The Long Awaited Blog

A place to read all the ramblings I've created.

[callialire]

A Comprehensive (But Not Exhaustive) Lists of All My Flaws

It's like there has always been too much of me.

I have too many clothes that I definitely don't wear, but how can anybody expect to give up my sophomore yearbook shirt, it's a fundamental part of my history, it's fibers have practically molded themselves to my bones. No, I don't care that I haven't worn it since 2019, what if I wake up in 2025 and that t-shirt is the only thing I want to wear, but instead, it's rotting in a Goodwill bin, because nobody else cares that much about high school year book t-shirts. What do I wear then?

I talk too much and too loud about things that people don't care about but if I don't say it right now, I'll choke on it, I swear. What if I die and those words are stuck in my throat and I can never change your mind and you never think of me when somebody tells that same joke? (Also I'm one of literally 40 people that crush and bend and fold ourselves into a single dining room every major holiday, if I don't yell, I may as well not speak, and as previously mentioned, that would do some serious damage to my ego.)

And speaking of ego, it's just another thing in me that has overgrown and like my front lawn, I have neglected to cut away the dead parts. So, it's wild and untamed and untended, probably full of bugs and weeds. I am the most important, I am the smartest in the room, I am the funniest, the best dressed. (False.) I do try the hardest, I can't stop, God knows I've tried. I care about other people and I tell myself it's for them, but I know the truth of it all. It's for me, I have to water the grass, I don't care that it's reaching my knees and the HOA keeps sending letters threatening to fine me over it. I don't care that it's dying and it's starting to smell like death too.

Moving away from the metaphorical (and incredibly tangled) ball of yarn I have become, I cannot stop buying things I don't need. I tell myself I will get organized, I just need another clear plastic bin to place on another bookshelf. If my dresser matches the frame of my mirror, I'm more likely to put my clothes away, right? If my desk has little porcelain cups for all my pens and paper clips, I'm definitely not going to avoid working for 6 days straight. I don't fold my laundry right away so I lose my socks all the time, and I don't even wear socks like 9 months out of the year, but I definitely need more before it's winter because the ones I wore last year all have holes in them because I wear shoes less than I wear socks and I'm outside all the time. If there's a special event, I need a pair of high heels, perhaps a dress to go with them, because all of the dresses I buy eventually end up in a bag that sits in the back of my car because I never wear dresses except when there's somewhere to go, and these tend to be one off occasions so I really don't need that pastel mini dress or the bright pink heels I bought to go with it, until I do and it turns out, I sold the dress at a garage sale last summer and I only made 6 bucks off it, even though it cost me 50.

Which brings us back into the metaphor of it all, because Net Loss of 44 Dollars Made with Good Intentions should really be the title of my autobiography. I won't elaborate on that right now, but you should know that it makes perfect sense.

It's never quiet enough, but in the same breath, it's too quiet and I'm too nervous that something is wrong. I have forgotten how to exist outside of myself and I am worried, deeply, that something in me is fundamentally wrong. Because there has always been too much of me and it has never been enough.

[callialire]

I cried on the first day of pre-k. And a little bit on the second day too.

Because I’m crouched down, knees aching, staring into the biggest, most excited, kind of scared set of hazel eyes I’ve ever seen, and she’s holding my hands so tight and she’s just looking at me like I’m the only thing she can see.

“We’re gonna do this, right? We’re gonna be brave and you’re so ready to go and have and the best day?”

And here’s the thing; I’m being really brave. Like the most brave I’ve ever been. Because after I graduated high school, I never thought I’d be back to crying on school district property again. But, alas, 7 years later, here goes the public school system, tormenting me once more because now I have to just… leave her there. That is insane. That is scary. How is this not a big deal to anybody else around me?

“No.” She’s telling me. “I can’t. I’m gonna miss you.” And her mouth is doing that thing where her lips quiver and her nose gets a little red right on the tip. And she keeps squeezing my hands.

Because here’s the thing about me and her: we’re kind of a package deal. Always have been. The kind of package that argues a lot and laughs a lot and talks over each other. The kind of package deal that falls asleep holding hands. We wake up early together, we share the same chair a lot. She’s 1,752 days old. I’ve spent a lot of those days being the first person she sees when she wakes up and the last one she sees before she falls asleep.

