I am an Atheist.

 I am an atheist. I am also a mother and a damned good one. I wasn’t always atheist. I was raised Christian and enjoyed the benefits that believing in God with the rest of my friends offered. I enjoyed that deep down good feeling that I was doing something right because I had confirmation from a higher order that said, “God approves.” I had a rule book laid out before me and I had checks and balances in the form of preachers and youth advisors. I was happy with this.

                Who doesn’t want to know that what they are doing is right, correct, and good? Being good was easy. Having loads of friends who also agreed and accepted me because of my choice to have Jesus in my life was also nice. So what turned me? What made me step away from the solace of a life well lived in step with the creator to face uncertainty? I know that in writing this, even though I don’t intend to offend anyone, it will inevitably offend someone. My lifestyle choice offends people as it is. Just being me offends someone. So, the only way that I can write this is to do myself justice and be completely truthful with my feelings, knowing full well that people are going to disagree with me and that people will be offended. So, in advance, if you are of the offended, I apologize that you are offended, but I will not recant my experiences, point of view or expression.

                Everyone knows that life is a journey rife with lessons to learn and experiences to be had. We are all fumbling around grabbing at anything that might hold answers to our loaded questions and have been since birth. If you don’t believe me, just take this example from my son, who is four. One day he came to me and asked,

“Mommy, why do people die?” This is the epitome of a loaded question if I ever heard one. What do you tell a four year old child? His innocence beamed up at me like a lost trinket of childhood that I once held in my own hand. I had options at my disposal. I had stories taught to me by various pastors, professors, science teachers and my own parents but I had to quickly choose the right thing to say to my child. How do you explain to him that death is something that everyone will experience? That one day, I will die and he will die? My first impulse was to soften the blow and describe a place that was better than this one. How could I paint such a bleak picture of the end of a human life after all? I wanted to protect him. I am his mother.

                I will get to my answer in a moment, but first I must say this. I AM his mother and therefore I feel strongly that he is educated. I think that holding things back and painting a reality based on my philosophies could do a disservice to him later in life. I knew that some of my answers and thoughts could be difficult for him to process, but he looked at me in earnest.

                “Everyone dies.” I finally answered, “It’s the natural order of life. Every person that is on this planet and every living thing will one day, eventually, stop living.” I knew that this was a lot for a four-year-old to understand, but I figured that it was a good base for questions that I knew would erupt from his thoughtful mind later in life. I could tell that he was considering this new information and drawing conclusions and tying up loose ends in his mind. I felt good about my answer. It was careful, true and it avoided breaching subjects that I wasn’t comfortable breaching with a child his age. But he had other plans. He’s always been very inquisitive.

                “But then what?” He asks, finally reaching that moment in his brain where he’s placed the events in their natural order and is so used to there being a next step-- a cause and effect--that he simply wants to know what happens next. I suck in a deep breath and choose my words carefully.

                “This is a hard one, baby. Different people have different thoughts on what happens when we die, but no one is really sure. What do you think happens?” He considers me carefully and then his eyes shift to the side. His mouth opens slightly and his hands finally come to rest on his hips.

                “I think that maybe we turn into superheroes.” His eyes reached mine, full of wonder and excitement at this new idea. I had to hand it to him. He was a smart child and imaginative at that.

                “Well, I think that’s a good hypothesis,” I responded.  Earlier that week we learned what a hypothesis was and how making hypothesis about how things work in the world helps us to understand the physical plane around us. He seemed satisfied with my answer and ran off to ransack his toys. I know that I want my child to form opinions and thoughts independent of me. I want to cultivate in him the ability to consider what I think and feel without taking it as the ultimate word when it comes to most things in life. I want him to understand that we are all human and that no one, no matter how smart, has all the answers.  I want him to feel free to consider the world around him and to find where he fits in it and ultimately find what makes him happy.  If this includes being religious, irreligious, gay, straight, powerful, artsy—whatever—I’d want him to be comforted in knowing that I would accept him no matter how he chose to view the world and those in it.

