A while back — a long while back — I wrote about how in those first few months after Levi left I couldn't stand to look at anything that reminded me of him. This obviously included pictures of us, his clothes, his stuff etc., but also included things that he had bought for me: jewelry, clothes, dishes, and so on.

Although this has changed somewhat — I am once again wearing my favorite pair of jeans, even though he gave them to me — it hasn't completely gone away.

Levi's splitting plan (which was equivalent to that of a criminal running away in the night) wasn't conducive to hauling furniture along with him.
 
Although, he was slightly crafty and snuck a few of his favorite things into a storage shed before he left, I was left with quite a bit of furniture.

(Now that I think of it, I never did say thank you — better get on that.)

Not initially having room for all of it, I put most of it into storage also. (Too bad Levi and I weren't on better terms, we coulda probably gotten a sweet two for one deal.)

Well, now I have the room, and a need, for the rest of the furniture. I have enlisted my friends to help me fetch it next Saturday.

"Why didn't you get it earlier?" my friend Rachel asked. I told her the truth: I didn't quite have the room for it, and, I couldn't stand to look at it. She told me that she had that same problem when she had broken up with a long term boyfriend. "Yeah, I think its a common symptom of breakups," I told her.

Then it hit me. I had an idea. "Wouldn't it be great if I could find another woman with a storage shed of furniture that shed of furniture that she couldn't stand to look at? "We could trade!!"

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Its been raining for days and I'm loving it. Sometimes its nice to have an excuse to to stay in and be lazy, to be cozy.

One of my favorite things to do when the weather starts getting colder is cook. Now, I'm actually a really horrible cook, but I do know how to make soup. Homemade soup. I don't recall where I picked it up from, but its pretty easy, it makes the house smell nice, and it's delicious.

Yesterday, Adrian and I made homemade chicken soup. Well, actually, Adrian kind of watched in awe as I danced around the kitchen — in an effort to make things interesting for him I dance around — chopping up veggies and singing. It was a blast, and we both enjoyed our soup.

Today we are making split pea soup. I let him pour the peas into the pot. He loved it! We did the same thing again — dancing, singing, giggling and smiling.

I love being a mother — I love my son with a veracity that I didn't even know existed. He really is my heart, and every time I look at him I am reminded that he is the something great that came out of this whole tragic mess.

I love our days together, and so look forward to every second we get to spend together. Its days like this that I am reminded that I needn't search for the perfect man, I already have him.

I've been having strange dreams lately. Not really nightmares — I guess it depends on the way you look at it — but close enough. It's as if the reality of being alone, living alone has just sunk in and my subconscious is freaking out!

For example, last night I had a dream that I was driving with the baby in the back seat. Suddenly my car started revving and bucking then sputtering and it died in the middle of the road.

I reached for my cell phone — remember this is a dream — and there was no service. Adrian started crying, I went to give him a bottle, and it was empty. It was then that I decided to try to fix the car myself — this is how you can be absolutely sure I was dreaming!

Suddenly, I morphed into a mom/mechanic, discovered that my timing belt — I don't even really know what that is — was broken, and somehow miraculously fixed it. I woke up exhausted. Don't you hate it when that happens?

The night before that, I had a dream that it started snowing. We turned on the TV and the weatherman was predicting six feet of snow. I stood on the porch and watched the snow fall in a panic, realizing that I would have to shovel out in the morning.

I must admit it was nice having a man around to take care of these sorts of things. Today I think I'll search the Life section for "Husband For Hire" Ads.

A while back — months ago — a good friend of mine told me that she was up to no good.

I've always had a lot of respect for her, as she seems to be the one that is always together. You know: owns a home, holds down a good job, gets along well with her parents and never really has any drama in general. I was very intrigued to know what it was that she was up to.

Well, she dropped a bomb. She told me that she had been sleeping with a married man. She went on to say that she didn't feel guilty about it, that there were issues in their marriage that had nothing to do with her — in her opinion, it was their problem.

