Category: Family Life

Meet my family and follow along as we traverse the sometimes unfamiliar waters of ADHD, Epilepsy, and life as a ministry family.

I’m Riding in the Tour de Cure: Go Team Phoenix Rising

Deana2 Comments

photo (2)Okay, I know I said I wouldn’t post while under the influence of cold meds, BUT I have got to share this with you guys. It’s official. My group of friends have all agreed (mostly all anyway) to ride with me in the Tour de Cure this year for ADA. I rode alone last year — yes they sent me out as the scout. I came back alive and so they’ve decided if I didn’t die, neither will they. That and the sub-culture at my husband’s office is one of physical fitness and it seems everyone and their grand-kids signed up this year —

Because I didn’t know what to expect, I only rode 10 miles last year — this year I’ve signed up for 25. All road, no trail that I know of . YIPES. (put paper sack over face, breathe deep, I can do this!)  Most of the team will hang at the 25 mark because this is their first ride for ADA. My base is presently at about ten miles, all trails, zero road. I need to up that over the next ten weeks or so in order to get ready — and ready I will be. I have to be ready, I’m the team captain for heaven sake. I mean how would it look if the captain dies mid route?

It would look bad.

Granted these riders are pros. They know what they are doing. They really just needed me to co-ordinate everything for them. I’m like the Wedding Planner only cooler. All they have to do is train and show up — I got the rest.

I have not ridden 25 or more consecutive miles on a bike since that day back in 1989 where Jeff (my then boy friend, now husband) tried to kill me. I still did not know my way around Chicago so when he suggested we take a “fun bike ride” from Niles IL to the Botanical Gardens, I had no idea how far it was.

I spent the night sleeping on the floor of my apartment with every muscle in my body seizing up because that was where I landed when we got back and getting up was not possible. I couldn’t walk right for a week. I should add, I was also in my best physical shape possible, weighing in at a whopping 124 pounds. I ran cable and installed PBX systems for a living. I rocked. And I still almost died.

And here I am ready to do it again — some 24 years later. HA This time, I’ll be prepared. This time I’m training. This time I have to because I don’t weigh 124 lbs anymore. My “diet” took a fun turn in December and January while I blew off some much-needed steam. (Translated, I decided to throw a major temper tantrum) I may have over enjoyed my newly discovered friends: Zacapa Rum,  and Glen’s Fiddich and Livet, My Irish Friend Jameson and my new favorite girlfriend Miss Tequila Rose with a splash of Baileys. I also discovered yummy smoothies made with avocado, cucumbers and coconut milk that probably pack half a days calories per pinch as well. While my calorie intake from food remained at 1,300-1,500, I’m afraid my beverage consumption offset that terribly.

Explaining to my doctor on Monday why I didn’t lose the ten pounds he suggest I lose two months ago was awkward and embarrassing.  He used the word “moderation” and I’m like okay, yeah, probably a good idea at this point. Alcohol has a lot of empty calories and I can either continue to be a brat or I can suck it up, find my resolve to get back in shape and start again. I’m not a heavy drinker, never have been, I just didn’t pay attention to the caloric intake and I’m paying for it with my lack of weight loss.

My temper tantrum is over.

I used to be an athlete.

I used to be a model.

I’m neither of those things today.

I’m not used to having to work at it. At least I didn’t consider it work when I was competing at Shaolin and Tai Chi. It was just fun.

Guess I need to learn how.

Now is as good a day as any.

CC_TourDeCure_190x190 Click on the Photo and Support My Ride!

My Favorite Superbowl Commercial: And on the 8th Day

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While I wasn’t raised on one, I come from a long line of farmers. This is a wonderful heritage. Paul Harvey nailed it.

Excuse me whilest I lie here and bleed

Deana12 Comments

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My money and I have parted ways. It’s been a horrible breakup really. Dollar bills flying out the window, while I sit on the floor crying, begging them to come back. I make false promises of goodness and mercy, but they don’t listen. They know I’m lying. Truth is if I could hang on to enough of them, I’d just hand them over to my hair dresser anyway — my roots are showing, I’m desperate. I’m almost willing to go without food if it means staying a red head for a little bit longer.

