My Awesome Birthday Story

My mom used to tell me a really pretty story about how I was born; or, at least pretty as far as my mom was concerned. She was a really blunt woman who never beat around the bush and said things the way they were; the result is that she tried to tell a pretty little tale, but a few weird details kept sneaking in there that just sort of… added a sense of wrongness. So here is my story the way my mom used to tell it to me, with pictures drawn by me.

“I wanted a little girl so badly, I used to pray all the time. ‘Please God, just give me a little girl.’ Every day I would pray, I wanted you so badly. A little girl I could  love and dress up and take care of. And then one day I was outside, looking up at the sky, wishing on the stars for you, and I saw it: a shooting star. I closed my eyes and I wished so badly for you. ‘Please, please give me a little girl. It’s all I want.’ A few weeks later, I was pregnant with you.

“See, me and your daddy had been trying for a while to get pregnant again after we had to give up your brother; we wanted a child of our own, and I’d  always wanted a little girl. I didn’t have it so easy growing up, and I told myself that I would be better than my mom. I would give you everything you wanted, and we’d be happy. I’ve tried my damndest, too. It’s hard, though…

“Anyway. You were supposed to be born on the 22nd, but when it go close, I just couldn’t wait anymore. I wanted you right then, I wanted you now. So I took some castor oil and mixed it with ketchup  and drank it, and it wasn’t  an hour later I started going into contractions. I was in labor with you for hours, but it didn’t hurt that much, honestly. I could’ve given birth to you myself if I hadn’t already had a c-section with your brother. The only bad thing is I was in labor so long you were born on your aunt’s birthday…”

The face of pure evil...

Yeah, she’d get derailed by that and the cute little story would normally venture off, though sometimes she’d stay on track long enough to tell me, “And when I saw you and held you in my arms, I loved you instantly.”

My dad? When I was little he told me, “When you were born, you farted so hard you flew around the room like a rocket and landed in my arms.”

When I got older, after my mom died, he broke it to me straight: “Your mom forced you out two weeks early because she couldn’t wait another two more weeks to start drinking again… and maybe she wanted to see you, too.”

Thanks for shattering my dreams, dad…

Hallway Children

 We were expecting the Alien to come by today, so this morning when someone knocked lightly on the door, me and the Hedgehog assumed it was him. Yawning, I sat up as the Hedgehog looked out our peephole.

Instantly his face changed, and he turned and came back, laying back down, informing me that we needed to be quiet now. Confused,  I got up and went to the door myself, peering out into the hallway.

I recognized that girl.  She was one of the hallway children who bothered me a lot. Yesterday she’d been bothering me about a phone… Aside from that one time I let the neighbors have a cup of sugar, we’ve never  shown any  willingness to give them things, so it seems really weird that they always ask us for stuff. Constantly. Groaning, I let out a sigh and went to the bathroom.

But the knocking never stopped. Every other moment there was another, soft, but very insistent knocking from our door. It was constant, never ending… This girl wasn’t giving up, she was determined someone was opening that door. Something came over me: my mind started whirling, my heart started pounding, and I knew if I didn’t get back soon and take care of the problem, the Hedgehog might lose his own temper.

So when I came out of the bathroom, I opened the door, looked her in the eye, and said, “The Hedgehog doesn’t get  home till after midnight and we don’t go to bed till after four, so if you don’t want us knocking incessantly at your door at 4am, could you please stop?”

She stared at me, silent, bewildered, until finally... “Can I borrow the phone?”

Eyebrow twitch. “No.” And I shut the door.

After I settled myself back in next to the Hedgehog to go to sleep, he informed me, “I wouldn’t have been so nice.” I smiled though. Maybe not, but I still felt kinda badass.

Thanksgiving

So I couldn't come up with a way to get out of going with the Hedgehog to his mom's house today. Mostly it was because he was so damned supportive and told me to stop freaking out. See, one of the benefits of this blog is that, as a socially awkward person who's terrified of confrontation, I can put my thoughts up here that I could never say aloud, because writing on the internet doesn't scare me as much.

Because on the internet, I feel like a boss.

This means the Hedgehog saw my last post, laughed at the thought of me trying to sneak off, told me I was ridiculous, and we had a normal conversation about how I should handle Thanksgiving today.

