Friends With Benefits - The Good Kind

Friends With Benefits.

#FWB

The phrase has entered our collective consciousness as a pal you can sleep with, no strings attached.

Friends with Benefits is a glorious, magical thing.

All the benefits of a relationship, without any of the hassle, drama, or compromise that sucks the life out of you, should you choose to yoke yourself to another person as you trudge through life.

I have had numerous FWBs in my life, but none that have meant as much to me as the father of my precious little Roo.


Before anyone gets up in arms, saying, "I KNEW IT!"----- I need to elaborate.

Lexers has (had) a Daddy.

And he was my best friend.

He was also my Friend With Benefits.  LITERALLY.

Literally, but not in the figurative (i.e., generally acknowledged) sense of that phrase.

We had all of the best qualities of a romantic relationship; shared experiences and memories with our children -- but none of the crap that comes with romance, sex, or "love".

Holidays punctuated by his amazing corn casserole (DIE, green bean casserole, you have nothing on Jimbo's magical, golden dish!), his ham AND turkey for Thanksgiving and  Christmas, and his cheesy cauliflower (cauliflower being pronounced as follows: CAWL-EE-FLOWER).

Christmas mornings with Santa leaving a potato in Mommy's stocking while leaving Roo and Daddy candy, toothbrushes, whoopee cushions, and a letter asking them to do better, try harder, and be kinder in the coming year.


The "benefits" we shared were watching our child grow together.  Being a team against Lexers' constant onslaught of deviousness.  Sharing his amazing biscuits and gravy for breakfast, making dinners with Lexi's big brother Tony and talking until the middle of the night on the front porch.

Jimbo was not my lover.  (Well, once, obvs.  Possibly even twice--DAMN YOU, Jameson!)  He was not my boyfriend for more than about 5 minutes. 

He was my buddy, my 'conscious-co-parenter', the bane of my existence at times, and so much more.

What he was....well, he was my best friend.  He was the rock I clung to when the stormy seas of my life tossed me around. 
He gave me advice. 
He got mad at me. 
He forgave me. 
He had my back all the time.  Always.

He made fun of me for watching Sex and the City ("All this show does is give cougars hope they can catch some hot young dude when that almost never happens in real life", he would growl.) 

Conveniently forgetting that most of his girlfriends/wives/fiancees--which were legion-- were all AT LEAST ten, and occasionally TWENTY YEARS YOUNGER!

He tolerated me playing 10 years worth of FRIENDS Thanksgiving episodes every year while we collaborated on a feast for our family.

He gave my niece advice, rides to school and events, and her first job as a cook in his bar.

He gave my sister advice, sarcastic criticism, a TON of shit, and a night job when she wanted to raise a down payment for a car in a short period of time.

He gave me advice, friendship, criticism, a TON of shit, and a place to call home.

Jimbo was my best friend.

We fought sometimes. 
We laughed together. 
We squabbled over lots of things. 

He spent a year ripping on Bernie Sanders, with the sole purpose of pissing me off.  I advised him DAILY that Hillary would end up being the real opponent to his CheetoColoredCottonCandy-Headed martinet of a Presidential candidate, but it irked him that my 'hippie shit' extended to a Jewish, Democratic-Socialist grandpa from Vermont, and he wouldn't let it go.

He lectured me about drinking and smoking too much (pot, meet your similarly-colored friend kettle), he lectured me about ditching my last (ridiculously moronic and pathetic) boyfriend, advising me that I "[wasn't] getting any younger" (again with the pot and kettle, yo!), and that I should think before I broke up with him and went back into the dating world 'at [my] age'--I was 37....

He totally had my back in pretty much any situation, and was always down to give me hours of unsolicited advice, peppered with 'Jimbo-isms'.

"Number one, you......number two...."
"My point is this..."
"What your don't understand is..."
"It is what it is"

And, of course, "Yeah, Yeah".   Which he said all the time.

ALL THE TIME. 

I started this #500WordsADay blog challenge last week, but couldn't go past day 2....

I'm a little busy.

Moving out of our house, boxing up all of his clothes so his kids and I can go through them later when the pain is not so fresh.

Helping my little baby bird cope with the loss of "Daddy"...her BFF...the person who took her to Chuck E Cheese (always on Tuesdays), long after I refused to set foot in there ever again.

Trying to muddle through writing obituaries, family statements, opening mail that is not mine, cancelling credit cards and bank accounts and ordering memorial shirts.....all the things you go through when someone dies on you out of nowhere....

Thing is, if it was anyone else this had happened to, my buddy Jimbo would be right behind me, lending support, advice, and being a rock for me to lean on.

And now I have no one.

Don't get me wrong, I have a terrific supportive family nearby, and Jimbo's friends have all rallied round and offered support, advice, and help.

 And it is SO appreciated.

So I don't LITERALLY have no one.

Figuratively, though, I am alone.

I am Roo's mom.

And she has no Dad. 

And I have no co-parent.

So, while I have spent the last few weeks telling everyone I am fine, and I 'got this', and I am strong enough to cope with this on my own, the truth is I am tired.

I am tired of missing my friend.

I am tired of watching the knowledge of how alone we are break over my little girls face and make her eyes fill and her chin waver every few hours.

I am tired of being patient with people when I just want to scream at them to leave me alone because my heart is broken and life -- as I have known it for the last 10 years -- is totally shattered.


I am tired of being mad.
I am tired of being sad. 
I am tired of being tired.
I am just fucking tired.

I wish I could say I feel Jimbo watching over me and lending me strength.

I wish I could say I  know everything will be okay.

I wish I could say none of this actually happened.


But...

I don't feel him.

I dream about him, sure,  just normal stuff---making spaghetti to impress yet another new girlfriend, changing light bulbs, buying WAY too much bread-- but that makes waking up even worse. 

