There is one thing that I am very adept at and that is leaping into things without cleverly assessing the obstacles that lurk ahead.

For example, the first time I went rollerblading I provided great entertainment for my sister Michele as I launched forward on my blades down a paved mountain road, diving off to the side to save myself from dying only to result in huge gravel encrusted raspberries scrapes.

Then there was the time that my “good friend” Jeff Rogers took me snowboarding for the first time, convincing me that lessons were for “wa wa’s”. I flew down the mountain feeling like a champion until THWAM! And the lights went out. I came to with tears streaming out of my eyes, a slight concussion and a whiplashed neck that to this day gives me pain. One would think that with age would come wisdom but not for this puppy.

Growing up, May was a magical month with cherry blossoms blooming and horsey ride birthday parties but with my son’s passion for Lacrosse, my birthday and Mother’s Day are swept to the wayside to accommodate the weekend Lacrosse Tournaments that are held that same weekend, every year.

Lacrosse was the popular sport of my high school where not a single Wagoneer with wooden paneling would drive by without the bumper sticker, “chicks love our sticks,” plastered to the back. I was a big fan, hanging out on the sidelines with my girlfriends to drool over the shirtless boys practicing after school. Now it is my boys who are playing and I am on the sidelines, this time actually paying attention to the game and cheering them on.

Two years ago, when I found out that Wade couldn’t come to Brevitt’s big Lacrosse Tournament in Denver, I decided to make that treacherous leap and take the three boys to the Tournament by myself, one of the stupidest decisions I have ever made in my life.

My very poor dyslexic navigational skills were in short circuit and I got lost every time we left the hotel. I was in full survival mode without the proper tools to get me by.

The parking lot alone at the Lacrosse fields was treacherous with hundreds of vehicles making abrupt maneuvers to steal a coveted parking spot. Once we parked I had to face the impossible challenge of finding the correct field.

Wade’s parents lived nearby and were my saving grace, guiding me to the field every game. Drenched in a panicked sweat, their dysfunctional daughter-in-law would arrive and dump their enormous sleeping two and a half year old grandson, Tucker, into their laps along with all of the Lacrosse equipment, all the while attempting to unsuccessfully conceal my inefficiencies so that they wouldn’t get too concerned that I was an inadequate wife to their son and mother to their grandsons.

I was in a living hell and getting madder by the minute that my other “friends,” all well seasoned in the routine, chose to not recognize that I needed help. I whirled in like the Tasmanian Devil, teeth nashing, with three disheveled boys. As soon as we would jump into the freezing pool, my  lounging, mojito drinking “friends”, whose calmness was beginning to get on my nerves,  would begin to round up their kids for the next game, giving me the sign that I should do the same. By the end of the weekend, I promised myself to search for a new set of more caring friends when I returned home.

For the last game, we were later than usual and Brevitt could not find his cup, “it’s this or we go home,” I yelled, ready to commit Hari Kari, and he ran off in tears with the top of my coffee mug tucked into his shorts for protection.

May is here once again and we just returned from our first Tournament away in Grand Junction. Things went a whole lot smoother this time and I was all to happy to no longer be a rookie in the world of kid sports.

Over the weekend, I looked but did not see anybody who needed saving but I’m guessing that most mother’s are far smarter than I and know to stay at home when the odds are so greatly against them.

I found this great challenge online called the Half Drunk Challenge. I was excited to partake in this challenge, not only because after a year of writing I have needed to rid myself of the thin embryonic veil that I have enveloped myself in but also because I have something to get off of my chest. In fact, I was so excited about this opportunity to let go that I obsessively wrote three posts in the past few days which will be released in the next few posts but in the end, even though they were subjects that I would not normally write about, I felt they were still way too contrived.

So, here it is, the big, bad, ugly truth:

I am a witch. Not a wicked witch, at least not the story book quintessential wicked witch. I’m a dysfunctional witch who has yet to discover all of her powers and it is my mother who knows my witchiness more than all others, accepting me for what I am, a moody, intolerant and irrational child.

“Don’t be ridiculous”, she cries trying to understand my insanity. “Your working too hard, your too hard on yourself, having three boys is difficult, get some sleep, stop waking up at 5:00am” but having somebody who totally understands me and makes excuses for my poor behavior doesn’t make it any easier.

Basically, I am a witch without the benefits! No magical broom to fly off on when I need it the most, no ability to cast spells or make potions to right all of the wrongs, just your ordinary  witch who can’t rise above the noise to call forth her inner good.

The good news is that when I am not being wickedly intolerant I am a very, very good and beautiful witch. Not like Glinda from the Wizard of OZ, although I do hail from the North. On that note promise to do me a favor, if you ever catch me in a frilly, tulled pink dress like Glinda’s please take me out back and shoot me. Anyway, I couldn’t be Glinda because I don’t have her sweet voice and sexy mole on my chin, or am I remembering her incorrectly?