My husband however, is not as committed to my vanity. He lies and tells me he likes my roots and thinks I should grow them out. After all, if I’m as committed to GMO free and organic food as I say I am, does it not make sense to stop poisoning myself with expensive hair dye? rhoda

I tell him to stop trying to confuse me with logic. Vanity is no match for truth at this point. If this keeps up, I’m going to wind up channeling my inner Rhoda.

In spite of my desperate pleas to stay, my dollar bills continue to leave me for greater loves like college tuition, a new furnace, a blown engine (which required a new to us car for my son), property taxes, dock fees, my sons meds, caring for my parents, my comedy habit, and physical therapy. Not to mention the usual things like food, utilities, and my mortgage; now it seems they want to leave me for my laptop.

I am presently laptopless — which sounds waay dirtier than I mean that. My laptop is my life people!

Let me just say that every letter in the alphabet is important, especially those that are part of your passwords and when that one letter doesn’t work, all heck breaks loose. There’s no getting onto Facebook, or Twitter, or your bank account or… if you’re like me this week  – YOUR WHOLE STINKIN LAPTOP.

There is no work around. Trust me, I’ve tried!

My life is locked away in a 4 lb it’s”gotta be pink because it’s cute” Dell processor. My banjo practice videos, my art work, my writing, my jokes, my blog. ALL of it – locked away from my prying eyes, because one stupid letter has gone awry.

Desperate to access my “life in a hard drive” I did the unthinkable. I pried off the offending letter in hopes that if I applied appropriate pressure to that little dot beneath the key, my letter would somehow resuscitate itself.

Didn’t work.

And to add insult to injury, adjoining keys have now bailed in protest. Nice. Traitors.

Which means I get to suck up what’s left of my redheaded pride, put on a hat, go to some geek rescue store and try to explain what happened. That’s not going to be cheap. Nor are these children going to care that I have a computer degree (from 1986, I know don’t laugh). They are going to look at my keyboard, and then try to sell me a new computer. My laptop is MAYBE five years old, I don’t want a new computer, or their goofy software that they will no doubt load trying to up sell me something. I just want my keys to work properly.

I need another expense right now like I need 10 more pounds. And no, I do not wish to discuss the ten pounds I gained over Christmas leaving me 20 in the hole with my doctor’s goal of “just lose ten by Valentines Day, can you do that?” — sigh. Hoping for a miracle here.

monkeysee-harness-01There is good news in this wine and cheese fest. I won something this week that will help me – not with the money, or my hair, but with my weight. See that pretty harness? It’s from MonkeySee in Australia. My friend Ashley B. over at Women Cyclists Blog (Seriously check her out, I love her blog and I’m not just saying that because I won free stuff, I promise.) did a product review and hosted a giveaway. I won. Yeah me!  I got to go online and order my own (I got pink of course) and I can’t wait to get it. Yes, I will review it for you guys. This looks like a killer product. Actually anything that makes me visible to motorists at night and helps me stay alive rocks in my book.

So you see, it’s not all bad. And I do realize in the grand scheme of things, not being able to afford to get my hair done is not the end of the world. There are people far worse off than I. So don’t send me hate mail, okay?  I am “cowgirling up” as they say in Oklahoma and I am gonna ride — maybe not a horse per se’, but at least my bike.

Have a great weekend you guys.

24 Years Ago Today

Deana1 Comment
Our Engagement Photo from 1990, Looks straight out of John Hughes Casting, doesn't it?
Our Engagement Photo from 1990, Looks straight out of John Hughes Casting, doesn’t it?

I used to be a computer technician in Chicago back in the 80’s. One day I got a trouble ticket for a computer in customer service. Seems some guy had seen me on the floor and spilled coke in his keyboard so that he could meet me. ( I don’t blame him really, I mean I was a babe. 😉 ) I took it downstairs and replaced it with another keyboard with a faulty space bar, because well, I thought he was kinda cute. I tortured that man for two months before agreeing to go out with him. Every week he’d ask me out, every week I’d say no. He finally tells me that he plays bass guitar in a band (yep, he played the guitar card.) and I agreed to ONE date. We went out for pizza and then a comedy club on December 3, 1988. I’ve been his ever since. 24 years later, a move across country, two wonderful boys (now grown men) and I still wouldn’t have it any other way. Love you babe!