I told her that in my opinion, she was completely wrong — that no woman should do that to another woman, period. I went on to tell her that this guy is clearly a liar — along with the slew of other names I called him — and that this was going to come back to bite her in the ass for sure.

Well, she kept doing it, and I tried to keep my opinions to myself. She decided that she couldn't talk to me about it, that my opinion was biased and that I was taking it all too personally because of what I went through with Levi. The whole thing made me sick, and truth-be-told I lost a lot of respect for her.

It turns out they did get found out. Apparently someone told his wife. I don't really know what the details of the situation are, but my best guess is that now the fun is over and the poor wife and mother is left to pick up the pieces. It's truly sad, and I feel badly for all of them — most importantly the kids.

The moral of the story: Don't engage in affairs with married men.

Levi did all of the cooking when we were together — most of the time. Because of that, I'm not really that great of a cook.

As a matter of fact, there has always been a man around to cook for me. My dad was a great cook, my first boyfriend was a chef, and then there was Levi.

That said, I'm sick of eating out of cans and sticking things in the microwave. Its gross, and someday I'm going to have a teenage boy to cook for! If Levis' appetite is any indicator for what Adrian's will be...well, all I can say is watch out.

I've decided to try to teach myself how to cook. A lot of people have told me to watch the cooking channel, but honestly, I find most of the hosts to be, well, annoying. Instead, I went to the bookstore, bought a few cookbooks and have resolved to try one new recipe a week.

Tonight I'm going to attempt a chicken casserole. When I told my friends, they all cracked up. Still, I think its a good move for me. I mean really, what's the worst thing that can happen — I'll burn the house down?

I have pretty high standards where men are concerned — you'd never know it, would you? I have a list of requirements about a mile long. I figure, if I learn to cook, I can scratch that off of the list. (However, I'll always require that man shovel off my car when it snows. I hate doing that!)

Does anyone have any advice for a new cook? Suggestions for places I might find recipes, or a new technique to try?

I'm getting rid of everything Levi, and in doing so, I feel like I'm taking back my life.

Levi picked out all of our furniture, all of our towels, all of our...well everything. I still have all of this stuff, and I'm sick of it. I never really liked his taste much anyhow. He's really into dark hues, lots of browns — who knew there were so many shades of brown!

So, I've been gifting couches, coffee tables, curtains and more to my friends. I figure whatever is left behind I can donate.

It's not just stuff that I'm trying to rid myself of. There are a lot of habits that come along with living with someone for so long, and even after they're gone, the habits remain hard to break.

You know what I mean: Watching that same TV show every night, the one you used to watch together but now you're watching alone — and you don't even like the freaking show.

Sometimes I still set the timer on the coffee pot because Levi liked me too. The biggest one of all — my bed. What is the deal with that? Can I please have my bed back?

I keep trying to reclaim it. Every night, I make a conscience effort to fall asleep in the middle of the bed, to take up the whole bed. Still, I consistently wake up on "my side." I'm starting to think I should trade in my king for a single, as I don't use it anyway.

Has anyone else run into this?

I woke up this morning smiling and ready for the day.

I blasted some music, danced around, Adrian squealed with delight. I went over to my closet, eyed all the clothes trying to figure out what to wear.

I started trying things on — while still dancing around trying to entertain Adrian — and in the process of doing so most of my clothes ended up on the floor. After what seemed like ages, I finally figured out what to wear.

We went into the kitchen, and I started breakfast. Adrain had scrambled eggs and Cheerios. I had cottage cheese and toast.

When we finished breakfast, I looked around for a moment: dishes in the sink, clothes all over the floor, make-up and hair products all over the bathroom. My house was a total mess. Ordinarily this might bother me, but this morning it made me grin from ear to ear. I'm finally free!

Levi was a neat freak, an obsessive compulsive neat freak. It drove me nuts! I drove him nuts! He's the kind of guy that does the dishes before he eats. He wouldn't dream of throwing clothes on the floor.

To him, everything has a place and if its out of place he can't function. I'm the type of person that doesn't really mind messes, so long as its not actually 'dirty'.

