You're studying what, exactly?

So, quite a few people have asked me what on earth it is I am planning to go to school for, and each time I answer it starts with taking a very deep breath. It's a long and complex answer, but if you stay in for the whole She-bang, it's worth it. But to tell it even once probably requires a little history.
My son was loosely diagnosed with a developmental disorder 3 years ago. Each time I've asked for a more defined answer, I keep getting the same run around. Trying to get him into behavioral therapy recently, I hit so many roadblocks I wanted to throw myself off the balcony. Calling no less than 50 different therapy/counseling offices (I'm not exaggerating, I kept a flippin' log), I couldn't find one person who could take him in.
"I'm sorry, I'm completely booked" was the most common answer.
"Until you get a better diagnosis, we can't help you" kinda the reason I need help.
Why is it so godamn hard to get help for a child? I would imagine most parents would give up after this. But I'm unemployed, so I keep on callin' until my fingers turn blue and I kill the phone battery for the ninth time in a day. The more frustrated I get, the more phone calls I make.
I kept getting letters from the unemployment office, promising to "re-educate" my sorry butt, because apparently when they saw I was a career administrator, they discovered that particular job choice is yielding no jobs at the moment. I thought and thought about what I could possibly "re-educate" myself in that wouldn't lead to another dead end career. I need something stable, that allows flexible hours for my son's needs, and enough money to live on. Something that won't kill me by drudging through a day of meaninglessness might be nice, too. And if I'm going through the trouble of studying, well, it better be something I'm interested in.
Let's see...politics? Nah, "former stripper and video game fanatic" doesn't go to well on the campaign trail (well, maybe to an exclusive 18-35 year old male nerd demographic).
Art? Again? I laugh hysterically. Why advance my education for more worthlessness. My presentations are sooooooo pretty! Annnnnnnnd that's about all I got from THAT!
Computers? hmm...well, I could, but any education in that area requires math. And boy, do I hate math. Plus, educating myself in a hobby area could undo any pleasure I take in screwing with all things with circuitry. It happened with art the first time. I had to paint the same damn bird over and over and over again in different mediums. By the time the assignment was done I hated birds, hated 5 different art mediums, and hated art in general. I still to this day curse pictures of parrots.
Marketing...well, I've worked in the field endlessly, and I'm apparently damn good at it. But, well, there's something kinda skeevy in it all. Unless I could make a fortune marketing world peace, I feel a little dirty at the end of the day knowing I can "take pride" in convincing people to spend money on shit they weren't originally wanting to.
More administration classes...blegh. Glorified secretary at the end of the tunnel? Yea...not exactly what I'd want on my gravestone...
So, it comes down to the true question that seems to be on random surveys. "If you could do anything in the world, what would you really do?"
My answer, for the last 6 years, at least, has been "teach art to special needs children".
One person asked me why once, and I talked about my fascination with the study of neuroscience, and the theory that art can have a very positive impact on multiple levels with these kids. It can be used as therapy, as an outlet, as a means of simple joys.
Why not open an art camp for those kids, then?
Heck, let's go one step further, since we're still in the "anything in the world" dream state: Create an art camp for special needs children, a resource center for their parents, while also practicing therapy for special needs children with specialization on alternate therapies and enhanced education. Work with schools to develop in-house art-therapy programs, better special education programs.
huh...I better call a counselor.
STEP 1: Get Early Childhood Education certification. This'll just be an Associates of Technical Arts (ooh sounds fancy!), but it takes less than 2 years, lesser still with my previous credits from Cal, and allows me to start immediately working with these kids. Art camp can easily begin at this point, as I'd be teaching up to third grade in the school year and bored out of my skull come summer time. Pray my placement is in special ed! Also gives me foundation for the end goal, being able to create advancements in education for these kids.
STEP 2: Now that I'm working with the very kids I want to be helping, begin studies at UW in Developmental Psychology with a specialization in Neurolinguistics. Probably will take 4 years, because I'll only be going part time due to above-mentioned occupation. But teaching younger kids does allow a generously open schedule. Grading 2nd grader homework not as bad as trying to wrap my head around a high schooler's mangled essay, times 30.
I have a dog! His name is Spike vs. Yo, 'sup Dawg, so I reads t'tis book by that dead dude and it sux so hard.
At the end of the tunnel, I'm still young enough to have a thriving practice and accomplish these goals. It's weird when I can say "I'm only 30" instead of "crap, I'm already 30". I may not be done in time to help Anthony as a young child, but I can help others like him. And by doing this now, I have the internal strength I need to continue hammering away at the task of getting him the help he needs. I could just sit here feeling sorry for myself and him because help is so hard to find. But instead I will stand up and demand that help, and then make myself into better help for the next kid that this happens to. Give me my "save the world" cape, I got work to do!!!

