Where Is My Razzmatazz?

In six months the stars are going to align and one great and terrible celestial event is going to occur.

I am going to turn 30.

I've been feeling pretty sanguine about it these last few years because one time I read (I think it was in US Weekly or maybe In Touch, you know the one that's 99 cents at the Walgreens) that in your 30's you feel more comfortable in your skin and you stop caring about what other people think. I latched on to that comment made by Ms. Barrymore or maybe Ms. Jolie (but hey, at least I'm not quoting Oprah or the white devil Sue Monk Kidd, right?) and I've been cradling it alone in my bed all these dark nights as the earth dies and so does my youth and 30 grows nearer from it's loom-spot on the horizon like an evil spitting orc army from which there is no escape.

The unfortunate truth, however, is that now, at almost exactly 29.5, I feel less secure than ever. I feel down right neurotic. I think I may actually have had more self-confidence at the age of 16 than I do right now.

Which actually makes sense, when you think about it. Most of us have had it pretty easy all our lives when we're 16. We're too young to be bitter, or failed, or feel old or crusty. We're trying so hard to fit in that we have yet to notice all the ways in which we don't. And we were told, us cozy little 80's Reganomic babies, that the world was ours. We had no reason to know any different. Not yet. Not then.

So instead of sinking into myself all zen-like and content, like I am a cat and my personality is a sunspot on the rug that I have now earned the right to luxuriate in permanently, I'm spending a lot of time fretting. About how I come off. About what other people think. About other's opinions of me. And it's sucking up my power. (The power of now, the power of my zen, of my true self, my north star, the holy spirit within me, however the hell you want to put it, cowgirl, it's all the same to me. Feel free to believe differently). It's sucking out all my ambitions and my ability to take confident steps in any direction. Basically I huddle shivering in a corner with this sick pit in my belly. I bite my nails. I laugh nervously. I feel homely and unattractive. And I can't muster up the vim, the ovaries, the Razzmatazz, if you will (I will if you won't), to do anything about it. To save myself from this absolute failure of. . . of myself.

But then--there's something in you, you know? That keeps kicking when you're down, that chatters away at all the unruly edges of your soul, the untended garden, the place where the bracken and bramble has taken hold. That little voice, that still small voice (oh don't get your knickers in a twist, it's just a phrase, as far as I know the Mormons haven't copy-righted it). The rest of me is catatonically picking out my eyebrows but that little voice keeps chirping in and saying, and you'll pardon my French: Who the hell cares? Who the hell cares? Who the hell cares??

I don't know if this is a good thing or not. The voice, well, it's a lot like the voice of this here blog post--a little angry, a bit abrasive, undeniably defensive; it's having trouble finding much humor in it all. I don't know if it's going to mellow out into that Sun Spot in my soul and leave me all content and 30-ish and you know--Grown Up. If it's going to help me find my Pluck again--or if it's going to ice over and grow a crust 'top of that and in three or four years I'm going to be walking around unshowered and launching in to angry diatribes at perfectly lovely cocktail parties, because it's just desperate to prove WHO THE HELL CARES.

I hope the voice of this post does not offend. I just feel rubbed a little raw.

I am Vesuvius and I am not in your way. No need to push me again.

Vesuvius Erupts

I tell myself we are living like bohemians which isn't true, but it helps. See, it's ok for bohemians to do things like spend their last fifteen francs on a box of red wine. However, this behavior is inexcusable in parents. So you see what I mean.

The real bohemians are Mermee and Trey Bien, and I mean to write about them but not today.

I keep trying to write you a lovely blog and nothing comes out right.

I think it must be because I am stressed as heck with job interviews--especially with people calling me in to interview for positions that may or may not actually exist ("Well Ms. Tuttle, we don't know if we're going to have fairies--I mean, we don't know that we aren't going to have fairies, do we--and so, saying we did actually have fairies: would you make a good one?")--and trying to find a house, worried about living on a smaller income, finding a school that will still take Indy (ha! That's a joke).

This stress had lead me to do such things as, well--spend my last fifteen francs on red wine, buy three fancy bars of chocolate, write snarky emails to strangers, laugh helplessly by myself in public, buy Pop Tarts, let papers with sensitive information (such as Mr. V's social security number) fly clear out the window, and watch Bones.

I don't know if you watch Bones but my crush on Mr Special Agent Booth came and went like Rocktober. All was well until this: we learned Booth looks down on organic food, judges even vaguely kinky sex, and thinks only skinny gals should love their own bodies. Seriously? This show is written for women. I am fairly sure there are only three men watching this show. This is who you give me for a romantic male lead? Mr "lose ten pounds get your pansy ass out of the farmers market and don't look at me in the eye"? Who writes this show, Stephanie Meyer? Try harder next time.

Then you read the actor cheated on his wife and even that little bit of you that remains sickly attracted to Booth flies away like sensitive information on windy days.

I'm breaking out. In one day I fed the girls both McDonalds and Chipotle. Along with the Pop Tarts I bought Kraft Macaroni and Cheese. If these aren't signs of mass systematic failure, I don't know what is. All systems overload! Vesuvius forgoes bananas for fruit loops, are we sure she has not been assassinated and replaced by Vesuvius from the Alternate Universe? The library called to inform me I would be sent to collections for an item that I lost and I blew my top.

I also got the fines removed and the fees waived. And no collections for me. Library Fascists.

Things like this are my lifelines: At Target there is a row of motion sensitive baby dolls. Every time we walk past them, they start to shake their heads about and wiggle their limbs and make creepy fake cooing noises.

And every time, Indy looks at them mistrustfully and tells me, "Those babies gonna kill me".

She's not scared or anything. Just acknowledging her own fate.

Now if only I could know mine.

Thank goodness I have a husband who makes me Cuban pork sandwiches and margaritas for mothers day.

And who allows me to select myself this little treasure.

Now we must collect them all. Mustn't we?