                Most of us atheists have a defined moral compass that is independent of the church or outside influences. We view the world around us and decide what is right based on what seems best for society and humanity. Is it right to steal? No. It hurts people. It hurts the economy. There are obvious and tangible consequences to stealing. Do I need to add the extra muscle of god in heaven looking down and mandating that it’s wrong? Not personally. This is only a small example of the expansive nature of the religion debate, but it’s a good one. When I chose to deny a god it came in stages. I asked every question and tried with fervor to maintain the notion that I needed a god in my life. I wanted to believe.

                I considered, deeply, the many well thought out arguments for a god existing that came to me throughout the years. I tried accepting them and when simple acceptance didn’t work, I tried reasoning them into my reality. Where did everything come from?  I agreed at one point that it must be a divine being. Someone who created everything, some entity that had a plan, a designer a creator. But… then my pesky brain would kick into gear and a cloud of questions would descend into my conscious, ruining my beautiful picture. The first inconsistency that always came to me, without fail, even as a child was if everything was created by god, this would mean that everything that exists must have a creator. If this is true, then god, himself, must have a creator… and so on into infinity. Even though I still have no clue as to how everything came to be, I know that logic is not on the side of Christianity in this instance. When I asked about this in church as a child several things happened. First, the pastor explained that God is the I Am, which made no sense to me. He told me that he spoke himself into existence… now, whether or not this is general Christian belief I do not know. 

Pardon me

Pardon Me

      The great flood of 2008 had left our house in saddening disrepair. I call it the great flood... though only my house was affected. It's really an experience to work yourself up to taking a nice bath when you are eight months pregnant only to step ankle deep in a pile of water in your hallway. I guess that our house is pretty old... and plumbing does not last forever. But... when your house floods like this you just know deep down that this is just the beginning of something much larger and more heinous to come.
      I'll fast forward through the details of the upcoming months. During the third trimester of my pregnancy my front yard resembled an excavation site from the plumbing work. Our house flooded two more times. After the thousands of dollars that went into salvaging the carpeting and drying out walls it was decided that a complete re-pipe of the house be done. Every wall where there was plumbing was cut open and gutted. Once the plumbing was all replaced, we were sure that our problems were over. The next thing to complete was closing up all of the holes.
      Then I had my baby. I was horrified to think of bringing her home in the midst of all of this destruction, but really... what choice did I have? So we brought her home and kept her in our bedroom. The day that I was calling the drywallers to come in and patch up all of the holes our air conditioning died. It didn't putter about with its death either signaling its end with sputters or surges of warmth. It just dropped dead; subsequently the first day it reached over 90 degrees outside. So as the kids and I lay sweltering in the oven of my home, I made a decision to fix the air conditioner first.
      Of course... it wasn't an easy fix. There were no blown fuses or a simple lack of coolant... no. The entire unit was fried. Bye bye to thousands of more dollars. And... a hold to the patching for now. After a week of stifling heat and more strangers lurking about my house with my newborn... breastfeeding might I add... the unit was replaced. Anyone who knows me well, knows that I have a slight anal tendency toward a very clean home. I am not environmentally friendly when it comes to murdering germs and use bleach with open windows. Call me crazy, but I love the smell of an aired out home after being completely bleached down. It's so crisp and most importantly... clean. I went through a stint of using all natural cleaners during Rowan's first two years of life because I felt guilty of... well... everything... but without bleach or antibacterial stuff... I felt like it was never clean enough. So... I made the switch back.