Death, War, and Cemetaries Part 2

So, after awkwardly bumbling through my first anti-climactic failure at explaining death, I prayed I would have a several year cushion before having to revisit this subject. Honestly, I think summing up sex will be an easier process.
But on Saturday, Dad asked me to come with him to the Vietnam Memorial that was temporarily being shown at the Acacia Memorial Garden. So, I figured I'll try and wing it when it comes to explaining this to kiddo...but praying he'll ust get distracted by geting to wave a flag and this will be a breeze (I know, baaaaad mommy thought).
We get to the cemetary, and I realize it's one of those ones that has the little flat headstones doting their landscape, eschewing the large monolithic headstones. On a personal note, I hate those kind. Granted, I plan on being cremated and scattered. But if you are going to go through the trouble of being planted in the ground for "eternal slumber" you should get one of those big wonkin headstones with the pretty carvings or witty epitaphs. If you are going to be permanently "around", do it with some dang fanfare! Subtle, dignified, and serene...pshaw.
Anyways, so now we are trying to tell Anthony those are NOT stepping stones, and he would face some severe consequences should he dare place a foot near one. As we walked up, I had to pull the mommy card and answer "BECAUSE I SAID SO" when he kept asking why.
So, we get to the wall, and my dad wanders over to the book to look for names of the people he had served with. The sheer size of that memorial can really get to you, just sitting there realizing how many names are on it. We saw people taking rubbings of names of loved ones, and some cried as they ran their fingers over the engraving. Anthony stared quizzically at his surroundings, not really saying much, just watching people walk along the wall. He walked over to it for his own inspection, and then asked what all the words were. I gently explained that they were names of soldiers (he does know this term, as Mommy has several friends in the armed forces and has shown him pictures). He asked where those soldiers were, and then if they were the ones standing over to the side.
I pulled him to the side and thought about this one. My answers here could lead to a cascade of complicated questions. "Honey, you know how Chunk got sick and had to go away and not come back?"
"uh-huh"
"Well, all these people went somewhere, and aren't coming back. Their names are on this wall so we can remember them, because they were very special people."
"They're soldiers"
"yes. and soldiers should be remembered, and they are special"
"is this all names?" ok, keep in mind, I'm kinda paraphrasing, because my son's grammar is a little off, and it takes a bit of practice to actually put together what he's trying to get out.
"yes"
"is a lot of soldiers"
"yes"
"where did they all go to not come back?"
War. Son, they went to war. That's what soldiers do. You see soldiers as people I'm friends with who put on funny outfits, and some have pictures with guns. But those outfits mean they go away and use those guns against other people wearing slightly different outfits, and hope that it's the other person who "won't be coming back". War is supposed to be when we're the good guys and we're making the bad guys stop doing bad things, and when I eventually get to explain this to you, it will be that black and white. I'll save the shades of grey on this subject for an even further day. But for now, or at least, now being when I say this all to you, war is good guys stopping bad guys. And eventually they'll build another wall, and Mommy will take you to that one, too, and you'll see her make a rubbing and cry, like those people there. And maybe when that happens you'll understand that the name is of the soldier that is in the picture on our wall, and you'l know why he's not coming back, and how very special it is to remember these names.
"They went away to a far away place"
pause...toddler thought process working...
"they are crying..." he was looking at a couple who were knealing by a lower name, taking a rubbing of it and quietly mourning. Going by ages, I'm guessing it was a sibling.
"yes, like when mommy cried because Chunk couldn't come back home. They are crying because they see the name of someone else that they loved who couldn't come home"
So I see the gears in my son's head clicking, and realize he has now decided this is actually a wall of pets' names. Or maybe he thinks that Chunk now has an awesome outfit and a gun, because he seems quite satisfied with my bungled answers, and I am most certain his comprehension is missing some key elements in this puzzle.
As we walk back to the car, Anthony wants to know why he can't use the "stepping stones". So I tell him that those stones have names on them, like the wall, names of people who went away and aren't coming back. He begrudgingly accepts this answer, and gets in the car.
As my father gets in the car, though, I see him break down. I don't see this often, and it's always the most jaring thing to me. He was upset, frightfully upset, because he couldn't remember how to spell the names of the person he served with, so we couldn't find him on the wall. It was a common name, so it wasn't like we could wiggle through a guess. And he could only remember one name, although many in his original unit died there.
I hugged Dad, and tried to tell him it was ok. He had just been through so much emotional stress, his brain just wasn't bringing up certain details. Not knowing the name didn't mean they meant less to him. I know this didn't help, and I felt damn stupid saying it. I dared not utter the obvious, that I was secretly saying a prayer while we were there thanking "to whom it may concern" that my father's name wasn't on there.
As I let Dad compose himself, I notice that Anthony has watched this exchange quietly. I'm guessing he chose not to ask any more questions because the last few answers Mommy lobbed didn't make a lick of sense. His little mind had already dismissed a wall of names, and stepping stones that weren't for stepping. And I'm pretty sure he's determined that adults crying must be tied to a recent meteorological oddity.
Give me a couple of years, kiddo. I'll read some more books, talk to some therapists, and hopefully I'll have enough time to formulate a better answer. But for the sake of that precious innocence, I pray that time doesn't come for a very long time.