I felt like someone going into battle...

So I spent the whole day laughing with his step-sisters, both of which are either just going into high school or already are, but both of them are hilarious and awesome so it doesn't matter, and I pretty much felt like I actually fit in for once, aside from some awkwardness. See, I met them before and they make me feel comfortable, so I'm just fine with them.

... Whaddaya know...? This isn't so bad...! Whooo!

When it came time to come home, however, both the Hedgehog's mom and the Terror's mom offered to drive us. At the same time. In the same car. I thought this would be the confrontation I'd been expecting...

Oh gods...

Except it never happened...



Surprisingly, this makes me feel worse.

But they're driving the Hedgehog to work, so I'm almost positive it's happening there... or worse, they'll drive back and talk to me... alone... without the Hedgehog... oh gods...
Edit: It's been 45 minutes, so they're not coming back.

Still terrified.

In fact, the only thing I do know at this point, is that there's a 99% chance I won't be watching the Terror ever again...


... She's my Chick Pea...

Edit: Okay, so they didn't talk to the Hedgehog either... but even he agreed it was suspicious and he'd been a little weirded out when they didn't talk to us on the way home.

This Child is Planning on Killing Me

 ... I have a sneaking suspicion that the Terror is planning on killing me... After all, I spent most of the day yelling at her thanks to a new annoying habit she has of eating two bites, throwing the food away, saying she's finished, and then telling me she's hungry...

I'm full, I'm done eating... Can I have a snack, I'm hungry...

Not to mention she's continuing her trend of asking me the same questions repeatedly in a row, ignoring me when I'm talking to her so I have to repeat myself until my throat is hoarse to elicit a response from her, and just plain ignoring what I'm telling her.

What time is it? Is it four yet? What time is it? Is it four yet?

This is her playing with glass cups I told her to not touch 5 mins before.

Get up. Get up. Stand up. Get up. Getupgetupgetup.

I have a sneaking suspicion she has no short term memory. Also, remember that picture at the top of this post? That's her reaction after I took those glass cups away.

Don't You Make Me Come Get You!

How could you be so stupid, me?

... I can't believe this child made me chase her down... again. I can't believe I made the mistake of letting her play outside again... again. Honestly, when am I ever gonna learn? Do I have some kind of chronic brain problem that makes learning from past mistakes impossible?

 It's just the Terror's been so... terrible today. All day long she's stared at me in that strangely blank but vaguely sad and confused way she has, making me repeat everything innumerable times.

"Stop. Stop it. I said stop. Stop right now!"

 "Let the dog go. Let Noodles go. Stop it, let him go, he wants down."

 "Close the fridge, you just ate and you didn't even finish your food. Close it. No, you just ate."

 "Pick that up. Pick it up. Pick it up. Pick up your mess."

"Let him go. Leave him alone."

"Get up. Get up and let Noodles out. Get up. Up. Up. Up!"

That last one was followed by, "Don't make me come get you..." She stood up and started inching away, and when I stood, she bolted. I chased her down the stairs and around the back of the house before I could snatch her up without hurting her...

Update: Ugh, she just made me have to get up and turn her back around in the timeout chair after she tried to play with Noodles and watch cartoons... Which is impossible because the kitchen is blocked off from the television...

Update: ... And after explaining again how timeout starts when she's quiet, she tried to get Noodles to come over to her... again...

Edit: This is my 45th post...

I Need A Job

Forewarning: I am angry. That is all.

I had been planning on writing this post out when I could think clearly about the events of the 11th when I had to watch both the Spawn and the Terror, and in fact was going to put it up today. After all, I had calmed down significantly since then and could think objectively about the whole day... Last Friday I was supposed to be paid. Now, if you read this blog, you might think I've been paid a couple of times since the first post on this blog... Well, I haven't. Today was only the second time I've ever been paid since I started watching the Terror.


The first time I got paid $85. Today? I got $80. I did the math on that... I'm still pretty much getting paid $8.50 a day to watch her kid.

Alright, deep breath Kit, don't get mad... just tell everyone what you planned...

