagnose. By the time I was done reading, I was convinced that Rudy had a brain tumor and was going to die at any moment. Seizures continued, medicine changed multiple times. It took us 8 months to finally find a good medication combination to regulate the love of my life. I was on pins and needles the entire time, worried that I didn't have much time with my precariously chosen dog that I cared about so very much.

Now over a year later since his adoption, Rudy is a happy healthy dog. He has a neurologist now, who immediately assured me that if Rudy had a brain tumor, it would be the slowest growing one she's ever seen in her career. She answers all of my ridiculous what ifs, and recently gave Rudy a clean bill of health after his yearly blood work. Rudy still has epilepsy, he always will, but it's very controlled.

Meanwhile Rudy is my love now more than ever. If this entry hasn't been gag worthy enough, I'll take it one step further. Rudy is the one that's always there for me, knows how I'm feeling, and loves me no matter what. I'm so happy he rescued me, as he is that I rescued him.

Hated It.

I just wrote a ridiculously long post, then realized it was me continuing to rehash friendships that didn't work out. I keep writing out what my points are, or why I feel in the right. It's a constant guard I want to put up and share. I hate that I still feel that way at times, or enough to want to write a blog post about it.

I'm at an odd point for me. I've never had people blatantly not want to be my friend, or be on friendly terms. It's weird accepting it. I don't mean that because I expect everyone to like me, but I perhaps it's more of a feeling of it all seeming so unfair.

Wait, life isn't fair. Real world, meet Lindsey. Lindsey, meet the real world.

So not to waste a blog post, here are random things I hate:
frogs
small kids
Seth Rogen
Diet Coke
blatant meanness
watermelon

This blog post has been brought to you by my lack of sleep.

QCHC

This is what friendship looks like. 15 years later, we all could come together, support a friend, and make new memories. I am amazingly lucky to be a part of something like this, lucky to have people that I know I can always return to a friendship with, and really just be myself. There were hugs, tears, and a lot of laughter. I'm so happy to say I could be a part of a great benefit to raise some money for a really great woman. Her story is here, if you're so inclined.

It was a great trip into the past, and now it's time to make the future.

Photo credit: Michael Watson

Some of the Most Important Relationships of my Life

When I was fourteen years old I met Punk Rock. We never had formally been introduced, though had run into each other from time to time. I owned some random tapes and cds that had fast beats and vocals that sounded like yelling. I knew that I liked what I heard, but I didn't realize it had a name. 

In high school my older friends that had licenses (!!!!) would pick me up and take me down to a coffee shop that had a tiny back room. There I fell in love with loud vocals, fast riffs, and words about defying authority and doing what you want in life. I crushed on boys, I dyed my hair pink, I met bands that had seen both coasts before I had ever set foot in an ocean. Mostly, I found music that made me feel alive. I related, loved, hated. I felt. 

Punk Rock introduced me to Hardcore on a blind date at a show one night in that tiny back room. Hardcore was different, much more passionate to me. I immediately wanted to be as close as I could to Hardcore. I had never related to songs in such a way. Hardcore and I became inseparable. 

Sixteen years later I still have my relationships with both Hardcore and Punk Rock. They're always playing on my iTunes, or my choice on Youtube. I get caught at a stoplight screaming my brains out and using the steering wheel as a drum I still cannot keep rhythm to. I still advertise the bands I love on my chest, even in my tattoos. There are albums and songs that I need to survive feelings and situations to this day. 

Hey, A Cemetery Post

So finally, a cemetery post. On my birthday I had planned on hitting a couple of Chicago cemeteries, but being the straight edge lady I am, I forgot what happens to the city for St. Patrick's day. So instead, Chris and I hit up a couple closer to home. Rudy also had his first adventure in a cemetery, and judging by the amount of mud he had on him, he enjoyed himself too.

Dirty Thirty

When it hit me this year that I was turning the big three-oh, I felt like I had to do something big. There were talks of Vegas, then maybe a little time away in a cabin on a lake, or even just a weekend in Milwaukee. As time grew closer and real life settled in around incomplete plans, I realized that the where didn't matter.

