Text Messages

“Hey, xoxo Lv U”

I looked at my phone and read the text message I never expected to get.

“Hey, xoxo Lv U”

Three weeks before, the last thing I heard from him was “I’m not going down this road with you.”  And just like I turned my phone off when I went into jail, I turned off my heart and believed he had walked away.

Ten days later, I was able to convince an officer to allow me to use my cell phone to check my bank balance.  While I had my phone, I checked my text messages.  There were none from him.  Ten days of ‘radio silence’.  That confirmed what I had believed all alone, he had walked away.

Eleven days after that I was given use of my cell phone to make phone calls to get bonded out.  And again, I looked for text messages, and again, there were none from him.  I spent the 22 hours I had to wait in jail thinking about what I would say to him when I got out.

The girls dad picked me up from jail, I had my cell phone and again, checked for text messages, still there were none.  I still felt I owed him something, so I sent him “I’m out, home tonight sometime”.

It was as if I had opened a floodgate.  The texts started pouring in, Where are you? Who’s got you? When are you coming home? How are you getting home?  When did you get out?  Why didn’t anyone tell me you were out? Can you call me?

And then, “Hey, xoxo Lv U”

I had just spent three weeks believing it was over. I had spent three weeks not even thinking about him.  I had spent three weeks building walls around my heart and believing when I got out, he would be gone.

And then there were more.

“I missed you”

“I kept tabs on you”

“Let me come get you”

“I really want to see you”

“I am ready to go, truck cleaned, car hauler on, getting to see my girl”

I stared at my phone as each text came in, more and more unsure what I was seeing, more and more unsure I could believe what I was reading.

In the midst of all the texts he was sending me, I started receiving texts he had sent the entire time I was in jail. He had sent me text messages every day while I was gone.  Knowing I wouldn’t have my phone, but hoping they would be there when I got out.

He picked me up that night and brought me back to his house for the night.  A buffer between jail, and the real world.  I stood there looking around at a house I never thought I’d stand in again, trying to wrap my mind around the fact that I was out of jail, and in his house.  He walked up to me, wrapped his arms around me and just held me.  I could feel how much I had hurt him, I could feel how much he had missed me, I could feel how relieved he was I was home.  I felt how sorry I was, how it hurt me to know I had hurt him, and I felt like a total shit for not trusting everything that was right in front of me.

And yet, I had spent three weeks building walls, keeping him out, believing he was gone.  Those were no easier to undo than the hurt and disappointment I had inflicted on him.

It’s been a week.  He’s still here.  He still says I love you every day.  I have learned in this past week, that he called and texted Muri several times a day to find out where I was, if anyone had heard anything new.  He watched posts on Facebook from my girls, and my family hoping for some sort of news.  He was there within hours of me being released and has asked about court dates, has offered to help out until I get completely back on my feet again.

I never did get all the text messages he sent in those long three weeks I was gone, but I got the important one

“Please get out soon.”

It told me all I needed to know.

Will Lisa be another Caylee?

Here we go again.

This is Baby Lisa.

A 10 month baby from Kansas City.

She’s been missing since October 4th. 

Her parents stopped cooperating with the authorities and lawyered up on October 8th. 

Wait, what?

Their 10 month old baby girl has gone missing, clearly not on her own, and they have stopped cooperating with the very people who are their best chance of finding and bringing her home?  If it was my baby I’d be there every single day telling the police, the FBI, everyone whatever it is they wanted to know so as to eliminate me from their list of suspects.  If I clearly had nothing to hide, nothing to do with her disappearance, let’s get me cleared so the investigators can get busy finding the baby, and who took her.

The FBI is involved.  The mother failed a lie detector test.  This baby is still missing.  It’s another Casey Anthony story.  And yet, as often as I have defended the Casey Anthony verdict, right now, it looks like the parents had something to do with the disappearance of this baby. 

The parents are no longer talking to authorities, but have granted media interviews.  There have been several inconsistencies in what they told investigators and what they are now telling the media. 

In this country you are innocent until proven guilty, I get that.  But when babies go missing we tend to look at the parents because on some level they are responsible, right or wrong. 

Last night, the mother admitted in a news interview that she was drunk the night the baby went missing.  She told investigators she hadn’t seen Lisa since 10:40 that night. She told the media it was closer to 6:40 and she may or may not have blacked out that night. 

Today, the FBI sealed their house.  The parents, up to this point, have been able to come and go as they pleased, getting whatever they needed from their home, while staying somewhere else.  Today the FBI banned them from their house. 

And yet, they are innocent until proven guilty. 

A little girl, who hasn’t even celebrated her first birthday, is not in her home, does not sleep in her own bed, is not with her parents. 

And the questions go unanswered.