      I say the above to show the reason I was completely freaked out and disturbed when we noticed the new "tenants" that had taken up residence in our home. It started with one, but don't most of these accounts? I had ventured into the kitchen to take my nightly pill and when I flipped on the light he was standing there on the counter. This was, by far, the largest roach I had ever seen in my entire life. I sucked in a lung full of air and squeaked my husband's name. The roach lifted its head and turned it to look at me. He looked AT me. This was not your average house roach. This roach had a head that moved independent of its body. It was at this moment that I knew that we were going to have a problem.
      I HATE roaches. I hate them more than spiders or any other creepy crawly insect you can dream up. Roaches aren't just gross or slimy looking, but they are a direct insult to my ability to maintain a clean home. I come from Texas, where the roaches only enter your house if you leave food out and don't clean it up for weeks on end. What was this beast doing on my newly bleached counter? What was he doing in my kitchen where every single piece of food item was sealed? How dare he? My husband reassured me that this was not a house roach. He said that in Florida there are palmetto bugs and wood roaches that live outdoors. So... I thought... this was an illegal alien in my home.
      I did what any good American would do. I called border control. The drywallers showed up at my house the following day. They patched all of my hundreds of holes for a hefty $50 a hole. They capped us at $450... I could tell that he felt especially bad for us. The next day I breathed easier. This was, of course, until I went into my kitchen. I flipped on the light and they were everywhere. There were four playing poker on my countertop, one taking a bath in the sink, another trying to find entrance into the fridge and several more taking their children to the park I call my crock pot.
      The most disturbing thing of all is that they did not scatter. They all turned their heads and looked at me. It was at this moment that I realized that they were intelligent. My husband hates to kill a living creature and has been known to carry spiders and a myriad of other bugs outdoors to set them free in their natural habitats. It was no different with roaches. He came into the kitchen and systematically trapped each roach under a disposable plastic cup and took care not to harm them. With surgeon-like precision he lifted and removed every single roach from our kitchen and took them outside and far from the house before setting them free.
      Monkey was delighted beyond belief with his newfound friends. Each time the Professor would take one of the roach filled cups outside he'd stand at the door and yell "Bye bye roach, see you soon!" It was like he knew that they would be back. We figured that after a couple of weeks, we would have trapped most of them and taken them outside. With the walls patched up, they should have a hard time getting back into the house and we'd be done. I wasn't keen on the idea of hiring an exterminator because my daughter was only two months old and a very tiny two months at that. So we waited out the weeks and did the nightly roach extractions.
      Each time I encountered a beady eyed bastard I grew increasingly angry. One day I left a pot of water in the sink... I was trying to loosen up some burned on dinner... long story... but at any rate, one of those menacing freaks came out to see what I was doing. I swept him into the pot. And let him drown. I am not going to lie... I felt pretty crappy after doing that. I mean... he had a right to live, just not in my house. I needed to make an example... I could swear I saw a piece of mirror under the stove with four tiny roach heads peering up at me.
      I broke down the next day and called an exterminator. I was adamant about them using products that were not harmful to small children. We left the house and my husband took off of work while they did their roach killing magic. He said that we would probably see more roaches than normal as they stagger out to die. The first couple of days, I saw nothing. Which was a delight in itself. The third day... the roaches held a funeral. By the fourth day, the mourners of said funeral were laying on their backs in various places... all dying. We put them out of their miseries. After about a week or so... I was overjoyed at the site of no roaches. It was nice to go into the kitchen and flip on the light without expecting to see one. It was short lived, though.
      There is a reason that roaches are one of the oldest creatures on the planet. They have an uncanny ability to survive. Even to this day, I will see one or two of the mammoth creatures strolling about. I've called the exterminator a couple more times, but its always the same thing. Clear for a few days after... and then out pops a new one. I don't know where they are coming from or what they want from me. Since its only one every now and again... we've regained our humanity and are escorting them out of the house.