I felt so liberated by my mess, that I turned the music up, picked up Adrian, and we danced and danced, both of us giggling like crazy.

So, I've joined the swell set and hired a "Manny"! For those of you who don't know what it is, a "Manny" = Male Nanny. The Manny is also the name of a popular book by Holly Peterson that's being made into a film.

Here's how it happened: My friend Erin babysat for me the night of Sarah's birthday party and she also brought her boyfriend, Ryan with her. So, after the party, and my fun night, I went to pick up Adrian. I walked into Erin's house and there's Ryan playing with my baby. Both had huge smiles on their faces and were clearly enjoying themselves. Erin was in the kitchen cleaning up the breakfast mess.

I sat down with Ryan and we chatted. He told me that they had taken Adrian shopping and that people kept complementing him on what a beautiful baby he had. He told me that he didn't correct people and allowed them all to believe that Adrian was his baby. He was bragging about Adrian's new "game": Ryan would make a sound like 'gaa' or 'baa,' and Adrian would repeat it. I didn't have the heart to tell him that Adrian plays that game with everyone! The whole thing was really cute.

Then, a few days later Ryan called and told me that he had a blast hanging out with Adrian, that he could use some extra money and asked me if I'd like to hire him as a babysitter. I said "yes" without hesitation. I think this will be good for all of us. Adrian will get to have some male bonding time with a nice guy, and I'll get a break every now and then. Perfect, right?

 

 

Two things that don't work: Being broke and searching for a New York City apartment. They don't go together,

And nevertheless, the fact is: I'm broke. Scary broke. My rainy day fund is gone. I thought it would last us much longer but I guess I underestimated how expensive a baby is. I lost my job when Adrian was in the hospital because I couldn't be there. That's made things really tough for a while.

I've secured another job (a pretty good one in Manhattan) but it doesn't start for another six weeks. So now I have the added pressure of finding an apartment with no money. It’s not going too well.

I wrote down all of my expenses last night and realized that I need to pull in an extra $5,000 to make the Manhattan thing work—$5,000 is keeping me from my dream.

My first thought was to take out a loan. Tried it, not going to happen. Since Levi's giant financial mess, MY credit is screwed...go figure. Then I thought about selling some of Levi's stuff that he left in storage. I consulted my lawyer on it—also not going to happen.

My attorney said that since Levi and I are still married I would have to split the proceeds with him. Also since I have no way of knowing how much this stuff is actually worth, Levi could say it’s worth much more than what I sold it for and then I could get even more screwed.

Yippee!

Next I thought about going right to the source: Levi or his parents. I decided against that immediately. I'm not going to beg Levi for money anymore and as far as his parents are concerned, they're such disgusting people I probably wouldn't take their money anyway. They have refused to acknowledge my son’s existence since his birth because he's not Jewish. Prior to his birth, they tried to convince me to sell my baby for $100 K.

I really despise them.

So now, I'm praying for a miracle.

Post Levi, I hate, hate, HATE living in this small town. Everywhere I go, I feel like I'm being judged, gossiped about, scrutinized and I’m sick to death of it.

I decided to make a change, a fresh start. I want to be anonymous again, so I’m planning to move to New York City— downstate to my current “upstate” living situation.

I’ve secured a writing job and now I’m looking for an apartment. This isn’t so easy. Not so long ago, I might have considered whether an apartment had decent light, wondered what kind of heat it had and does the plumbing work? I would ask about the neighbors—were they “cool” which usually translated into, could I blast loud music or host loud parties.

Those days are long gone. Now, I have one requirement for a new apartment (okay maybe more than one, but this is a big one). The one question I’ll be asking while looking at New York City apartments is: Does it have “jumping doorways”?

For those of you who don’t know what a “jumping doorway” is, it’s a doorway that has enough trim or molding around it to hold up the Jolly Jumper that my son loves.

Adrian will jump in there for a good hour, that’s a pretty significant attention span for a six-month-old and I’ve learned to get a lot done during his jumping time. I love the Jolly Jumper!

So, if anyone knows of an available apartment with good jumping doorways, please let me know.