"L" on my Forehead

I am a LOSER!  I missed my blogoversary again!!  Am I that much of a domestic diva that I forget my humble beginnings?  In 2008 I started recording all of my mind-numbing antics dating out there in divorced-single-parent land & I guess I've come 180 from there...in a new house, with my "soul-mate" & an instant family (aside from my own son) & a stepmother of 2 1/2 kiddos (the 1/2 is the one in college)....certainly enough blog-fodder to continue this running dialogue to be sure.  I have thought about changing the name & the direction, essentially starting a new blog altogether but the name really does still fit.  Why?  Well, I haven't gotten remarried & I don't see a rock on my finger in the near future so technically Xing Fu is still my boyfriend. And will be for the yet unseeable, unknowable future....but lucky me I've found my kissable frog & maybe, because I haven't been writing too terribly much this past blog year, it has something to do with "near-wedded" bliss.  Yeah, lots has happened but do I want to bore the blogosphere with information about which laundry soap works best on cat blood?  Well, maybe you do want to know...actually, I have no clue. 

So I imagine that another reason why I've been missing writing is because of sailing--all-consuming, all engrossing & a bit of a niche community, sailing.  I should really get an apartment in Annapolis--I practically live there during the summer.  And, honestly, it is the only place where I've had a really decent Dark 'n' Stormy.  (Annapolis: A drinking town with a sailing problem.)  I know a lot of my sailing friends check this blog on occasion but aside from them, who the hell knows the difference between a gybe & a tack???  So, I've laid off the sailing posts a bit too--except for the last one--oh boy was that a doozy!  But I can tell you that my sailing season is essentially over & I probably won't be writing too much more about it until April...*sniff*.  I still have this huge knot over my elbow & pretty horrific bruising that is fading, but that's all that is left of my sailing for the season. 

I sit here now thinking about the future of this blog. What will be the turn?  Xing Fu & I trying to figure out what to do when we aren't sailing?  Or what it means to find that supposed "soul mate" & what to do with him once you do....day in & day out we take for granted where we came from--we need to make sure that we remember what it was so we can appreciate what it is now.  So many women of my age bracket are out there looking--all I can say is, keep going!  Keep fighting the good fight! Mebbe I can have some helpful tidbits to dole out now & then about finding that prince among the frogs.   Reflecting back to 2008 when I started this thing--it has been one heck of a ride!

Oh, Happy Halloween everyone!  Be safe!

Bat Halloween Nightmares

  

You Don't Look a Day Over 4

Boyfriend, Please! We've Been Together 4 Years!

How is it possible that I missed my "Blogoversary"? Could it have something to do with hurricane SANDY??? That's it--memorable!   Eh, mebbe except that thus far, fingers crossed, eyes crossed, toes crossed, we still have power here in our little space in Towson.  Instead, I was being domestic since I was off of work--baking bread; pumpkin beer bread (used Guiness)  & banana bread.  Wow! What a change from 4 years ago!  My life has done a complete 180 from the beginning of this blog which was inspired by a bad break-up, to living in a new house that I bought with my boyfriend! In fact, I haven't visited Ok Cupid, Match, eHarmony, J-date (NOT for sailors who want to date other J-boat sailors) etc., since the end of 2009.  Ok, I think I may have gone to OK Cupid to show Xing Fu since he had no need to try the online route & was online-dating curious. But since then, nuffin'. And I like not playing with the on-line stuff....generally, there is no longing to meet ex-preachers with 11 kids for a Telesma Solstice concert anymore.  Although, I wouldn't trade some of the whacked-out experiences I've had--just makes me appreciate my new domestic, blended family & the new adventures in stepmom-land and since I'm still not married....Boyfriend, Please! still works.  But if I continue to get, "So, (pregnant pause) when are you & Xing Fu going to get married?", I may have to go get business cards made that say:

             "No, we aren't getting married.
                 No, not anytime soon.
                 Yes, we like it this way.
                 Yes, many couples who don't marry do
                 Better Together."

Ah, co-habitating bliss! 

And last but not least, it is time for you to go vote for my blog.  You can do this everyday from yesterday to November 8th.  Here's the link: http://data.baltimoresun.com/mobbies/2012/voting/rb-vote-kit.php

That wonderful rag, The Baltimore Sun is sponsoring the Mobbies: Maryland's Outstanding Blogs. So go vote for me in the Lifestyle & Personal blog categories--no money but bragging rights! What a great blogoversary present--it's a gift that keeps giving!