Death, War, and Cemetaries, Part 1

When I was 8 years old, my Grandmother died of cancer. I knew that she was dying, as I had been flown down in haste to be able to say goodbye, and I did grasp what was going on. Shortly after, there was a funeral, and I cried along with the rest of the family. We visited her grave a few years later, and I understood that Grandma was behind the stone in the Mausoleum, unmoving. This was my first experience with Death, as well as a cemetary.
When I was about 10, our country joined the Gulf War, and I watchedsome footage on the news, we talked about it in class, and my father explained his being a Veteran of the Vietnam Conflict. My little brain pondered all of the meanings of these realities, much more clarity was brought to previous grade school studies of wars, and I grasped the difficulties and gravities that war brings to a world. This was my first experience with War.
Unfortunately, my son has had a rather odd indoctrination into all three of these, and does not have the cognitive abilities to understand any of them. Perhaps I am thankful that he still retains these innocences.
When we first took Chunk to the vet, I explained that our feline was sick. Just like when Anthony had croup and went to see a doctor, Chunk was going to see a Kitty Doctor. The next day, the day we had to put Chunk down, I was crying uncontrollably. Anthony asked why mommy was crying.
"Mommy is crying because Chunk is sick. I love Chunky, and I don't want to see him sick and hurt. Sometimes when people we love very much are hurting, we hurt, too."
This was the best answer I could come up with.
My dad came with us, and quietly ushered kiddo away so that I could say goodbye. In the car, Anthony asked why we didn't take Chunk back from the vet.
"Chunk is still sick. Chunk is so sick that he's going to have to go away, and we won't be able to see him again"
"Is that why you said Goodbye? Because he's going away?"
"Yes. But he won't come back with us again, and that makes Mommy sad"
"But maybe when he's better, he can come back"
"Sometimes people, or kitties, don't get better, dear. And they just stay...gone"
"Oh. He'll stay with vet then"
So, basically my son thinks that Chunk has taken up residence at the vet clinic. I don't quite think permanent absence is a concept he can really wrap his head around. I think he has a bit of an idea of actual permanence, because he knows that Mommy and Daddy won't live together again. This sad truth he accepted head on at a very early age. It' amazing when you see how such a heavy concept can seem simple in the eyes of the very young. But to him it's a simple fact of his life, and has never been the worse for it.
But, when you think about it, this is a rather easy permanence to explain.
We lived together when you were born. Now we don't. You still see both of us, are loved by both of us, and your life goes on, just on a different path than it originated. Through the eyes of a child, this is a relatively simple concept, especially since it's a common truth for many families.
