Natural Family Planning (NFP) and the Oilfield Worker

Well.  Let me tell you.  This here is not a light subject.   You miss your husband; he comes home...you haven’t see him in fifteen days, and you...you want to make him a cup of coffee.  No!  Duh!  You want to kiss his face off!  Oops...sorry...wait, wait...too much too soon.  OK.  Let me back up. 

Coffee.  You want to make him a cup of coffee.

He smiles at you, and you smile at him, and there are many, many children in between you on the couch.  However, your eye contact allows subliminal messages to transmit, and, in seconds, through the skulls of the children, you are communicating sweet nothings.  One raise of his eyebrow, and the deal is assumed to be sealed, and your husband says in a best-daddy-ever voice, “Well, let’s get these children to bed,” where he will tuck them in, and I do mean extra super duper tucked in, like with the blankets so tight they are all like gasping, “Too tight...dad...it hurts...too tight, dad....” 

But, no...before he shuffles them down the hall, he sees you attempting more eye contact...and dad is confused, thinking, “Why more eye contact...let’s get this show on the road,” and you are raising both eyebrows now, grunting almost, and he looks you square in the eye and goes deep into your messaging system and sees the unthinkable,

“Ovulation.” 

He jumps back, breathless. 

Did he really just see that? 

He peeks into your mind again, and your menstrual calendar is posted on the wall of your consciousness,

“Day 14.”

Retreat. 

“Children, Let’s read books!”

He rounds the children up by their scruffs and sweeps them away, grabbing random reading material from tabletops...ushering everyone and everything into your bed, stuffing all of it between the two of you, saving you a ¼” slither of the mattress for your own purposes, and acting dead when you arrive an hour later.

Can you ask a boss to move around the schedule for reasons such as these?  

The Year Without a Christmas Card

If you have children, you have likely plopped down to watch The Year Without a Santa Claus.  Actually, I remember that movie from my youth, and I am pretty far out from my “youth,” so the movie is pretty stinkin old (I am not).  Though years have passed, claymation remains quite the delight in my world, and Heat Miser and Snow Miser do not lose their magnetism.  They still cause me to stop in my tracks and stare, and I am not sure why.  Creepy old animated man-beasts singing and strutting around hold my attention.  Go figure. 

In any case, this is not to be about creepy man-beasts.

This is about creepy me.

And, to be fair, creepy is probably the wrong word, but complicated is close, so we will go with that:  this is about complicated me.

I can complicate anything, to include the sending of Christmas cards.

You didn’t get one last year or this year, right?  Right.  That was not because you got taken from “the list.”  That was because the sender is complicated.

See, I took something beautiful and turned it into something gross.  I took a greeting, and I turned it into a stage of sorts, where I would display the perfect image of my family.  Lies.  It was all lies, that picture.  My kids only looked like that for a split second, and only from the waist up.  I took pictures while smacking myself in the forehead, mumbling and growling catchy phrases at my children, memorable phrases like, “What is wrong with your face?”

The day of taking Christmas Card Pictures in my house became a sort of doom that loomed in the distance.  I would announce, “Tomorrow, we will take Christmas pictures,” and children would break out in sweats and binge eat for the rest of the day.  They began to replay that low, deep, tuck-your-chin-into-your-chest-look-out-the-very-top-of-your-eyeballs voice, which I used, while taking Christmas card pictures, pictures that would be sent out to the people, the people who might never guess I could/can conjure up such a husky, peculiar tone as that

But, why would you think that of me – I mean...the card...the illustrious Christmas card, so well-planned and perfectly selected, all glittery and warm.  It did not suggest over-caffeinated banshee taking pictures whilst alternating between low ill-mannered coercion and high “Smile Pretty” coos at her subjects.  Merry Christmas, mom’s a psycho!

Why did I care so much about that picture...about that card?

Because it was going out as a representation of me...of us, and I wanted it to be perfect.

I don’t think I should pour time...money...or emotions into something that shallow.  Not that the sending of Christmas cards is shallow – I am sure you do it with much moral tenacity and very little self promotion.   I, on the other hand, can complicate...can twist and spoil...even a greeting card.

And so, I put myself on the wagon.

I am not allowed to send you cards.

Yet, I care about you and hope you had a wonderful Christmas.  I hope you are off to a terrific New Year.

I am happy I didn’t lie to you with another perfect picture and pithy salutation.

Rather, I come to you on Facebook and occasionally via blog, raw and flawed,

so that you will know the real me,

the one who is just like the real you.

Merry belated Christmas...we are all still in our underwear.