On the 11th I had to watch both of the kids at the same time, and as you may know, the Spawn seems to think it's his job to terrorize the Terror and get her behavior going a thousand times worse. He was okay first thing in the morning because he was focused on his game, but... he beat it, and not 30 minutes after my post, he came out of his room and helped to cause near non-stop chaos for the rest of the day.

On top of their usual behavior of dashing up and down the hall and jumping on the couch, the talk of buttholes continued... non-stop... through every conversation... no matter what they were playing. Sometimes they changed it up and talked about dooky. I got them to stop for all of 15 minutes when I made up a game where they could only use five words to talk, all really weird words, like "ceiling fan"... That occupied them until the Terror kept on talking about poop and butts... I couldn't make it stop.

Before I move on, I will tell you the good things that happened: we all had a good laugh over the questions for the FAQ and my answers, and I had a couple of nice game conversations with the Spawn... There was even a kind of touching moment when I explained that when I was yelling at them to stop, I was yelling at both of them, not just him. They were both doing things that were wrong, and he should tell me when she was bothering him, so I could take care of it...

... You know, as opposed to getting a hard pillow and slamming it across her face while screaming at her.

That was pretty much the only good things that happened. The rest of the day was spent trying to make them play nice with each other, trying to get the Terror to stop trying to shove her finger up his butt, to leave him alone when he wanted to go back to play his game, to get him to share with her...

They had pillow fights and wrestled and stacked pillows on each other and jumped off of the couches onto each other, and for the most part... I let them. So long as they weren't screaming or arguing, I let them be and play with each other.

I could remember being six and playing with my older brother. My older brother terrorized me. We were both in Judo, so he called it "practice" and my aunt let him pound my head repeatedly into the floor or ground while they watched. Also, he was in football, and would use me as a target to practice tackling.

While the Terror and the Spawn pretty much screamed and hollered non-stop and made me wanna strangle something, they pretty much were having fun. Aside from taking an iPhone or iPod (don't own one and can't tell the difference nowadays...) and recording him talking and not sharing, and above incident where she was bothering him and he wailed on her, and all the times she tried to shove her finger up his butt, they played pretty well with each other.

Of course, that doesn't mean they didn't drive me nuts with the constant chaos, and the Spawn played his usual game of ignoring my authority and laughing at me when I tried to get them to stop, or getting way too offended and storming off... But talking with the Hedgehog cleared all that up later. You have to feel sorry for a kid who thinks everything's his fault.

So looking back on it, it wasn't as bad as it could've been... even though they made fun of me and hit me in the head with a pillow when my back was turned, said I had a "monster face" and that I was fat.

But my point is... would you deal with all of this for $8.50 a day?

And would you really pay the person who watches your precious child from 8am to 8pm some nights for 3 or 4 days a week so little...?

How I Got Curly Hair (a hint, I wasn't born that way)

In case no one has seen the awesomeness that is my adorable little self with my cute blonde hair in paint form, here it is.

I put the bow on so you know I'm a girl!

In case no has seen my normal paint self, which causes me to wonder who you thought that was all this time, here it is, too.

Clearly the most epic person on the internet...

 Now, unless you're the kind of person who knows a lot about hair and how it can change, you might be a little  suspicious about why I was so cute and blonde when I was little, and why I happen to have dark curly hair now, you might also be wondering about the glasses, but that's explained way more easily: I was near sighted my whole life and no one noticed me squinting really hard to see until I was in middle school.

I have two things to say about this picture... Yes, my hair looked like that, and looking at it, I have to wonder why I wondered why people always thought I was mistakenly mad at them...

 Of course, that creates interesting pictures and makes you wonder why no one ever noticed me making that face, and I really wish it could help explain why exactly I was so bad with faces, but it doesn't... I'm just bad with faces, and names. I once became friends with a girl because in gym class I became friends with this girl who was tall, thin, had straight blonde hair, and glasses. The next day in gym class I saw a girl who looked vaguely familiar and started talking to her... She was short, had a huge butt, and had short, curly, red hair... the only thing they had in common was glasses...

 I thought they were the same girl...

Clearly something is wrong with me, but you already knew that.

Clearly there was also something wrong with them if they became friends with this face...

