Yeah, I'm riled up today. The autism news. The job crap. The rain. The insurance worries. Bella has been a real pisser today - poor child was hungry and decided to tell me by having a half day tantrum. I'd fed her several times, of course - only to have the food end up strewn about the floor. When you can not speak, it's hard to say, "Mom, I am so sick of the gluten free rice cereal I could scream!" So she just screamed and got it over with. I hate when I can't read her mind. Makes me feel very inadequate. Like we need THAT in the house right now!
So, when I feel like biting the heads off small fluffy animals and pulling the wings off fairies and sprites, I have to calm myself. Do I reach for the Chivas Regal? Nah. The pain killers in my medicine cabinet from dental work last year? Why bother? I went to the library. Aaaaaahhhhh.
My blood pressure automatically ratchets down when I step into the library, knowing so many old friends are there to soothe me. I walked up and down the fiction aisles. I sniffed around mystery. I flounced past romance - NOT TODAY! Unsure of just which arrow to pull out of the quiver, I paced the stacks. And there he was. Him. The man I would love to meet and just sit with in silence. Just to know he was next to me would suffice. I'm not sure I could speak around him at all. A stunned silence, slack jawed, dreamy eyes would be the best I could muster.
RAY BRADBURY. I pulled Driving Blind off the shelf. Ah Ha! I haven't read this one!! Thank God he's so prolific.
At home Bella continued to howl. I finally fed her something she wanted and gave her a bath. The water soothes her little soul. As she splashed, I sat on the tile floor and read. My jaw unclenched. My eyes aren't squinting. And that crevasse in my forehead is gone. RAY BRADBURY.
What's your Bradbury?
19 comments:
I LOVED The Martian Chronicles.
Loved it. Them. Whatever.
Ray Bradbury is my absolute favorite author. Has been since high school. I would dearly love to meet him - he's 87! I recommend "Farewell to Summer" his follow up to Dandelion Wine - came out within the last couple of years. It's about getting older b0t woven into tale of mid-American that only Ray Bradbury could create. My kid's cute too, isn't she? LOL!
The ones that make me laugh and don't make me feel like mine is the only life that spirals our of control sometimes- Annie LaMott, David & Amy Sedaris, Augustine Burroughs, Spaulding Gray, Sarah Silverman. Today I am recovering from oral surgery following the extraction of a front tooth knocked out by my six-year-old son who has autism. Let me tell you, having one of your front teeth out is not a good look. It will be replaced soon by a three-tooth bridge which will match the other three tooth bridge I have when he did the same thing three years ago. Movie star teeth. Now, if he could fix my waistline....
I remember the days of the multi hour tantrums! Oh how I remember them. My daughter could scream so long, so loud that the co-ed neighbors next door thought for sure I was beating her (as if!). I remember carrying her to the door in her little diapers to yell at the police for coming yet again and frightening her, yet again! When it was all said and done I was always too spent to read, but rock n roll heaven awaited. I would put on whatever favorite sound tickled my fancy that day and dance, all of us together most times. Even my oldest who, as a person with autism, was supposed to be rigid, lol, can wiggle his hips like a pro!
I did library therapy yesterday too.
Thank God for libraries.
Oh anon!!! I'm so sorry. People have no clue what we go through with our kids - for our kids.
Hi to my new friend Kimberly, with whom I have much in common!
Michelle - ain't the liberry da best?
MG - Martians rule.
Kim:
Checkin' in on you.
She's beautiful!!!! Those eyes . . . . And I am so sorry you all had a rough day.
My Bradbudy is actually (weird chick that I am) curling up with a quantum physics textbook and reading it until my brain hurts with concepts about the universe.
And a vodka on ice doesn't hurt.
;-)
E
Erica,
I'm joining you in the vodka on ice! No make mine a martini! Lol!
I'm reading John Irving's Until I Find You. Nothing like Irving's effed up characters to make me feel like a normal person! Book + bathtub is my preferred method, but tonight I did Pride & Prejudice on TV with knitting (Keira Knightly version -- not as good as BBC one with yummy Colin Firth, but it did the trick tonight!) I should be in bed - we lose an hour tonight! That reminds me, I better change the clocks when Hutton isn't looking so he doesn't get freaked! ;)
I have a four-legged sanity keeper called Meg and a red one called Travecello....if it's realy bad, they work as a team.
Tough isn't it? Do you let them have what they want and risk getting a diva or do you say no and ride the storm? (and we're talking hurricaine tornedo here)The worst is when they get so worked up they can't tell you what it was they wanted in the first place. The number of times I've had every food cupboard open and chairs round the room to get Bear to just choose something! Then I risk her getting over whelmed and off we go again.
Anon - I feel for you! Want to join my campaign? It's called "Never mind the child protection, what about the parents?"! LOL!! so far my face is intact but a broken wrist and displaced hip are among my battle scars
She is a cutie! She favors you huh?
I sing/play piano (or what's left over from my ability to play as a kid) to get away.
Of course there is alway Calgon...
Oh, Kim, you should've been with me. My day was tiresome and dreary as well, but nowhere near as arduous as yours. I mentioned to you in an email--I happened to have a fleeting 1/2 hour at a hotel and got a glass of champagne, sat down with my laptop and enjoyed the piano player nearby. THAT was my Bradbury, after driving throughout the DC area in torrential downpours with insane drivers for 6 hours.
PS--I think anonymous sounds like she needs to read Sleeping with Ward Cleaver, don't you?
Yes! Oh my gosh - did I say Ray Bradbury? I meant JENNY GARDINER!
All Kim blog readers should read Sleeping With Ward Cleaver by Mizz Jenny Gardiner. It's a pip!
When I have days like that, I read Jodi Picoult. Crap.
But good crap.
And I'm having a lemon drop martini.
Right. Now.
Ooooh, lemon drop martini. If one of my sisters in law ever pisses me off enough, I'll share a lemon drop story. Aw heck, what am I saying? Here it is. I met a certain sister in law many years ago for the first time at my future in laws. We went to other family members house for party. Future sister in law got trashed on lemon drops, banged into a brick wall, bled everywhere and trashed a set of pearls she'd gotten from the in laws as a wedding gift! LOL!!! I love drunken stories! Lemme tell you about the time in high school I lost and earring and a contact - but remained a virgin! Ah, 9th grade! ;)
Never had a lemon drop martini but if it can wreak all that havoc, I want the recipe! My favorite is a pineapple martini, or mango, can't decide. Love those little curvy bottles near the cheap wine in the grocery store. Lot's of good flavors there! Think I'll settle in with one tonight too. Hating this weekend. Stress!
ooooohhhh...Lemontinis and me do NOT get along. After a particularly stressful holiday gathering of my family last year, we ended up at our good friends' house for New Year's Eve, and one of our friends brought back her sisters lemon-tini recipe from their holiday gathering. I threw back a few of them and they were so lemony good and I sure didn't taste the alcohol! I got up to use the bathroom, my head started swimming, and I found a comfy couch and tucked myself in for about an hour before everyone made me wake up. I have sworn off lemon-tini's for ever...
Oh, and Kim, thanks for the Sleeping with Ward Cleaver endorsement LOL
My kid's cute too, isn't she?
Your kid is ADORABLE.
Kim, you're a saint.
Bradbury, Heinlein, Niven, Dick, Martin and Kuttner are among the best scifi writers of the 20th century. My favorite, however, is the late Robert L. Forward, he of the "hard science" fiction genre. His stories are not truly fiction, as the science behind them is sound, and even plausible. It is escapist literature, but with a broad stroke of realism. Give it a try.
RJ
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