Because none of those things will ever happen again.

Never.

I don't know everything will be okay.

I have a 9 year old little girl who lost her BFF and her partner in crime. 

I don't know how we are going to get through graduations, weddings, or any other major life event without her loud, gravelly-voiced, opinionated father directing the show.

I don't know how to make him real for his 3 kids or 2 grandchildren...How to tell them how much he loved them, how to teach the babies all the things he would want them to know about him, and how to make them understand what a vibrant, interesting, caring, and thoughtful person they came from....(they all look just like him, too!)

This happened, though. 

It's real.

It's a 'thing'.

My best friend (actually, he was TONS of people's best friend -- it was just how he rolled) is gone. 

My friend with benefits (the good, true, lasting benefits) is gone.

And I just don't really know what's next....

Liar, Liar, Pants On Fire

"A time you lied"

Interestingly enough, I lie every single day…to me.

'A time".

That is singular.  Oops.

I lie and say I am too old and fat and too much of a hippie to care that I am old and fat.  But I care.  Not enough to put down the new Reese's Pieces-Stuffed Peanut Butter Cups, but I do care.

I lie and say I am fine. 

And I am not fine. 

My baby girl's dad died 3 weeks ago tonight and I am forced daily to watch her struggle and fight through the grief at the loss of her BFF -- they were seriously the best pals -- and try to make arrangements and tie up loose ends, all the while assuring everyone I am fine when I cannot even take 5 minutes to process the death of my roomie, my BFF, and my obnoxious co-parent because I have to run around worrying about 'offending' people or making people feel 'left out' when all I am trying to do is get this shit tied up and closed out as quickly and cleanly as possible-- for my daughter and for her siblings who are broken as well.

I lie and say I WILL NOT smoke another cigarette today.

I lie and say TOMMOROW I will get up at 5 and exercise.

I lie and say I am okay with being alone and self-sufficient when deep down I really wish I could turn to someone and say 'Please help me with this, I can't manage this on my own'. 

I lie and say that I will change.  That I will take up yoga to calm my restless brain (and tone my chubby form), even though I always topple over and worry about farting during Child's Pose like the person in front of me inevitably does.

I lie and say I will not lose my patience; I will be softer and kinder and allow people in.

A time that I lie is when I am awake. 

When there is another thing to check off the list. 

When there is another person insisting I clean up their mess because I have a job and some discretionary income and a little bit of logic, so OF COURSE I should drop everything and go rescue them from the same self-inflicted crap they created by being thoughtless and careless and living champagne lives on a Boone's Farm income.

The best thing about #500WordsADay is that, when I write this stuff, it flows organically and then I go back to revise and edit and learn things about myself that I didn't know, or gain insights I hadn't seen.

I think what I learned from this one is that I am doing myself a major disservice by lying to myself.

I think this was a good way to look at my lies and expose them to the light.

I hope I have the courage to do that.

And I hope that last sentence wasn't another lie.

The Last Time You were Happy For A Week Straight

So, we dusted off the #500WordsADay experiment again.

I never finish these, but I am going to try this time, I figure I can do almost anything for ten days.

Not sure if we were supposed to address the prompts in order, but this one resonated, so here goes.

When I saw the prompt for being happy a week straight, I laughed and vowed to skip.

Over it.

I just don't think 'happy' is in my DNA.

Then, a 'memory' popped up on Facebook. 

I almost didn't re-post it, but I stopped to look at it and think.

I am not one of those people that 'peaked' in high school---at least I hope the fuck not. You know who I mean....the people you run into when you visit your hometown that call their buddies by their last names, and reminisce about the missed (or made) field goal in playoffs…

However, that picture made me really think and remember a few times in my life when I was genuinely happy. 

Don't get me wrong, I have had multiple transcendent moments in my life....moments where I felt entirely rooted in this universe, moments where I felt I belonged, and moments where love blazed through me so thoroughly, that I felt incandescent.

They are/were 'moments', though.

A week?

I looked at that picture---which to me is like one of those "What does not belong" pictures we were given in elementary school.

In high school, we lived in an apartment.  The Gold Exchange and Sadie's were within a mile. Walking distance if you were drunk, which my mother always was.

I was a Ridge Kid.  Raised in the trees and dirt.  We had solar panels and kerosene lamps not electricity. 

We had pots and the wood stove not a water heater. 

There was an outhouse. 

When I decided I wanted to be a cheerleader, my mother and older sister mocked me, and my dad told me to try for what I wanted.

I did fundraiser after fundraiser...selling chocolate and magazines, because the welfare check would pay for rent and beer, but never my heart's desire.

Cheer camp. Sunburned, shouting until I was hoarse, joining in with hundreds of other girls who jumped and squealed and shouted and danced. Happy.

It wasn’t a full week, it was 5 days, but the happiness remains. 

It was good.

And those girls...

 Doctor's daughters,  girls who got tucked in, and girls who were taken to Sunrise Mall for school clothes (not Cheryl's Clothes Closet-the local thrift store) accepted me. 

They took me in and loved me, even though their socio-economic status said they shouldn’t.

They should have shunned me and dumped buckets of pigs blood on my head, or bribed the quarterback to ask me to prom and not shown.

Their religion told them I was not their kind. 

Their money told them I didn't fit in.

Their perfect clothes and shiny hair and orthodontia told them I was different.

But a week made us sisters. 

And then they were there for me.

Always.

My little girl lost her daddy a few weeks ago, and a couple of them have had that happen to them in the last 3 years, reached out with love.

The two most devout and dedicated to their religion have always been there for me.

Always.

It wasn't 7 days, but it was a week.

And I was happy.

Every. Fucking. Day.