Livin', Lovin', Learnin'

Well, it has been a looooooooooooooong time since I've sat down and written anything meaningful in here. Is anyone even still reading?
I've pretty much just been riding the tides of life of late, and boy has it been one hell of a journey. I suppose this is what makes up the spice of life, but it's damn tiring living the one that I do. See, in case I haven't made it abundantly clear, I have an extremely FULL life. I work six days a week, and each of those days starts at 5:30 in the morning. I wake, start the coffee, rush myself into getting ready and most of the week, hurry to get the wee one ready at the same time. After begging him to finish his 'nana, we scamper off to the bus for an hour plus commute full of wriggling, whining, and general fuss making because apparently being three and a half and having to ride a boring ol' commuter bus just AIN'T happenin. Granted, I've been able to master a few tricks to ply complacency out of Sir Stubborn, like timing a thingie of his favourite yogurt for the switch in busses midway during our commute, and having him recite every colour of ever ad on the ceiling. Sometimes it works, othertimes I end up climbing off the bus at our stop with him screaming in my arms and every other commuter on there cursing my existence. The sitter picks him up at the coffee shop next to my work, and I get through my entire day complete with checking my now drasticly reduced paycheck (thanks, corporate fuckers!), having no time for lunch, only two staff members worth a shit, and then scrambling to meet the sitter at 6, climb on the bus, and drag him home (that commute is even worse. tired baby + long commute + crabby co-passengers = my own private hell). We have just enough time when I walk in the door to play the I Don't Want THAT For Dinner game, pop kiddo into a bath for Splashfest, and then curl up into bed with him to read the same damn Curious George book over and over and over again. I get the remaining two hours of my day to snuggle into Scott, maybe watch TV or whine until he lets me take over the TV to whack away at whatever video game suits my fancy. Since he bought me a crazy amount for Christmas, I got options. It rocks. I love my boyfriend!
So here's the kicker...that's only three days a week. The other three of my work days are pretty terrifying. On Thursdays I go through the usual routine except I get to play roulette with hoping that the ex dragged his ass out of bed to meet me at our busstop for a baby exchange. If he misses the first bus, I have exactly one half hour to blow up his phone and yell him onto the next one so I'm only moderately late. After the 7:02 bus goes, I am forced to take a cab, a la last Thursday. Remember that trip to the hospital I took in Sept? That shit is setting me back 2,500$. Mama can't afford a fucking $30 cab ride right now because her sorry ass ex can't drag his carcass out of bed to snag custody for a whopping day and a half.
IF all goes well I get to snag an hour of "me time" on the bus giddily playing with the DSLite afformentioned wonderboyfriend bestowed upon me for christmas (I am soooooooo incredibly spoiled, seriously!!!). I scared some guy the other day because he realized that whilst happily stylussing my critter around a cutesypoo town on Animal Crossing, I was nodding my head to Icon of Coil. Apparently the dichotomy of this broke something in the poor man's head. Now, because I am "only" working a nine hour day during the four working days I have my son, I get to spend the other two working eleven hour shifts. See, my paycheck got this nice big kick in the nads, and as a side dish, my hours got increased, too. I was originally paid 2,200 a month based on some fantasy 45 hour work week as a salaried individual. I'm now paid 1,500 as an HOURLY employee based on a 51 hour worok week (since that 1,500 is including overtime, how fucking nice) with no monthly bonus. Oh, to make up for it they rebestowed our SPIFFs. Well, teh vendor provided ones at least. It couldn't possibly come from the company who makes a fortune fucking us over...
So, the light at the end of this long, frustrating, time consuming and incredibly thankless tunnel is that I get that magic one day off a week, and I do live it up. I sleep in as much as Anthony lets me, and spend the morning snuggling with that precious little man on the couch. I happily endure Handy Manny and Sesame Street and Johny and the Sprites so I can inhale babyhair and feel little hands curl around mine. He has this ridiculous sweet habit if he's sitting on my lap, he'll reach a hand around to my cheek, pat it and mumble "Love you, mommy"...just because. While he takes his nap Scott and I lounge on the couch and enjoy a cup of coffee and talk about our random ideas for our future. We'd like to move to a bigger place, one with a yard and a studio space for me to paint again. I really haven't since I moved in here, both from lack of time and space. I hop onto the computer on a rare occassion to check the job listings, because quite frankly, I can't give my life to a company like this when they shit on us as badly as they just did. The paycuts were brutal, and I got passed over for a store closer to my home and would've taken a lesser cut in pay for a fucking rookie just because she belonged to a damn clique of kissasses. I loved the Shack dearly, but apparently it could give two shits less about the people working there, and that's a company philosophy I can no longer support. Especially because being a Single Mother is apparently the fucking mark of death in this workplace. I long for the simplistic nine to five I hear so often spoke of by my friends in the normal, non-retail world. I yearn for health benefits that don't cost $200 a month just to minimally cover my son and I.
So, I suck at keeping touch with my friends, hardly ever venture on line to commune with my homies, and yeah...don't have much time for anything that resembles normalcy. Maybe when I was younger this level of hectic was do-able, with not anymore. But I'm makin' it work as best I can, loving my family as much as humanly possible, and learning the hard way that being a single parent in this world sucks and takes the effort of everyone around you just to work. Thank god I have amazing people in my life who can cheer me on, though.
I love you guys.
Keep wavin' those pom poms.