So it has been a rough week again, or should I say year already....got over the strep thang, but still have water in the ear that makes me want to vomit if I turn too quickly to the right or the left. Ups and downs are scary, but then I tore or partially tore my meniscus. Totally acceptable for a middle age women as myself, since I partially tore my right one a year and a half ago...but shit...really...give me a break would you. And then the break happened....a shitty death filled week at BEVS, and to top it off a suicide at the school Sydney and Berkeley will attend.

First of all we all have dealt with death...I happen to deal with it more then the normal human being as do my co-workers...but to come into work and immediately have to euthanize three animals in a span of 30 minutes, tends to put a damper on the night. Yes, these animals were suffering, and so were their owners, and "we" did the only humane thing possible, but it sucks...really sucks. I had to cling onto something, and that something was a dog. A dog named Max, who not only survived a surgery that pulled an object from his large intestine that was unidentifiable. But a second surgery were he was leaking poisonous fluid from his incision into his abdominal cavity, causing severe infection and blood loss. Max was stoic, god like if you will, his little stub tail that had at one time been surgically amputated wagged even as we put yet another needle into his already painful and swollen belly. It was amazing and wonderful and every technician who dealt with him pulled for his recovery. His folks had just had some trouble themselves in life, and yet their stoic behavior to do all they could do for their "child" was astonishing. I dreamed about Max, and had to call in the morning to make sure he was alive...a dog I have never known until last week, and I was committed. As of late he is still doing well, a surgeon whom invested his work into a client he'd never met, donated his time, and his tech's time to a dog he believed in...it was a shining moment, in a week of cloudiness.

After leaving Max at midnight in the hands of my devoted co-workers, I drove home, satisfied or relieved that he was going to make it, and the news came on. It brought me back to reality and the loss of a human being. So young and vibrant, sporty and friendly. It was hard to face, and I still am in shock. There are a million questions running in my head, a gun : in school: why didn't anyone know? Why ? Sadness and empathy. Anger for the kids who were left in the dark, and had to concentrate on their exams, after the gunshot rang from the school. I didn't know Conner, and I am sure everybody is looking into the reasons why he did what he did. But it was hard to deal with.

At 15, I had no boyfriends, I was a loner, I was a C student and hung out with the popular crowd, the sports crowd, and the geeks...it was my life to fit in. 15 sucked, hormones, being malested by the people I babysat for, trying to deal with being an awkward teenager, do I smoke pot, drink beer, pay attention to my parents, who do I go for, for help...well the answer was my peers. At that age highschool was everything, it made you who you were, if you were not accepted, you didn't succeed. That was your life. I entrusted friends with my deepest secrets, and they told everybody. I relied on friendships that lasted a year. I told mothers and fathers that their child was having a sleep over at my house, when they were out partying at Middlebury College...it was survival, painful and ugly. I hated my early years at high school.

It took awhile and then I realized that I didn't want to be that person who lied to parents, or friends. I didn't care if you were on the smoking side of the school or on the sports teams. If you were pretty, cute or scum...it was a perfect Fuck you moment, and I decided, if you don't like who I am, I don't care. It worked...I made friends I would have looked over, I lived experiences I would not have and I survived what I thought was the worst part of my life ever. I guess this all ties into the will to conquer, or defeat your demons ...etc...I just look at Max and think, wow, that was me a long time ago, all odds against me and I worked it out, and then I look at Conner and wish I had known him, to tell him this is not your life. It is high school. A stressful, most painful accomplishment, that can be about you or about how you fit in to society....and you need to make it about you. My heart goes out to Conners family and friends and I only hope in the next 6 years that my daughter has to grow, that she is strong and full of self esteem. Because these were things her mother was not, and I could have been in Conners place.

Never grow old

Last night I had the pleasure of seeing my friend play acoustic guitar at Parima. It was an experience that took me back to my college days, pre-kid, pre- marriage, pre-anything that meant I needed to stop, look, and listen. I was free to be me. Eating good food, with good friends, and listening to music that I would enjoy throughout the night. It was as if I was in another state or country, feeling like I could do anything and it would be alright. Of course it was alright, when I walked in the door, and snuggled in amongst my children, husband and dogs bodies, although my head didn't really agree with me in the morning. However I had done it, gone out had a good time and made it back in one piece.

The object of this statement is well, don't grow up. Let yourself go. If everyone just got to step back for one day, or night or hour, there would be no need for depression drugs, therapy sessions, millions of dollars spent on things that we think will improve our lives but just sit collecting dust in the basement. Children our most precious cargo...why not enjoy what they have to offer with their sense of free spirit and carelessness. Now don't get me wrong, these types of events can lead to disaster if taken daily, but that is where our adult maturity and experiences come into play. We know when enough is enough and get back into the grind. I love being a mom, wife, care-taker, and worker...but I also know how to kick back and have a good time. This is who I am and will be for however more days I have on this planet, and it makes me smile.