What matters is that I'm spending my birthday with a man I am very much in love with, who has turned into my best friend. There was a time that I never thought my best friend could also be the one I'm in love with, that they would always be separate entities. I like how life can really say, "In your face, you were way off on this one."

I wish I could see all of my friends within this 24 hours, but the world doesn't spin around me like I like to wish. Accepting that I am not a priority to others is kind of a punch in the stomach, but also a fair and realistic one. To put it bluntly, no one should have their heads up my ass. It's about being equal, not who can ass kiss the other the most. /end butt talk.

So yeah. I'm thirty. I'm happy, living life my way, and being an adult that stands on her own two feet.

Mastering Sharing a Bed

Sharing a bed on a regular basis, let alone daily is completely weird to me. Chris and I generally see each other for 2 or 3 overnights a week, but 24/7 is going to be much different. As we get closer and closer to our move in date for our very first shared apartment, things like this creep into my weird detail obsessed mind.

I've always assumed the unspoken rule is that you share the bed half and half. In my mind I've always figured that where the pillows meet is the center, the invisible line. When I sleep in bed with a friend, this is the general rule. Now I know boyfriends are a but different, as there's actual wanting to touch or cuddle (ew) at times, but that still doesn't constitute bed hog-ery.

Chris is so slick at stealing the majority of the queen size bed. He has this knack for sprawling out with his arm going one way, butt going the other. Throw Rudy into the mix and I'm left with half a butt cheek's length to squeeze in to. Right now I'm laying with my left hip smushed on his his butt and my right side balancing precariously on the edge.

So how do I retaliate? I go in for a snuggle and try to roll my way in. I pretend to "sleep move" around and be so smushed onto him that he's forced to move over. Ive tried to poke him in the ribs, but the last time it ended with him elbowing my face in his sleep. There's always the old safety as well, the "pretend to be sleeping" fart. Unfortunately farts = laughter for me so I can't pull this one off very well.

Tonight's technique will involve a roll and push cuddle move. If Chris wakes up and wonders what I'm doing I can always fake sleep. Wish me luck.

A Small Town Trial

For just over 4 years of my life, I lived in small town USA, located just off interstate 80 in the midst of cornfields and nothingness. Why oh why would I live there? My career. I had an opportunity to forge ahead and I grabbed it. Little did I know that this would be one of my most interesting journeys to date.

Oh, small towns. They have their charm. The little one off food joints that taste like heaven, the shops that sell anything from darling necklaces to deer antlers. I knew where the best food was, where not to shop, and exactly where all the best cemeteries were.

I began living the small town life in an apartment from hell, complete with giant spiders and a neighbor making meth. Then I hit the jackpot and had an amazing apartment for dirt cheap. I'm paying double for something smaller here in the burbs.

Unfortunately with every small town comes the usual weirdness. Everyone knows everyone, so I stuck out like a punk in a prep school. During the first couple of weeks I lived there, I had women talking about me while I shopped the local craft store, and a lot of customers point blank ask me who I was and where I came from when dealing with me at my job. Needless to say, not exactly a town full of tact.

I was cast as an outsider at work, and considered an oddball for being in my mid 20s, unmarried, and childless. Most were horrified when I told them that I had no plans to have children. I had to deal with a workplace that was a clique of older people that disliked me not only because I was new to their routine, but I was also a young woman that was in charge. The horror!

As time went by, I grew thicker skin and learned not to take the small minded comments and perception personal. I dealt with the most difficult co-workers I have yet to come across, including a 50 year old mom who tried desperately to be young, an assistant that had an incredibly mean, selfish spirit, and a few men that hated me because I had a vagina that wasn't old and decrepit.

There were days I went home and shut out the world. I didn't care about the small town functions, who beat up who at the local hole in the wall bar, or who drove drunk but got off because they were friends with the cop.

Contrary to my post this far, it wasn't all bad. I met a few of the kindest, most genuine people that I might ever meet. I even had a few moments there that I laughed so hard I had to run to the bathroom. I found one of my favorite tombstones there. I got addicted to pork tenderloin sandwiches from a little joint that had wood paneled walls.