But permanently gone...well, that one's different. There is no alternate route there, that pathway just...stopped. To a child, all paths go forward, in front of him, indefinitely. There can't be an end when we're still at the beginning. To him, I'm not older, or further along my path. I'm just a much taller version of him, and it's only my height that lends me the ability to use knives or the stove. To him, I must be at the beginning of my path, too, because that's where he is, and I'm standing right beside him. Mommy was always Mommy, and will always be Mommy. He knows I have birthdays, and assumes that with having them, I will get bigger, too. In his mind, I should be the same size as Scott aaaaaaaaaaaaany day now...
I wish I could bottle that innocence. Only seeing many paths that go on forever, each one as rich as the next, and none have an end to halt me. It's a bittersweet momment seeing that innocence stare back at you. I thought of Bob, and how nice it would be to think of him eventually coming around, that giving up was a temporary problem. I thought of Josh, who could just be on the mend at some desert hospital tent, and there would still be a bear hug in the future. And of Victor. Quietly sitting in a hospital bed, he'd soon return to the apartment in Belltown, and we'd all go sit around the dingy little apartment that would always be there. And he'd get tired of the "Swiss Army Prosthetic" jokes, so he'd just regrow it and move on. Like all of the toys before that get mended (or secretly re-purchased).
Because in the eyes of a child, things don't go away forever. They can change, shift, switch directions. But there's no such thing as gone.

Chunkopotimus Maximus

Once upon a time my ex and I adopted two stray kitties. We were told they were littermates, and for some reason decided that meant they were boys, so named them after our favourite wrestling team, Buh-buh and Devon Dudley. Buh-buh was a quiet, timid little grey striped tabby. Devon was an outgoing but slightly awkward solid black tom. One night there was some strange noises, and we discovered, probably much after the two of them did, that Buh-Buh should've been Babette. So, we had a teenage mother on our hands, and a few months later I "midwifed" the three kitten litter she was carrying into the world. First came a little grey tabby, just like mommy! Then came a little black squirmer, just like daddy! Then came...a bright orange ball of fluff that more closely resembled a hamster with the legs of an overgrown jackrabbit.

In our one bedroom apartment, we certainly couldn't keep 5 cats. Sadly, right after having the kittens, Buh-buh displayed alarmingly ferile behavior, attacking both us and her offspring. After multiple lacerations and heroic kitten resues, we carted her off to a no-kill shelter, suggesting she perhaps find an outdoor residence. We quickly found a home for the black kitten, who was a feisty little girl. The grey one took a bit longer, and we named her mouse due to her comically large ears. As I had my sights set on keeping the orange one, we attempted to name him Spike (third member of the Dudley team for you wrestling impaired readers). However, his furry-ness only expanded, to the point where it stuck straight out and he looked as if he had been gently electricuted, so he was nicnamed, then later rechristiened, Chunk.