Sooo, I’ve established that Glinda I am not, but when I am good, oh boy do I thrive on it to a point where people think I am nuts as I throw my love around to those who are capable of handling it.

If only I could hold onto the greater good all of the time and not let the bad reveal my scary self to my three little boys…hang on a second, they are the ones who call forth my badness with their inability to listen when we say it is bedtime because their fantastic innate clock tells them that 7:30pm is ding a ling, wake up and get crazy time.

They may cringe at the black pointy hat and wart on my chin that reveal that my deep and dark annoyances are getting the best of me but it is me and Wade who cringe at their loss of hearing. They shouldn’t have to accept and forgive me for all of my wickedness but I am all that they have for a mother and so they have no choice.

Call me witchy poo if you dare but even witches become witchy for a reason and if you wake up with your tongue tied in a knot, don’t go asking why because nobody will understand you.

Tucker stayed home with me yesterday. What is it about children that they fall on the days that their mother is planning to take off? I mean really, where’s the sense of humor in that?

When I realized that my most needed day of recovery from my treacherous week was not going to happen I looked up to the Universe and had a little conversation to anybody who would listen, “I really want to know, I’m being serious now, did I do something terribly wrong in my previous life or even in this life that I am unaware of?

Oh I know, I shouldn’t have left Tucker in the car that one time he was sleeping.  The time I raced in to get a Chai Tea from Starbucks which I knew I shouldn’t have been spending my money on in the first place but was feeling rebellious and when I came out of the store with my frothy, delicious cup of decadence I was met by a fleet of policemen with lots of questions. Upon reflection, I admit that I let my selfish desire to pamper myself get the best of me but didn’t I learn my lesson?”

“Oh..wait, I remember now, it must have been the time that I backed into the parked car forgetting as always about my huge bike rack, that wasn’t good that I  crashed and dashed, was it? Anyway, I was certain that the dent had been there for years and I couldn’t have possibly been the one who was responsible for it.”

I never did get any answers and so I changed my mindset and spent the day jumping on top of Tucker, staring into his incredibly luminous eyes and dark lashes  and making him giggle. When we weren’t rolling around together I resumed  to  the multitude of phone calls I had to make to desperately try to avoid plunging further into debt.

When I received the email that I was invited to go away for a weekend of indulgence with my good friends I bent over and slammed my head against my desk a few times arising with tears of frustration.

I wrote an email that made me feel slightly better and pressed send:

I have reached the dark and diaphanous pit of my bank account, and have no money to join you this weekend. ZILCH, NADA, flat out broke like a kinda gimme, buy me , do me kinda broke. I got no bling. I got nothin’ to offer.

Although, spending a weekend with you and yours; spaaing it up, reading,  hiking/running and consuming major amounts of alcohol sounds over the top appealing, I shall have to pass it by and drown at home…alone… in my sorrows.

Every month bankruptsy hovers over us and  I contemplate selling a child to pay our mortgage. It gets more and more difficult to remain positive and I have nothing left to fall back on.

Just as I swore that I would never be one of those moms who talked about bowel movements, I also swore that I would never let money come in between Wade and my relationship. But life is not black and white and Wade and I are struggling to hang on to each other and everything that we are responsible for. It was far easier to control conversations about babies than it is to control our spiraling finances.

On the bad days I think about how the best way to save money would be to take Tucker out of pre-school. If that happens I cannot possibly write with Tucker at my heels. If I lose my freedom to write than I will most likely lose my sanity and if I lose my sanity than I will lose Wade and if I lose Wade than I will lose Brevitt and Axel who will blame me for everything and if I lose my children than you may as well shove me into a box with a huge weight on it and throw it overboard.

Sometimes I cannot believe how numb I have become to all the negativity that I am confronted with month to month and sometimes I spend my time driving with blurred vision as the tears role down my face. I know that we are not alone in our struggle, everywhere I turn I witness other families struggling and I cry for them as well.

Other times I look at the way the light hits the Autumnal wild grass turning it a beautiful and earthy shade of gold and I marvel at the low lying clouds hugging the mountains in their soft embrace and I get filled with an intense happiness. I still have my husband, my children, my mother, my sister’s, my friends and all of our health. I live in a beautiful place, I can rely upon nature to be my Prozac and I have a good sense of humor that I can call upon at any moment to help me through the tough times.

So pfffft, just ignore me, I’m fine actually. It’s just that my friends have told me that I should write a little more about the adversity in my life and not sound so goddamn happy all the time. So there it is. Do with it what you may!