But this isn't the story about how I'm so awkward with remembering people that complete strangers sometimes come up to me and start conversations during which I sit there the whole time trying desperately to remember where I know them from, or how I managed for years to pass eye exams while making a face that some people only make on the brightest day of the year when they're at the beach and the sun is glaring directly into their eyes... This is the story of how I went from thick, straight, super long blonde hair to having short, still thick, dark curly hair...

 My head was shaved.

When I was six years old I was living with two of my aunts, both of their husbands, two of my cousins, and my older brother. This was a household that was... how shall I say this simply...? They were pretty open to my tomboyish ways.

This did happen... And that kid didn't go to school the next day.

And I was quite the tomboy. I played in traffic, thought I could walk everywhere, got into fights, ignored other little girls because playing with dolls was dumb, and really only played with boys because they were all I had to play with and I wanted to live up to the expectations of my older brother... I was a lot like the Terror in this.

Brrrooooooothhheeeeeerrrrr...

 Still, I was a pretty open and friendly little kid, super outgoing, really mischievous, and I let everyone play with my hair. Who wouldn't want to? It was thick and long enough it reached past my butt and strawberry blonde. I loved my hair. I washed it all by myself every morning and kept it clean and brushed.

 My head was the perfect storm for lice.

I spent most of the 1st grade out of school because I kept lice. They never left. Every time I went back to school they had returned, magically, overnight. I practically bathed in lice shampoo. My clothes were kept in black bags. I wasn't allowed to sleep on a bed... of course, that might be because my aunts were the embodiment of pure evil, but I digress...

Eventually the effort to win the war against my lice became so bad that my aunt decided to cut my hair.

First to my shoulders...

Then to my ears when she realized she couldn't cut hair to save her life.

And it was still crooked...

We thought that was the end of that and I went back to school, feeling cold and lightheaded, by when I passed the school nurse's lice check, I was happy. Looking more like a boy that before, my behavior wasn't considered all that weird anymore, but I still looked slightly like a girl.

Then they did another lice check and my lice had come back... bigger, stronger, and looking like super lice. I can still remember the school nurse standing over my head saying, "Why are they invisible? Should they be transparent? This isn't normal..." to herself.

With no other options remaining, my aunt shaved all of my hair off, and we won the war against lice...

 Only now I didn't look like a little girl at all, I looked like a little boy, and I got treated like one. No one told me I was "so cute" or "so pretty" anymore, or asked to play with my hair, or if they could brush it or braid it... I didn't realize how much I'd liked the attention until it was gone.

That year I went back to live with my mom and she was devastated. I was practically bald and didn't look a thing like a little girl, and my momma was a very girly woman. She dressed me up like a girl in all pink so people would know I was a girl, kept me from playing in the road, and stopped me from playing with the boys... not that I had much choice, that was the stage where girls were icky to them and they refused to play with me... and the girls refused to play with me because I was too rough.

I only had one friend, the boy who lived across the street... and that was because he liked me. He kissed me on the cheek.

 It was a few more years before my hair got to my shoulder blades again, only now it was more of a dark dirty blonde and it was sort of wavy... Mom loved it. She highlighted it champagne blonde and curled it up like hers, and I managed to become a little more girly for all her efforts...

"Are we really twins, mommy?!"

 And then one day when I was twelve she looked at my had and told me, "I bet if we cut if off it'll be curly... Look at that wave, I bet you that the weight of your hair is the only thing stopping it." With an inability to predict the future, I let her. She was right, my hair curled right up, and for all of a day I was super cute...

The only problem was, I didn't know how to take care of curly hair. I brushed it when it was dry, had no idea about conditioners, didn't know what to do with it when it was frizzy... before long it looked like I was making a half-assed attempt at an afro. It kind of wilted in the middle too much to be a real afro, and it hung down too low in the back...

Also,  I made this face...

 The first day of middle school, four boys licked Skittles and threw them at the back of my head to see if they would stick... I was teased relentlessly, every day, about it... When I graduated from high school, I was still dealing with people yelling, "Skittles, taste the rainbow!" at me in the hallway... then again, the accident with the hair-dye in 7th grade probably didn't help refute that...

... It actually looked worse than this...

There are reasons why I'm an awkward not-quite-member of society.