We don't hire preggos here

It feels like a bad discrimination movie. A ton of shrivelled up old hags staring at you as if because you are a mother, you are unfit to enter into the workforce. After all, your children are small enough to cyphon off your useful brainpower and if you've got more than one child... jesus... is there any brain left? I half-heartedly click through oodles of wanted ads with a sense of helplessness, after all, no one is going to hire me anyhow. I'm pregnant.

At this point I have a couple of options at my disposal. I could play stupid. I could be completely honest. I could be partially honest. I've already tried being completely honest. For a while I had a nice situation lined up for me. It's amazing how easily other mother's will betray their own kind. Here is a mother trying to go back to work, but in having a very small child is in need of childcare. I offer affordable, extremely intellectual, loving and clean childcare. She goes with me, signs paperwork, puts down a deposit even and then because a daycare center suddenly opens a spot, she chooses to go with them because working with me is too much of a hassle.

I've made things very simple. I mean, I do afterall have to plan for my son as well. I don't know about them, but I do know that I am worth working with a little. The overall payoff for her child's well being, education and healthiness would have been so much greater than the couple of weeks in which I'd have had some people in my home to help with the children. Wow. That's really hard.

I'm now faced with an option. I have another interested party and my question is... should I say something about my pregnancy or should I say nothing at all? When would be an ok time to mention that I'm pregnant? I don't want to be dishonest, because I wouldn't want someone else being dishonest with me, but I know that I might have a month or two where I can still pretty much hide it. What are your thoughts?

A Wild Hair

Ever since I was about ten years old, I've been sprouting these bizarre hairs on my body. They are thick and white like fishing floss. I remember the first time I had one. Something was itching on the side of my eye. I went into the bathroom and climbed up on the counter so that I could get a good look at it through the mirror. I know that a normal person would stand in front of a sink and bend to the mirror, but I was ten... and the average size of a six year old. With my knees strategically placed one on either side of the sink I leaned in and contorted my face the way one does when trying to look at a particular spot.

What was that?!?!?! A long, clear piece of hair was coming out of the corner of my eye. That is so weird! I have to get it out. I had no understanding of tweezers and immediately started trying to pull it out with my fingers. It took a little while, but finally it came off. I looked at the hair in my had and it was wild. It was about a half an inch long and really really thick... my only question - Where did this come from?!

As each year passed, it was marked with pulling out clearish white hairs from various places on my body, usually on my arm or face somewhere. I'd normally catch them when they were really small and I'd pull them out immediately. One time I was sitting and getting a well deserved pedicure and my mom spotted a white hair growing on the back of my arm. I had not seen it at that point and so I looked at her and asked, "What is up with this? Do I have to always get these? Where do they come from?" I guess that the pedicurist overheard our conversation because she was like, "No! No! Don't pull them out, they good luck! Bring lots of money!" I was so confused! So now I have sacred white hairs that keep popping up and the reason that we've always been dirt poor and struggling is because all this time I've been just ripping them out?!

It was a good laugh and fun to believe that this freakish occurence might have a real positive tune to it in the end, but we knew the reality. My body is just weird. A couple of days ago I was slathering my stomach down with the latest in moisturizing, collegen replacing elastin something or other and I felt something on one of my old stretch marks; battle wounds from my first pregnancy. I looked down and thought to myself... well... it must be a mole tag, those always grow when I'm pregnant. Instead of letting it go, though, I figured I might take a quick pull at it with the tweezers to make sure. It was not long enough to visibly look like a hair, but it was just a little too long to look like a skin tag too. I grabbed the tweezers and skillfully removed it from the stretch mark. It was LONG. I mean... really really long. It looked like a big toenail clipping after all was said and done.

The last time I talked to my mom about it, she mentioned that she read an article about women that get those random hairs and read that it was some sort of disease. Great. This is just what I need... a fishing hair disease.

Does this pee stick make me look fat?

I spent WAY too much money on my last pregnancy test. I mean, really... the dollar store test would have done the trick just the same. How difficult is it to detect the hormone pregnancy? Fertility has never been a difficult waiting game for me, it's more like a trip and fall right into it kind of game for me. It's easy, though, to forget yourself and get lost in the recounts of many women on the road to pregnancy. Most of them have been trying for at least a couple of months and some of them for over a year or so.

I remember getting the phonecall from the Professor while he was on a business trip with the governor in Tampa.

"Hey honey, I've been thinking...Monkey's getting older... and we don't want him to be too much older than our other babies... so I think we should just go ahead and get pregnant." Mind you... a week earlier I had scheduled a doctor's appointment to have Mirena, an intrauterine contraceptive, implanted into my uterus. This would mean 2-5 years of fruitless baby making-which is always fun too-but COME ON! I guess that he got cold feet on the whole pregnancy issue.
At any rate, back to the reason I titled the post the way that I did. Does this pee stick make me look fat? I ask because I swear that the second I held it steadily in the stream and watched it develop--ok... you got me, I didn't sit and watch it develop, it was digital--and say PREGNANT, my stomach immediately molded to a roundish kind of pregnant ball shape and my boobs swelled up two cup sizes. No joke. I guess that what they say is true to the extreme for me: After you have one baby, you show sooner with your others. In my case I didn't show until six months with my first, and even then it was a tiny little cute bump and with number two I pissed on a stick and now look like I did at seven months pregnant.
So... I've been Wiisearching and have come up completely dry for the Wii Fit. I've gotta do something about maintaining... lord knows I don't want to blow up like I did with Monkey.