changin'

minisgarden
i have been workin' around the clock this past month on a big project. it has probably taken me twice as long as it would anybody else. i have no organizin' skills , dyslexia and the attention span of a nat and had no knowledge whatsoever about the process. but i have had that enviable list o' attributes in all my endeavors so it was somethin' new slowin' me down.

i just haven't felt like myself lately. i am usually pretty even in demeanor but the past coupla' months my typically pleasant mood has traveled all over the place....and can do so in a nano second. i can be feelin' just fine and then, from the t.v.-on-all-the-time room (which is directly below the doo dad den and runs at a very high volume), i hear that poor paris is without moisturizer in prison and i am thrown into a state o' despair. since nothin' has really changed in my daily life to cause these mood swings, i am forced to face the truth.

the truth is....i am approachin' that thing. that thing i first heard about a zillion years ago...that thing that made all my grandmother's friends do crazy things and gain 72 pounds overnight and made their hair fall out - just the front part where you would normally sprout a nice set o' bangs and was real difficult to hide...that thing that makes you sweat like a pig in a poke on a hot summer day and can make your skin match your faux alligator bag.....that thing that can make you throw all nutritional learnin' right outta your mind and force you to eat only one major food group for days on end (that food group bein' anything full o' grease and goo) and can make you stare for long periods o time at your prince charmin' and try to remember when he was charmin' and why you thought he was princely.

my grandmother used to get together with a group o' ladies once a week - i believe they called themselves the rose society but i could be wrong cause i don't remember there ever bein' roses mentioned durin' their gatherins'. they usually held these faux rose society meetins' in my grandmother's parlor full o' victorian velvet furniture and jo and i got to come in and serve the gooey goods our grandmother pretended she had made herself. after our servin' duties we'd go door to door sellin' whatever gooey goods gotten at the grocer's weren't greedily grabbed by the gossipin' group.

but that all changed after one rainy gatherin' day. followin'our servin' duties jo and i sat right outside the door and spied on these fascinatin' creatures and from that point on, we preferred their gossip to makin' money from leftovers. these fancy women talked about all the friends they had but that weren't in attendance. the poor non-attendees were experiencin' some horrible luck and some had takin' to really bad behavior - behavior unbecomin' to any person much less a grand mother! they talked about each women as if they were checkin' their names off a list when they couldn't think o' anything else to share about 'em. before movin' on to the next victim, my grandmother would say, in one o' those loud kinda whispers..."she must be goin' through the change". there was always a big emphasis on the word 'change' and then the gossipin' group o' grand mothers would greatly gasp, gulp down more iced tea and then get goin' on the next 'friend'.

what was this change the group o' grannies attributed to such looney behavior and horrendous luck? jo said it meant exactly that - the 'friend' was off goin' through all her change - choosin' to go shoppin' rather than sit around with a bunch o' middle aged gossipers gnawin' on faux home-baked goods with our grandmother. queenie said it meant that the woman was havin' that operation to make her face all stretched out and shiny but i knew that change was called 'havin' work done'.

after a mornin' o' listenin' to my grandmother boss my dear, sweet grandfather around more than usual, i heard her tellin' my aunt that she hadn't felt like herself lately and she must be at the beginnin' of goin' through the change. havin' heard that this change had caused the faux rose society member's friends to age 100 years within a week or wake up to big bald spots or lock their prince charmins out of the house, i had no choice but to ask my grandmother...what was this change she spoke so often of and was headin' toward herself?

my grandmother told me it was monstrous mistake made by mother nature....that when women reached a certain age they went through a change that was about the same as bein' turned inside out and hung upside down and that nothin' ever looked the same again and that only the strong survived. this of course concerned me greatly - especially the part o' havin' to be strong cause my grandmother never lifted a finger except to stir somethin' now and then or pick up the phone and her rather large upper arms showed no sign o' muscle. while i pondered her fate, my grandmother sat down her snicker's bar and wrapped those rather large - and sweaty - upper arms around me and told me not to worry - that by the time i was her age they would have invented somethin' so i wouldn't have to deal with this change. she was wrong.

in all the passin' time, a zillion years it seems - nothin' has been invented so that jo and queenie and i don't have to deal with this change. i'm afraid, instead, the money for such a cure was spent on makin' sure men still acted interested in their changin' women (even if their woman was no longer interested in that kinda interest). you know - that one those nice people wanna make sure we know how to obtain by sendin' us all those emails daily.

personally, i feel this way o' doin' things wasn't thought out too well...if they had taken care of us women first there might not be such a need for drugs like that for men. maybe if women weren't forced to sweat like pigs or have rollercoaster moods and crunchy skin, there wouldn't be so many men needin' viagra and the like.

havin' decided my moodiness the last coupla months was due to this monstrous mistake mother nature made and seein' no way to skip it and no cure bein' offered in the near future, i decided to read up a bit on it all. i only made it through the first few pages where they have a picture of a changin' woman. it's a side few and she has droopy double ds, a double chin and is sort of pudgy. the caption says, ' embrace the new woman you have become'....then it has all these lil call outs all around that scream out all the things to look forward to embracin'. i searched in vain for even one i could pretend to accept much less embrace. mini's daddy looked over my shoulder and apparently felt the same way i did about this change. i was glad he had appeared to offer up some kind words o' love and support about these loomin' changes and i could tell he was takin' some time to come up with just the right thing to say to me...his adored wife and mother of his perfect child.

when he finally spoke, he said, 'i don't know mo....maybe we should just get a gun a shoot you.' then he went outside to admire his grass. you can see just a bit o' that much admired grass along with some o' my outdoors creative work in the attached pictures.

it's my birthday tomorrow. that means i am one year closer to 'the change' so i guess i need to finish readin' that horrible lil book. i'm hopin' they put the worst stuff up front and i'll discover the list worth embracin' as i read more.

thanks again for stoppin' by and for takin' the time to leave your sweet messages ...i hope you all have a happy father's day!

xoxoxoxoxxoxo,
mo