 

It’s My Faith, Not my Comedy, That Helps me “Cope”

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“How do you separate the hyperbole from reality when you are with other comics?”

It depends entirely on the location and the relationship. If we’re friends we’re real. But we’re not always really friends, sometimes we’re just peers.

I can’t believe you know so-and-so! That is so cool!

No, I don’t know them.

But they are on your Facebook and you have pictures with them!

Sigh.

Being peers with someone, running into each other once or twice a year and photo ops, does not equal “Knowing” them. I get to meet a lot of cool people as a writer and as a comic, but that doesn’t mean we are friends. I am at best an acquaintance with some of them and just a fan for most others.  A good example of that is somewhere in this vast world are photos of me with Johnny Cole and Huey Lewis, but it doesn’t mean we are friends or even know each other. The back story to those photos is the questionably legal introduction and being sent home by Mr. Lewis because he rightly assessed that while I might be of legal age, I really wasn’t that bright (defined as I was too naive for my own good)  and my cute self and barely there black dress definitely did not belong in front of their hotel in downtown Detroit back in 1987.  My enthusiasm for meeting Mr. Cole surpassed all common sense, not to mention several city ordinances. Mr Lewis was a much-needed voice of reason and protected me from knowing more than I had bargained for. So, I have photos that prove we met, but that doesn’t mean we know each other. Thank God.

The false belief of knowing someone happens a lot today. We read news stories, books, Tweets, Facebook statuses, blogs and we gain this false sense of personal intimacy. We come to believe that we really know said person, when in actuality we don’t. Not really anyway. I’ll admit that I’ve been guilty of that myself. True intimacy requires more than just internet snippets. True intimacy requires face time, honesty, humility, and mutual transparency. True intimacy is a commitment.

The word intimacy can really be broken down into three words: Into Me See.

Even though I’ve lived in 12 step rooms since I was 12 and been telling my story from a podium since I was 14, it’s my inner most circle that knows the really real me. They know the whiny sometimes feeling put upon raised an only child who says yes as quickly as she says no for all of the wrong reasons. The sometimes kind to a fault, wishes she had more of a spine when it counted me.  They are the committed, tried, true, trusted, and wholly loved individuals that trudge this road of happy destiny. True to life for all of us, other people just get glimpses behind the curtain from time to time.

A behind the curtain glimpse for you guys – I don’t use comedy to cope, I don’t tell jokes about actual people I know (unless I have their permission), and it’s my faith (messy and crayola scribbled that it is) that gets me through life. 

While I have been guilty of perhaps “over sharing” some of my recent health issues on my private Facebook page at the request of several long distance friends who are going through the same thing, I do tend to keep the private out of the personal. Most of my stories and jokes are actually a conglomerate of events and people. The theme and overall message are the same, I’ve just changed it up enough that the guilty are protected.

I’m the same way with my comedy, I never tell jokes about individual people per se’, I do however write and tell jokes about circumstances and events that crack me up. Unless I have someone’s permission up front to include them in my jokes, I don’t. Even my doctor jokes are a conglomerate of several people and focus on the awkwardness of the situations caused by aging, than the physician himself. For those of us old enough to remember Phyllis Diller, her husband “fang” wasn’t real either. She made up a persona that skyrocketed her to stardom.

There are a few things that have been said to me recently that I would really like to speak to today if you don’t mind.

1. If I lived your life, I’d smoke too. — Said by my cardiologist last year based on a 5 minute conversation.   No, you wouldn’t. I smoke today (on and off) because I’ve been smoking since I was 17. I’m addicted. Smoking because of life circumstances is a cop out, call it what it is. I’m an addict prone to selfishness on occasion and tend to self destruct when feeling overwhelmed, it really is that simple.

2. I suppose being a stand up comic is a great coping mechanism — Not really. I don’t use comedy to cope. I use it to entertain, to show people the underbelly of life sometimes thereby making people think and to help bring levity to life circumstances. I find that when I use comedy as a coping mechanism or even a shield (as I’m sometimes prone to do) my humor becomes barbed and has a toxic bite. I don’t want that. I want people to feel good when leaving my show instead of feeling dirty. You know?