 

They're always thinking of me

Last night, after picking up the girls from their dad’s early because he wanted to watch the Super Bowl. Meh, what do I care?  I’ll pick them up early.  Not like I was watching the game.

We get home at a fairly decent time, and by decent I mean Oh my god I still have hours before it’s time to go to bed even though I could drop right now and sleep the sleep of the dead.  I decided to have a snack, you know because nothing is better than eating when you really just want to go to bed.

I’ll have some cheese and crackers and finish off that half bottle of wine in the fridge that I started the other night while watching the second season of Sex and the City.

I go to the kitchen, open the cabinet, grab the box of crackers, pop it open, reach in and Hello (hello hello hello) (those are echos for those of you who aren’t hearing this post narrated in your head like I am as I type it)

The girls?  Had helped themselves to some cheese and crackers (but not my wine, thankyouverymuch) while they had been snowed in.  Fine. I’m ok with that.  The cheese and crackers?  For everyone.  The wine?  All. Mine.

I reach in the box, thinking WTF?  There, at the bottom of the box….

2 1/2 crackers.

Not 3.

Two and a half.

I slowly turn to the girls and ask them “Did you seriously put this box away with only two and a half crackers left in it?  Why not just EAT the two and a half crackers?  There’s still plenty of cheese left, so I know you didn’t run out of cheese.”

The best answer they could come up with?

“We wanted to save some for you mom!”

Gee.  Thanks.

I am thankful for things most people take for granted.

It’s been a year to be thankful for.   And yet, I find myself selling it all short.  I am thankful for things this year that most everyone else takes for granted.  I’m thankful that my legal issues are behind me and there will be no more weekends spent in jail.  And really, isn’t that on everyone’s list of things to be thankful for this year?

I am thankful that I finally have a place to live that is not a rat infested hell hole (there were no rats at any of the places I’ve lived.  An occasional mouse? Yes. Rats? No).  I have a place I can be proud of and I can have people over and the girls can have play dates and sleep overs and a social life.

I am thankful that I finally have my head screwed on straight.  I have finally figured out that I have to give up tanning and manis/pedis and Starbucks every day so that I can pay the rent and the utilities and buy groceries.  And see?  How this is simple basic economics that everyone else understands naturally but me?  The one who has a BS in Business Administration, who actually took economics and accounting and business management in college?  Took 42 years to get it.

I am thankful that I am on medication and makes all of the above things possible.  Sure I hate the fact that for the rest of my life I will have to be on medication just so I can function like everyone else manages to do on a day to day basis, but if swallowing a pill or two every single day means I live my life in relative comfort and security, then so be it.

I am thankful that I walked away from an accident that could have been oh so much worse than it turned out to be.  The pictures is much more horrifying than the reality, really.   Of course, now I have to deal with insurance and estimates and blah blah blah but uh, I’ll gladly do that, to be able to walk away.  Even if with a limp.

I am thankful that for whatever reason (and I don’t care the reason) for the first time since our divorce, the girls’ dad and I have found a way to be co-parents together and work together without trying to kill each other.  We have found a peace and understanding between us and that makes the girls’ lives easier too.  And frankly, that’s what it’s all about.

I am thankful that my brother won’t be home for the holidays this year.  Well, not really thankful that he won’t be home. I am thankful that he is on US soil and has the freedom to make the choice where he will be spending the holidays.  With a brother in the military, holidays are always touchy because we never know if he will get to be home or even on US soil.  And if he is, we are eternally grateful that he is, but also a bit guilty that we get him home while there are families out there who haven’t seen their loved ones in months or even years.

I am thankful that I get the opportunity to write with a great group of women over at Buy-Her.com.  I love to write, (although you can’t tell it by looking at my own blogs) and I love to shop and writing for Buy-Her.com combines the two and that rocks.  My Drama Tweens also love the idea of trying out new things and helping me write about it for Miss Britt.    So I am thankful to Britt for giving me the opportunity to combine two things I love and share that experience with two people I love.

I am thankful for my work bestie who shares her birthday with me.  Everyone needs someone in their life who is always there to remind you that your awesome far outshines everyone else’s awesome.   I know that we are good enough friends that she would take me and the girls in if we needed a place to live.  She knows we are good enough friends that I would never ask that of her.

I am thankful for all you guys too.  For the support and friendship you have shared with me this year has touched me in ways I can’t put into words.  And when you leave me with a lack of words, you’ve accomplished something.  Thank you for coming by and reading this stuff every day, thank you for leaving comment love, thank you for the kind thoughts, the heartfelt prayers, the well wishes, the swift kicks in the ass when I need them, and the friendship you all have offered throughout the year.  I cherish you all.

Now, go do a whipped cream shot (or ten) and get your thankfulness on!