I didn't keep the contacts I made when I moved. I keep in touch with one amazing lady who shares my fascination of ghosts and can decorate a cake like no other. Im not sure if I want to forget it all, but I sure don't want to keep the memories alive.

It's been a year since I've gotten out of that little town, and life has changed so much. I can see my boyfriend on a regular basis (hell, we're moving in together in a week), I have the love of my life Rudy, and I can go out in public without having to deal with people being socially weird to me. I feel good away from there. I'm happy.

Maybe I was too paranoid there, maybe I felt the hand of judgement coming down on me a little too hard. What I consciously did do was really become a strong woman that I'm proud to be.

Best Friends Aren't Forever, and That's Okay.

In kindergarten I met my first best friend. His name was Eric, and we bonded over backyard wiffle ball, dinosaurs, and sand pizzas. Later on in grade school, I met a best friend I still have to this day, and even made me godmother of one of her children.

What makes a best friend friendship? I think we all see it differently, and have different kinds of besties. One of my best friends I only see a handful of times a year, we can even go weeks without a text message, let alone a phone call. But when I do see him, it's like time hasn't passed us by, not even a moment. He's a BFF that I know is a lifer. I've had the BF that I was in constant communication with. We texted, talked on the phone daily, and really coexisted at times as one. As I've grown older and figured myself out, that type of friendship has faded. I've been accused of distancing myself, which I can't deny, but I also feel like I can stand on my own now, and prefer to just be me, not Lindsey and __________________.

Over the years we've all gone through the ups and downs of friendships, of best friendships. The times of our lives, like rolling in cow pies to get under an electric fence to explore Cemetery X or awkwardly coercing the caretaker of one of the most haunted houses in Kansas to let us snoop. Then there's the downs. Blah. Finding out a best friend has ill intentions or is just playing the using game, or not really having your back is such a blow.

Then there's the best friends that become toxic. How does this happen? One day everything clicks, and the next you can literally feel the resentment rising off the text message. We are constantly growing as individuals and together as friends, yet we can also head down completely different roads. I can't say I regret these, as I've learned a lot from them, but I wish the ill will that's felt would disappear.

So, in 9 days I'll be 30 years old. Thirty years holds a long line of best friends. This has molded me into my badass self, bullshit and all. I've had what I thought were BFFs, only to discover they were really BFUSCCA (best friends until someone cooler comes along). But I do have those BFFs that stick around, well, forever.

This isn't a high horse I'm riding around on. I'm not looking for validation for my life or how awesome I am. I'm not looking for judgement, though I'm sure there's people out there that have me on the stand as I type.

This is about my journey of best friends.

Tales From the Embalming Table

Chris and I love Tales From the Crypt, and tonight's ep of choice has become one of my favorites.

"Fitting Punishment" is about a shady mortician. As someone fascinated with death, I know a thing or two about a thing or two when it comes to the subject. All I could do was critique all the steps of embalming, and how horribly wrong they were doing them.

The finale of the episode included Air Jordan'd feet (unattached to legs) kick the shady mortician and a footless body walking down some stairs.

I do a lot of other cool stuff in my free time, I swear.

Between a Chicken Ring and a Hush Puppy...

In between a White Castle and a Long John Silver's (aka one stop heart attack block) lies a small cemetery not too far from my apartment.

My favorite resident of this cemetery is Johanna McCormick. Johanna was murdered in 1919 by a man that she turned down for a date. Her murderer stuck his shotgun through her window and fired away. Sounds like a level headed rational dude.

Once the snow clears, I think I'll go visit Johanna.

Take Two.

I've tried this before, and lose interest in mere months. More often than not, I got too wrapped up in trying to to write about bullshit like drama or trying to appease a friendship.

I've moved, so my blog should too.

2013 (and turning 30 on March 16th) is getting back to what I love, what I strive for, and what makes my life just that, mine. Strong friendships, an amazing boyfriend, and my little dog that rules my Instagram.

Will there be adventures in cemetery exploring? Oh, oh yes. This time Rudy will probably get to come along on the day adventures to make things that much more aesthetically pleasing. Because really, who doesn't love a cute wiener dog?