3. It’s my faith in something bigger than me, that helps me cope — While it was my mother who taught me how to say bedtime prayers, I really learned how to pray reading Judith Blume’s “Are You There God, it’s Me Margaret?” For those of you who are unfamiliar with that book, let me just say it’s a book about a young girl who wasn’t changing quickly enough to suit herself and she talked to God about it, daily, as if he were her friend. If that isn’t the story of my life.

The older I get the less willing I am to put God in some kind of black and white box. The more research I do on religion and spirituality, the more I realize that the debates out there aren’t about proving God is real or the facts surrounding history, so much as they are proving who is the smartest. I used to listen in on the modern debates between pastors and I get frustrated at the direction things go. There are too many egos out there for me today.  If even the greatest scholars of today (and yesterday) can’t nail down the facts, I’m not about to try.

I just know today when it comes to knowing me — the really real me, I have this power greater than myself that I choose to call God. It’s that relationship that trumps all others. The one that sees through all my stuff and meets me exactly where I am no matter how messy, how confused, scared, sometimes lost, angry or happy I really am. Sometimes I lose faith and hope and ask to borrow a friend’s for a few days. That’s okay as well. It doesn’t matter to me if this relationship doesn’t make sense to others. It’s wholly mine. And I like it. It’s a relationship that is as real to me as the end of my nose, covered in Grace and Love, and Peace. It’s a relationship where instead of my pulling back the curtain for a glimpse, he tore it for a full view.

I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that I am wholly loved and fully known by the God of the universe – that’s all I need to know. That is how I cope.

Wishing all of my American readers a very happy Thanksgiving.

Recalculating

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I used to think I had 1,001 reasons to hate men, turns out I have 1,001 reasons to hate one man and the rest of the poor saps just caught the shrapnel. — Fisher’s of Men.

Fisher’s of Men is not a new story that woke me up one night wanting to be written. It’s a story that really began in a home for unwed mothers in Utica NY in 1965 and is working it’s way to resolution with every new step, every new discovery and every word I write. It’s a story that has to be written and desires to be told. It’s a story that is almost universal in nature and bigger than me. It’s story that I have been asked to share on stage since I was 14. It’s also a story that I thought I could write during National Novel Writers Month. 50,000 words. Piece of cake I thought.  I’ve discovered it’s also a story that can’t be wrapped up that neatly yet.

The first few days, the first week even the words flew off my finger tips onto my keyboard and into my hard drive. I know everything there is to know about her, after all I created her. I’ve eaten, slept, and breathed her into existence for over 47 years. I know her inside out and backwards. She’s a mix of things, sinner and saint, lover and fighter. Porcupine and Pollyanna. She’s full of self-knowledge and yet it avails me nothing. My protagonist doesn’t resolve. Every story has a beginning, a catalyst and resolution.  She needs to resolve in order for the story to be complete.

When I couldn’t make her resolve, I ran to my cove in order to be alone and find my ending. I firmly believe that every writer should have a body of water to live near or at least visit. There is truth in water and it’s boundaries. And if you are lucky and listen closely the wind will catch it’s truth and carry it to you.  I spent the weekend wandering the boundaries of my cove hoping to find clarity when the truth hit me square in my gut with such force it almost took my breath away. My protagonist doesn’t resolve because I don’t. Fisher’s of Men isn’t a piece of fiction, it’s my life story. It’s me. Until I resolve, my story will remain in a state of crux.

One of my writing buddies spoke this weekend about how her word for 2013 flew in the window and jumped up and bit her. Much like the wands in Harry Potter that choose the wizard, certain words choose the author, not the other way around. That’s what happened to me. I’m not ready for it, I have no idea what to do with it, but here it is. My word for 2013 is RESOLVE.

This will be a word of rich depth, broad meaning, and many layers. I looked it up. Like me, it’s meanings are wide and varied. One of my favorite definitions so far the the transitive verb, to solve an equation again with new values. That has a nice ring to it, don’t you think? Maybe the whole reason Kat(that was her name) and I don’t resolve is because we’ve been using the incorrect values in the equation.

2013 – is going to be a year of recalculating.