Me and her, we’re doing all of this together for the very first time. Her first steps were mine too, and her first word was practically pulled from my throat. Her first laugh was the first thing I didn’t just listen to, but actually heard. Her firsts are mine too. She is my first and it is so great and so hard and so happy and so, so sad and I don’t know how I’m supposed to feel all of this and keep going. I don’t know how to love somebody this much. It doesn’t feel sustainable.

Sure, she’s only 4. But she’s basically 5. And it feels like the clock started counting 2 days ago. And soon she’s going to be 6 and then 10 and then 15 and then gone.

And she’s gonna miss me and I’m gonna miss her, and send help because I literally don’t know I’m expected to make it through the rest of my life like this (and she has a sister too and they make my life better and brighter and harder and everything is better but it’s all melancholy blue tinged because the clock is ticking and imnotreadyimnotreadyimnotready but also icantwaiticantwait). I don’t know how to love somebody this much, I don’t know where to put it.

So, yeah, I cried on the first day of pre-k and a little on the second day too.

[callialire]

I will never doubt my daughters’ capabilities to claim their own space. And I do my best every day to never encroach on their space for the sake of being polite, to make things easier or friendlier for somebody else. My youngest still gives out affection with reckless abandon, but she WILL tell you when she’s had enough, she is not afraid to ruin a good mood and tell you she does. Not. Want. To. She will not give a hug she does not mean, nor a high five or even a fist bump. She will not play games she has no desire to engage in. She is steadfast in her fire and it makes me want to be a better person.

My oldest though, she’s learned the niceties a little more. The ripe old age of 4 and half, she knows she’s capable of hurting feelings and it is her least favorite thing to do. (Most of the time.) But, she cannot be swayed. She will offer a fist pump in place of the hug she will not give, here please take my favorite stuffy to cuddle with in bed because I dont really want to lay with you. I’m sorry I don’t really like holding hands, but I’m right over here with my mom if you’re worried. She performs the perfect rejection with a sugar sweet smile across her Cupid’s bow lips, baring tiny gapped teeth that should not fool you. She is all bite, little baby teeth sharpened to a point when the situation arises. She demands her respect, her space, her body, her boundaries. She does so eloquently. And she will not be disrespected, she will not be ignored. She makes me want to be a better person.

Raising kids is hard, raising kids is scary. Kids who know their shit are even scarier. But, it’s oh so worth it. I’ll take the attitudes any day. And I’ll accept the hugs I get, and respect the ones I don’t. And I’ll hold the others around me to the same standards, the same boundaries because that is what my daughters deserve. They can do it, they will do it. So can I.

[callialire]

An ode to all my favorite dads!

Starting off with my own personal favorite (sorry dad)— to the boy I met, the man he became, and the kickass dad he is, happy fricking Father’s Day! I hope we spend the rest of our days with braids in our hair and our nails painted. Every day, I get to witness the impossible, immeasurable love you have for our daughters and I’m thankful and grateful beyond words. Every day, I fall more in love with you. You’ve not only become a father, you are a doctor and a hair stylist and a jungle gym and a tickle monster. You are the calm in our overly talkative, curly haired, big eyed storm. You are the only boy invited to tea parties, and the kindest fake food critic in all the land, you’ve never complained about a single over cooked plastic steak or pursed your lips at a cup of too sour Lego tea. It is an honor I cannot properly express to raise strong, smart, brave, beautiful young women with you. We are the luckiest girls in the world to live life with and be loved by our big boy.

To the father I got when I was 17, and I didn’t even know it yet. My father in law is single handedly the kindest, gentlest man I’ve ever known. He has shown me a whole new kind of love that I never knew existed. The epitome of a good man. It is the privilege of a lifetime to raise my daughters in the presence of his love.

To the man I didn’t get enough time with, there is not a day that goes by that I don’t miss you with everything in me. You are in everything good that I have. In my daughters’ favorite toys and the creaks of this old house, in the way I see the world, the way the sun feels when I sit on the porch. I think about you when I eat a particularly good meal, and when I drink a bad cup of coffee. I hope we make you proud, I hope you’re living it up, I hope you think I’m good, because you make want to be. I love you and I miss you and I always will. Happy Father’s Day bud.