The New Year's thang

So, here we are in the New Year of 2011, not so kind for the Sears family, 2 kids with strep, mom with strep, sinus and ear infection, but none the less still truckin'. I was trying hard to think of what my resolution(s) could be. Not only the obvious ones,

1) Drink less

2)Lose weight

3) Eat healthy

4) Save the Earth

and it just got me more and more depressed. I need to do all these things and can't figure out how to start or am just overwhelmed by the big picture. I had claimed that I was not going to drink for 6 months, that lasted until the first holiday party....broken, I was pumped to do another session of bootcamp the 5:30 exercise class that motivates me to get out of my nice warm bed with one or two or three humans in it. I started eating breakfast at a regular time, instead of 10am or 11am, I recycle, use less, and re-use as much as possible. However, it wasn't doing it for me. Why was I still in a slumber. And then it dawned on me. People were relying on me to fail. The roll of the eyes, when I would have another glass of wine, the "your not doing bootcamp?"...questions when your head feels like someone took a bat to your sinuses, the pants that just won't get any looser, all these things were eating at my self-esteem and whittling it down to a none sharp pencil. I was down, and not really wanting to get up, and then as I watched my child crawl out of bed, crying, her body limp from sleep, putting every bit of effort to raise her hands and arms around my neck to hold on. I realized I was loved, needed, important. I kicked my depression back into it's corner and squeezed back, needing her as much as she needed me and as I write this it brings tears to my eyes. I was selfish to think of what I needed for a New Year's resolution, it was right here in front of me. I am going to start again, with baby steps, and whenever I feel overwhelmed and down in the dumps, I will reach out, grab a hold of my child and squeeze. It is the best feeling ever.

A year in the life of Lupe

January 5, 2011

It is amazing what can happen in a year, or two. I just read my old blogs from a time when things were not so much black and white, and realize they still are not so black and white, more like yellow and sienna.

I have watched the chicks that arrived so fresh and strong willed in their box, grow and nurture to a point where they could be kept outside, free, graze on the grasses of life, and then to be eliminated by the neighbors dog in one swell swoop. That day was dark. And one that brought me back to my childhood, when we would hear the cackle of the chickens in their pen, that meant distress. My sisters and I would drop everything and run to the pen, scared to see what was inside but also protective of what we had coveted as our own. It was often times bloody, heads chewed off and left with the bodies, wasting away like a used McDonald's wrapper.

That would be a weasel, the next time a hawk, or the worst, the neighbors dog that slipped under the fencing and would run by you claiming his prize in his squawking mouth and disappearing down the road.

The day my daughters chicks died, was one of the worst memories I can remember. It was partially my fault, and 99 percent my neighbors dogs instinct.

I had just let the chicks now pullets out for an afternoon in the sun, after being in our basement for 4 weeks, they wanted to see the light. Well, they saw the light maybe a bit too brightly. We had devised a temporary fencing. Wire around a small pen, which was secured by plastic electric fence poles. I had just put the girls out and was watching their excitement as they flapped and fluttered and ran with new vigor at the space they were not used too. It was time to pick up my daughter from school, a 15 minute round trip, without traffic, 20 minutes at most if behind the bus. Loaded up the Berkster in her car seat, and headed out.

You know that little voice in your head that says 'maybe you should have put the chickens back in, before you left'...well I didn't listen to it. But I did get that no so happy feeling in my gut while driving 45 in a 30 mph zone. I even remember herding Sydney under my wing to get her out of the classroom and into the car, saying 'we have to hurry Sydney, I left the chickens out'...

No herding or speeding could have helped the mass executions we received while driving up the driveway. The chicks were still, silent, and warm. Lying in the same spot as when I had left them, except for one, who lay halfway in the pens door, slowly working to breath just another breathe. She died in my hands as the adrenaline pulsed through my veins , and that little voice became a loud thumping 'I Told You So'. 13 dead, 2 injured, all splayed across my driveway for my daughters to behold.

The screams of the children were almost unbearable. They could not understand how or why this had happened. Berkeley kept remarking' you can take it to work mom and fix it, it's alright, it will be alright' Unfortunately Berk it won't be alright. They are dead, passed on, spirits and soon to be earth. It was a hard concept to grasp even for a 40 year old. I had loved these chicks from day 3 of their lives, and they were gone.

Since that moment I have excepted that little voice, it knows what it is talking about. The chickens were compensated for by our neighbor, the funeral under the apple tree gave a sense of closure to my children, and the new box of chicks arrived several weeks later. However, the haunting truth will never leave and I have a feeling my children will be the ones that have that same childhood memory I grew up with many years ago.