We finally found a home for his other sister, and he quietly readjusted to life with just Daddy Devon and his two humans. They both had an odd obsession with plastic bags, crawling itno trash recepticals and borrowing in grocery bags (whether empty or not). Chunk was hardly an affectionate cat, preferring to be rather aloof and stare at us from the other side of the couch. When he decided he wanted a quick pet, he would gnaw on the back of his intended victim. He did have a very odd habit of meowing irritatedly if we picked Devon up, like how dare he lower himself to human contact. The only change fixing him brought was that he talked less.

He continued his standoffishness when we moved to Edmonds, and would really only cuddle up to me, and that was rare. We discovered he had an inate fear of squirrels, as they would scamper up to our windows and Chunk would lose his mind trying to get away from them. When I left Rick, we agreed that I would take Chunk and he would take Devon. He made it very clear how much he disliked the giant orange complaint machine. As soon as Chunk and I moved into the new apartment, he seemed to have a drastic change in personality. Suddenly he had to sleep everynight curled next to my chest (I feared if he actually curled up on my chest, I wouldn't be able to breathe). He would follow me from room to room, and would climb onto whatever lap was made available. We discovered the "self cleaning option" on him, basically, if you scratched the back of his neck, he would convulse for a second and then go into what seemed to be a compulsory licking of himself. The more you scratched, the more fervent his licking became. If you scratched his back, the licking would increase in velocity and include heavy breathing, so we called it light wash and heavy load. When Scott moved in, his cats seemed to delight in jumping out and Chunk to scare the daylights out of him. Eros attempted a play fight with him once, and was quickly on the receiving end of what we could only describe as a full body slam. When Chunk walked away, Eros sat there, looking quite dazed!

For the last three years, pretty much everyone who saw Chunk got "loved" by him. He was a glutton for food and affection. There was not a single night that cat wasn't right up in my face getting his purr on. It's genuinely hard to remember that at one point he wasn't this cuddly. His weight steadily grew, and he was definitely owning his name. Sadly, his weight also made him rather clutzy. He had trouble making it onto the bed sometimes, or the back of the couch, and we'd have to stifle our giggles watching him do his frantic scramble to get his heavy hindquarters to catch up with the rest of him. There is nothing more goofy looking that seeing his wide-eyed face pop up, fore-paws desperately clawing at the covers, then disappear with a THUD.

Even more ridiculous was Chunk's eating habits. He would only eat dry food, and would give you a disgusted look should you attempt to give him wet food. The one time I saw him try it he smacked his lips patheticly, like the texture was just freaking him out. He would, however, follow you if you had a bowl of ice cream, or...potatoe chips. Most cats saw tuna from a can as a treat, but to Chunk, it was goldfish crackers. Popcorn was also another favourite of his.

I don't want to go into details of his final days. Needless to say he had either a stroke or a brain tumor, either of which was causing his body to shut down rapidly. It took them a day to figure it out, and by then he lost all control of all function from the waist down. The vet did give me the option to try pregnazone, which could've possibly kept him alive for "up to a month", but his life would've been terrible in that month. I chose to let him go humanely, rather than prolong any misery. I hugged him goodbye, and sat there bawling into his fur for a few minutes. I don't think I've stopped crying, because sitting on the couch I keep thinking he should be next to me. Going to bed I kept reaching for him, expecting his firm headbutt on my shoulder.

I'm guessing people who don't have cats/pets would see this much grief for a furry one as odd. I guess I'm a crazy cat lady. But Chunk was my companion through so much. He was a part of my life. He was a damn cool cat, fat as hell, with the heart and mindset of a cat much more delicate. I don't want to replace him, because he was so unique, it's hard to imagine another animal taking his place. I'll be mourning for a while.

Last night I remembered Bob had loved Chunk (pretty much anyone who met Chunk fell in love with him). He sat on my couch for a while just triggering the self-clean reaction and laughing. That was two weeks before Bob took his life, actually.

I'd like to think he's taking care of Chunk for me now. Feed him goldfish crackers, Bob, and don't forget to scratch his neck.