I love all the dads I know, it is so big and so warm, I don’t know where to keep it all, it makes me feel like the sun. I am the luckiest girl.

Happy Father’s Day!!

[callialire]

RANT (with a creative writing twist)

My daughter makes potions in the backyard. She can also type her name on an iPad keyboard.

In a hypercritical age, where nobody is happy with how we raise our children- not even me sometimes, I take solace in the fact that an apprentice alchemist sleeps down the hall for me, a poultice of mud and beads still caked under her fingernails after watching her favorite episode of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles curled up in her mothers bed, cuddling her father's pillow.

The fact of the matter is, children cannot be expected to stay away from technology. It was touchy 20 years ago when I stood guard in front of the metal bowl cauldron in my mother's backyard, trying to figure out how to train my Nintendogs for their next big show. I feel no shame and take no blame for raising children familiar with the world they are growing into.

So, yes, my children watch those weird hamster Lego maze videos on YouTube and they can frame an iPhone photo better than I can. They're exposed to more of the world at their tiny fingertips than anybody before them, though not nearly as much as those coming after them.

Because my daughters still make potions. They still get stained a dark brown from hours in the sun, their hair still turns brittle in public pool chlorine soaked braids. They eat watermelon slices on the front porch and watch the rain and feel the thunder in their toes, tucked in the garage with their dad.

And to get less artistic with it, I do not care if people think children spend too much time in front of screens. People thought kids read too many books, listened to too many radio programs, spent too much time not doing what those before them idealized their childhood as.

Our children are kind and they are smart and they love to learn as much as they can, as often as they can, and you know what, they like watching those weird slime videos too. They also like playing in the mud and rolling in the grass and dancing in the sprinkler, building snowmen and crunching the yellowest leaves on the street. They like making potions.

I am just exhausted hearing how our children are destined to fail, doomed to a life of mediocrity, a life void of creativity and independent thought, like the ones raising them were raised wrong, like the parents themselves have already failed, completing a generational curse of AI indoctrination.

Kids are kids are kids. Let them be. Trust the children you've raised.

(Leave me alone and stop making weird comments when my kids are watching tv.)

[callialire]

Mother's Day is this weekend and when I think about love...

I think about decaf sweet tea, and forced California road trips because he can't get better here, I wish he could. So bad, I wish he could. But, he can't. So you tell him to go.

I think about airplane tickets and rental cars and McDonald's hashbrowns because it's the only thing you'll eat before a game and something is better than nothing, after all.

I think about video games. And frozen pickle juice. A fancy new bed for your dog to sleep on. My address programmed into all of your apps so you can send me something whenever you think of me.

I think about a birthday cake sent to my Texas front door the very first time I left the state to become my own family. How you call to sing happy birthday in the same high pitched tone, fighting through laughter every single year. Even though you hate birthdays.

Mostly, when I think about love (you know the kind), I think about my mom.

I think about how she knows Jason couldn’t sleep when his face was covered, so even in death, she wouldn't let that be. ("Don't," she tells the doctors. "Don't cover his face. He hates that, don't cover his face please.")

I think about how there is always apple juice and fruit snacks in her home. How her door is always unlocked, and if it isn't, she makes sure we have the code to get in. I think about how, even at 25 years old, she still lets me curl up in bed with her and cry when I need it.

I think about how our conversations are mostly half spoken sentences, because we don't even need the whole thing at this point. Speaking in a language only the two of us know, laughing at jokes we haven't even said.

Sometimes, I can only take a deep breath in the kitchen I grew up in. Sometimes, it's the only place where everything doesn't feel like so much.

Sometimes, when I think about love, it has a face. And it is the first face I ever saw, it is the first voice I knew. Before I knew about the sun and stars and boys and daughters, it all comes back to her.

So yeah, when I think about love, I think about my mom.

[callialire]

My little sister is red dirt caked under perfectly manicured fingernails. Shiny curled hair matted to the back of her neck after 6 hours in the sun. All muscle and sinew and tanned skin and freckles and smiles that crack her face wide open. Green eyes that may get stuck on her bad attitude, rolled to the sky. Cries all the time. Laughs even more. Sings loudly. Dances unabashedly. A dirty little gossip who I’d trust with my deepest secrets. My daughter’s best friend. Scared but does it anyways brave.