The Chick meca

I recently purchased chicks, from a wonderful chick company in Alabama. As I waited patiently for my day old chicks to arrive, I started to think of the stress and strife these fresh out of the incubator critters were facing.

*Hatched from artificial light, and warmth, with no clucking hen to encourage them out of their shell

*Plucked from a nice warm home, vaccinated and shoved in a box with a hand warmer, small amounts of food, and no water

*Bounced and bobbled all over the country, in heat and cold, and darkness

*Arriving 3 days later in a room where boxes are bounced on top of you and weird voices are complaining that you're peeping to loud

* Being picked up and transferred to another artificial source of heat, food you haven't tasted before and faces peeking in at you every 10 seconds to see if your feet are up in the air.

Sounds like a lot of family trips I took when I was a kid, but seriously, the will to survive this amazing journey is well, Amazing! What mammal, animal, reptile, insect or alien can do such a thing? The answer is pretty much all of them. We've seen it with chicks, children that fit in the palm of your hand, spiders that walk on the busy streets of NY. or a pack of lions that pounce on a baby wildebeest dragging it into the water, where an alligator decides to join in the fight, yet the damn thing survives.

Survival, it's what we all do, some of us do it a bit better then others. I was recently put in a situation, where survival was not the choice my friend decided he wanted. With a gun to his head and 4 others surrounding his room, he wanted to end it. Luckily, his parents stepped in, all the way in Michigan, and called the cops, who eventually tackled my friend and took him to be psychologically analyzed. He's fine, and he's just another guy you'd meet on the street, cute, funny and able to liven up a party. But something switched in his head for just a moment, and for that moment, nothing mattered. He didn't care that he had a caring family, a group of friends who would go out of their way to help him, a job, food on the table, heat, and love. It is that moment where we have to test our strengths, should we survive or should we cry out to be saved. He cried out, and we were there to hear him, and I am glad he is in my life.

What's this have to do with chicks, well they are dealt with many of the same toils and troubles we are in life, and if you can survive a trip like they do at one day old, you can survive almost anything. I am grateful for my chicks ability to survive tough situations, but I am most grateful that I have a friend who found the strength in himself, not to pull the trigger. I love you bro.

Are you for real?

Well yesterday was indeed a good day, until I was forced to shove a 6'5" 35ish man out a door, while face to face with an opposing 6'2" man screaming in my face, " Let's go, I will take this outside, let's go. " Let me tell you standing on 3" heels with a 5'6" build is really a challenge when you have beer and adrenaline pushing on every ounce of your tired body. What are people thinking? This is Jericho Vermont! Why can't we all be happy, the sun is shining and has been for over 12 hours, there were no thunderstorms to cloud our minds, and people are on vacation with their families enjoying a night of dancing to the 80's they grew up to. I guess the real issue is that people need an excuse to do anything. Why not calmly sit down and discuss the reason their 6wk old baby was standing being cradled to sleep 5 ft away from a pounding beats of Billy Idol or Y.M.C.A! Yeah I know you're thinking why was the baby there in the first place? Well they were eating food at 10pm, but the manager on duty as well as ourselves ( bartenders/waitresses) might have suggested that they leave. But the child was asleep. Either that or so stressed from the beat, he had no choice to fall asleep, that is after all a stress response in animals. Needless to say no blood was shed, the situation was apprehended and the baby left the dance floor.
The argument: the family with the baby has had 4 kids, the women who had the guts to complain, had tried to conceive for 2 years and had 1.. This was her first time out with her husband in 4 years alone. Which one is the better parent? That's up to the individual, but my bet is the latter.
Being a bartender is a fun and fast paced lifestyle, you have to love to chat it up even when your sinuses are screaming at you and every time the base speaker thumps so does your eye sockets. And it is a mentally challenging. Their are a lot of wonderful people out there and they have their issues like the rest of us, but this is Jericho, Vt , don't be in my face when you're 6'5" asking for a fight. We're a peaceful town and work on resolving our issues with conversation other then explicatives.

Feeling Blue?

Today is probably going to be a good day, after a night of drinking, eating good food and falling down a flight of stairs, the sun is shining and the kids are happy. It's been hard lately, rain has doused the New England country side for 3 of the 4 summer months, mildew is in the basements, turning into living creatures, tomatoes rotting in the garden of weeds and hay is left for the deer to eat. After a very depressing summer I can already see the leaves turning their shades of colors and am not prepared for what seems to be fall. I can see a clearing in the clouds and watch my children ages 4y and 20 months fascinate themselves with the slugs that have overrun the lawn/garden/driveway. It has come to my attention, that I need a break, a break from the 4 jobs I fill my crazy life with, a break from the poisons of alcohol, and a break from the facade I live in. I am grateful for those who support me, love me and most importantly have patience with me. It is going to be a good day.