From Wikidictionary.com
Verb
resolve (third-person singular simple present resolves, present participle resolving, simple past and past participle resolved)
  1. (transitive) To find a solution to (a problem).
  2. (transitive) To solve again.
    I’ll have to resolve the equation with the new values.
  3. (intransitive) To make a firm decision to do something.
    I resolve to finish this work before I go home.
  4. To come to an agreement or make peace; patch up relationship, settle differences, bury the hatchet.
    After two weeks of bickering, they finally resolved their differences.
  5. (transitive, intransitive, reflexive) To break down into constituent parts; to decompose; to disintegrate; to return to a simpler constitution or a primeval state.
  6. (music) to cause a chord to go from dissonance to consonance

In Search of my brain

Deana3 Comments

 

Country Girls, Chatter Boxes, Lobotomies and Life

Deana3 Comments

hy·per·bo·le

   [hahy-pur-buh-lee]

1. obvious and intentional exaggeration.
2. an extravagant statement or figure of speech not intended to be taken literally, as “to wait an eternity.”

Have you ever tried to tell a joke to someone and have them stare at you like you have a third eye? Me too. I’m amazed at how many people do not recognize hyperbole from reality, especially when it comes to humor. In light of that recent discovery,  I want to clarify a few points for my literalistically thinking friends and followers. (I’m pretty sure I made that word up, but you know what I mean.)

While my girlfriends and I love to talk about Johnny Depp, we’re not about to leave our husbands for him. He’s a brilliant actor for sure, but that’s all. And if you still do not understand the nuances of hyperbole, go read some Anne Lamott. She is a strong influence on my writing style today.

I did not really go buy a little black dress, red lipstick and fish-net stockings when I read “Follow me and I will make you fishers of men.” That is what we call a joke. All references to my “catch and release program” in Fishers of Men simply refer to how insecure, clingy and naive I was in my younger years.

Even though I think they are charming as heck, cowboys do not really give me the hiccups. Yes I did blush and giggle the very first time I met one, however, I like the simplicity and manners that comes with these guys. They make it safe and easy to be a woman. And let’s face it, something about being called “darlin” touches my heart. I never had that growing up and I’ve learned to enjoy it today. It’s when they stop calling me darlin’ that I worry.

A walking lobotomy is simply a phrase I use to describe how easily I can throw my IQ out the window when it comes to certain men. When I was younger (much much younger), if our eyes met across a crowded room and my heart started doing 280, chances are they either had a flask in their pocket or a criminal record. Or in the case of that blue-eyed wonder I met in front of the Sears Tower back in 1987, both.

I did not really hire a stunt double for my annual exam – again that was a JOKE.

I am not a stay home wife anymore. I am a self-employed comic, speaker, actress, artist and freelance writer. Having my personal office in my home is not that same as “staying home.” I am not a bored housewife taking artsy fartsy classes to pass the time. I’m an artist striving to improve my craft. I left my career in telecommunications to raise my family and care for a child with epilepsy. I’m very proud of both of my children and have no regrets. In order for me to return to telecom, I’d have to go back to college and start over. I figured if I was going to start over at my age, why not do something I’m good at and enjoy.

Contrary to popular belief, I am still married – to the same man I met back in 1988 (not the Sears Tower dude). We love each other a great deal and are comfortable enough with each other and our relationship to acknowledge that certain Hollywood stars are dreamy. He’s into Meg Ryan, Goldie Hawn, Emma Stone, and a few others. His tastes run more towards natural beauty than flash. I like that. The fact that I sometimes write jokes about cowboys, Hollywood bad boys, and my previous dating disasters does not in any way shape or form bother him. If it did, I would write about something else entirely. My husband reads my blog every week. I do not write anything that would shock or amaze him. We’ve been together since December 3, 1988. There isn’t a man alive who knows me better than he does.

He knows if I’m laughing and cutting up with a man, it’s no big deal. He knows that taking me to see a Johnny Depp or Robert Downey Jr flick is no big deal either.

I know not to go see Magic Mike or read 50 Shades of Grey. That would not sit well.

He knows if I’m rendered silent in the presence of a man (and yes that does still happen to me at times, I’m 47  and very human and if you say that has never happened to you, well I think you are lying.) or avoid someone like the plague – just trust that and move on.

And for all my girlfriends who texted me Monday night telling me to change the channel to the CMA’s – I know that the first Monday night football game of the season is on and there is no way I’m going to be able to convince that man to change the channel for five minutes just so I can watch Luke Bryan dance.

Have mercy.