Strong and soft, linen and steel, simultaneously both the forest fire and the spring rain that calms it.

My sister came into this world bright red and screaming and 16 sweet years later, has shown no sign of changing her demeanor. I wouldn’t have it any other way.

[callialire]

I take pictures of my daughters laying in bed with my mom, we call every day even though we live 10 minutes away, I have videos of the way the three of them giggle together. It’s one of the best ways to be loved, by a grandmother. I get to see my girls know that. It brings a little bit of peace.

I’ve officially been without you longer than I was with you, and I still tell you all the good things, and the not so good things. I can still catch a piece of you in cigarettes and fresh coffee brewing. You’d hate the way the Broncos are playing. But, you’d love the girls. Oh my God, you’d love them. And they would be so lucky to know you, and they’d love you more than me. I can’t always remember your voice, but sometimes I wake up with the feeling that you’re still here. In the jokes we tell, especially in the food we cook, and the feeling when we’re all together.

I miss you, and that’s just how I’ll always feel now and that’s okay. (Mom is a great grandma, don’t worry. That’s where I see you the most. All the love I get to miss, my girls get to have.)

[callialire]

I have lived a life without my brother. I don’t remember it but they say it’s true, that I once existed without him. It doesn’t sound possible, you know, that there was once a me—so little but even still— that didn’t have him.

Who would laugh at my jokes, who would tell me I’m the best person he knows, who would steal all the change out of my car to buy swishers in high school if I had no brother, right? God, who would be the first person I told all my secrets to?

If there was no him, who could show me radical change with only the desire of being good and kind exist? Who would keep me from shouldering our mother’s burden? Would there even be a room I could tuck myself away in when everyone came looking for me if I didn’t have him?

My brother is 23 today! (And we got kinda scared we wouldn’t make it this far.) but, I’ve got the scars and the bad pictures and ghost of a stomach sore from laughing to prove it. My brother is 23 today and he is one of the best men (not boys) I know, and he earned that shit with literal blood and sweat and tears and a heart that beats loud and good in his ears.

My brother is 23 today and though there are those that came after him, it is this one that taught me unconditional love because it is this one that made me a big sister. So, I don’t believe there was a me before him, because I wasn’t a sister until he came along and how can I be me if he isn’t here?

[callialire]

In 10 years, we probably ate 3000 dinners together. And I spent roughly 1000 of those complaining about the overuse of fennel and mustard. How bittersweet to know I’ve done 365 dinners without you now, and I’ll never get another one. But I’ll always have those 3000.

The bad: a lot can change in a year.

The good: a lot can change in a year.

It doesn’t hurt so bad anymore, and I’ve learned that I can talk to you, instead of God these days. You’ve always been a good listener and some things don’t change even in death.

I think I’ll always miss your laugh and I’ll always listen for the sound of you in the house you filled. But you were nothing if not a man full of life, with a desire to live it every single day you had. So, I’ll keep an ear out for you in the sunshine and I’ll laugh at all the chapsticks you send my way.

I love you I miss you I wish you were here I know you’re better now I miss you I love you

[callialire]

Things I've Learned About Grief

[callialire]

I am not naturally the most maternal person. I am not (and really have never been) somebody people look at and go “God, she was just meant to be a mom”. But here we are, 2 kids deep. Being a mom for like, literally ever.

I’m not nearly patient enough, not nearly playful enough, a lot of the time, I just don’t feel… enough full stop. And as much as I want this whole thing to have a happy ending, where I say something like: but none of that matters because I have these wonderful girls that make everything feel okay…

That’s just not true.

It’s harder more often than it’s not. I’m angry a lot and sad less often nowadays (because of the anger) and I feel like I’m missing out on everything all the time. I feel like a burden with a hoard of similarly impatient, demanding, wild gremlins trailing behind me.

Motherhood has made maintaining friendships harder, it’s made maintaining myself… harder, if not impossible. It all feels like so. Much. And everybody around me makes it seem so easy. And it has, in fact, made me feel like I’m wired wrong for this. Like there are so many more women out there that could do it better than me.