Chicago Bound

Off to Chicago to visit my sis & her family.  Fun times, especially because Xing Fu is coming too--our first plane trip together!  Uh huh, we're getting away from it all--right to 40 degree weather!  WooHoo!  This was supposed to be a trip taken earlier in the season so we could go sailing with my sis & her husband but as usual, timing is everything...even so, looking forward to a weekend with my sis in her stomping grounds & time away with my guy.  I have mentioned in the past how important I think getting away as a couple is important--often we've gone to the beach together for a weekend--this is a bit of a departure for us--heh--I think a good one.  I often think that we just don't have a lot of "us" time & I feel it is vitally important to build that in on occasion.  I sent an  email to Xing Fu after we'd had a little back & forth about scheduling.  It is truly what I feel:


"we already have such limited time during the week & even some weekends that it is often a press to simply have "us" time.  One reason that this weekend will be nice for that--I am a very firm believer that a successful relationship must have times where the focus is solely on the relationship & very little else if at all possible."

And while I'm away it will be my 3rd year "blogoversary"--hopefully I will get a chance to send a message out into the blogosphere from Chi-town.

Boyfriend, Defined?

As my 3rd "Blogoversary" looms nearer, I often take some time to reflect how things have changed from year to year & of course this one is no different.  So as I have been thinking back & how when I first started this blog it was all about the myriad of frogs that I had kissed, was kissing, & was going to kiss, I fell across this article in the lofty rag, of all places, The New York Times.  Finding love can be frustrating, discouraging, interesting, & sometimes pretty fun, but it is difficult for all ages as this particular essay by Marguerite Fields shows.  It was published in 2008 (I wonder what has since happened to its author--has she found "the one"?).  Anyway, it wants to target college students or recent entrants into the "adult" world, but I think it applies to all of us enchanted frog-seekers newly minted or not:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/04/fashion/04love.html?pagewanted=all 

 

Magical Moments

“There is some kiss we want with 

our whole lives, the touch of

 spirit on the body.  Sea water

begs the pearl to break its shell.

And the lily, how passionately

It needs some wild darling! At

Night, I open the window and ask

The moon to come and press its

Face against mine.  Breathe into

Me. Close the language-door and

Open the love-window.  The moon

Won’t use the door.  – Rumi

Last weekend, while at the beach, we had a moment that we both label as magical.  Xing Fu has a few of them that he likes to talk about & this one is on both of our lists.  We went up to the boardwalk in Rehobeth to get Thrashers & hot dogs.   We decided to sit on one of the benches up by the ocean.  As we were sitting there, all of a sudden a little paw appears between the dune & the boardwalk.  I get up & look between & there's a little tabby kitten (a lot like the one pictured above).  He was just sitting there so I decided to feed him some of my polish sausage.  I break off a piece & hold it out to him--his little paw swipes quickly like a piston & snags the meat out of my very surprised fingers.  He looked very healthy--eyes clear, coat shiny, ears clean, so obviously I wasn't the only sausage donor.  I continued to offer pieces of the sausage & he wouldn't allow me to hand it to him--I had to place it on the edge of the boardwalk but after he'd consumed each piece, his little face would pop up looking for more.  Piston paw each time until there was nothing left.  Then, it was as if he knew that it was all gone because when I looked over the edge, he's disappeared just as he'd appeared--I imagined him curled up in the sun somewhere licking his paws for the last taste of the sausage.  It was a small snippet of our time at the beach together but I have to agree with Xing Fu--it was magical because it unfolded only for us--our own shared memory.  Just like the pieces of shell with the purple insides that I collect every time I go to the beach.


We've had a few "magical memories"--Xing Fu recalls evenings at concerts that he found particularly noteworthy--Nada Surf when first we went to Full Kee for dinner, & arrived just as the band came on & then he caught the drum stick as we stood watching.  Another one he remembers is the night we saw Telesma at Sonar with Alex Gray painting his special brand of psychedelia.


I remember being down in North Carolina the night before we dropped my kid off at camp--we stood at the edge of the water on the dock of a marina, watching the water ripple & the moon reflect off of the masts of sailboats & the still water. The feeling of peace that night was just amazing.  

Magical Moments--we have quite a few--I like that he remembers these & refers to them often--bringing us yet closer--like our kitten.

And so I come to another "blogoversary".  I take these posts as a refection point from the previous year.  A "where am I now?" kinda thing.  So where was I & where am I now?


Last year:
It has also been quite amusing to see the dating blunders I've written about--I think ultimately when I do find the right one it will be fun to go back & revisit it all from time to time just to appreciate the journey.

Overall I am happy with what I've experienced--a lot I would never have lived through if I were still married--it has been quite the adventure & I'm looking forward to many more along the way--

My commentary for this year (certainly my blog focus has changed quite a lot):

Have I found "the one"?  How can I think otherwise when we were getting ready for work this morning & he bursts into "Happy Blogoversary, Happy Blogoversary..."  So, I think so--certainly this time last year I was still filtering through the frogs for the prince.  Is Xing Fu my prince?  It certainly has been a dream of a romance--even today, with emails flying back & forth between us, he writes the most loving notes to me.  One phrase that he says to me often is most probably one of my favorites: "Are you as wonderful as I think you are?"  How can a woman not melt when she hears that?   I am a lucky woman that this wonderful man has chosen to be my partner--I hope next year I can write the exact same thing.