Being a mom is something that requires WORK. Every second of every day. And I just wanted to say something just in case there is another mom out there who always see pale pink and peachy motherhood, with gently spoken reprimands and feels guilty for losing her temper maybe just a little bit over bathtime and bedtime and pretend playtime.

I think it needs to be spoken on more. And I think it should be okay to not feel like you were made to be a mother. Because it is, quite frankly, fucking hard. And it like… really blows. Even if all the love in the world is there, even if your kids are nice and kind and good. It’s okay. Ya know?

[callialire]

I was 20 when I got pregnant the first time. Damian knew first. I was 22 when I got pregnant the second time. A lot of things had changed, but still, Damian was my first phone call.

My brother is a lot of things, and in 22 years of life, he’s changed more than most people I know. But, hand to God, he’s the best uncle I could have asked for for my daughters.

He’s the one they beg to chase them around at Grandma’s house, he’s the one that gets lured into playing with sand for 45 minutes even though his ride is literally… waiting for him. He can’t make himself walk away. He is… also the one they yell at for being mean and he has thrown em around a fair few times.

It’s great to see my favorite people love my best friend as much they do. And it’s even better to see him love them.

[callialire]

My sister is 15.

She curls her hair every morning. She likes TV medical dramas and the color pink. She wants to be a brain surgeon.

My sister is 15.

She knows death. Intimately.

She scans her school ID every morning-- the picture of her with shining hair and million watt smile. She submits to daily bag checks.

My sister is 15.

She sings too loud to her favorite songs and she's captain of the softball team (as a sophomore, can you believe that?) Her boyfriend waits for her every day after 2nd period.

My sister is 15.

She has not known a year without lockdown procedures and active shooter drills. She cries in the car.

A teenager should not be able to tell you what fear smells like-- it's Sol De Janeiro perfume and that bitter saltiness you get when you cry. Should not have the half moon nail marks of her best friends carved into the palms of her hands as they cling to each other in the auditorium while SWAT tries to prevent the (previously) unimaginable. Should not scramble to text her love to her family.

And yet...

My sister is 15. And she does.

[callialire]

25!

and…

well yeah okay I live with my mom. and I lost my stepdad this year. and I didn’t really go back to college like I said I was going to.

Really, I’ve been on top of less mountains than I thought I would have. Planted myself and laid down deeper roots than expected.

Been to less bars than my teenage self imagined.

But! 25!

and…

I’m married to my best friend in like.. the whole world. My girls get to grow up seeing and loving my mom every day. I got to know a man and love him so much that the loss felt unimaginable. I got to know that kind of love!

I didn’t go back to school, but I got this wild job I just so happen to love (and be like really good at)

Less mountains, more… walks around the blocks with two toddlers trailing behind. fewer bars, more barbecues.

25 and I’m getting dinner with some of my favorite people tonight.

25 and im helping my best friend shop for wedding dresses on Friday.

25 and I’m going to a pumpkin patch with my family on Sunday.

25 andandand because there’s just more coming.

25!!

[callialire]

there’s no other love like this in the whole world. in a hundred years, we’ll be dead and gone and I still remember how small your hands were, and how big your smiles. I’ll still hear your little laugh and I’ll tell all my ghost friends all your silly jokes. iloveyouiloveyouiloveyou

[callialire]

it took me a long time to appreciate sisterhood. I prided myself as the girl who grew up with brothers.(and I love my brothers don’t doubt it for a second) I listened to their music and I liked the sports they liked and I played their games. I learned how to change a tire early on and there was always somebody around to change my oil and my brake pads. I was tough. I was funny in a way boys appreciated. Never too much.

But man, never underestimate the power of being too much. And it took me a long time to get there. To see my baby sister grow into skincare and pretty dresses just for the hell of it and the color pink. To have a soft sister who laughs loudly and cries often and cares so much about EVERYTHING for me to like really get it.

There’s a pure, raw beauty in being a girl. She, who asks me to pluck her eyebrows and changes her outfit 4 times before leaving the house, has taught me the fierceness in being a woman. How fun it is to like the music I like just because I like it, to scream the songs in the car. Tell the jokes I think are funny. Wear the dresses. She is an unrelenting force of nature. I have so much to learn from her.

Just… damn I do love my sister.