*It’s mine now.

*His pillow? Also mine…until mine no longer smells like him and I steal back the pillow he is currently using.

*Seriously, it’s like a never-ending game of keep -away.

*His robe? Mine.

*His old T-shirts as my new(ish) nightshirts? Done.

*His toothbrush? Hold up. I have standards, people…

*And sometimes? All that’s left clean out of the three reusable water bottle pack we bought is the pink one (which he HATES taking to work) because I have lost and or/used both of the “manly” bottles I promised him he could have because the pink one was all mine.

*And I still have the nerve to look all What The Hell is Your Problem when he gets pissy because I have a habit of going all Winona Ryder with almost all of his belongings because it’s how the game is played, okay?

*For reals and true. It says so right there in little fine imaginary print.

*I’m writing this post in list form because my brain is only capable of remembering how to properly format one sentence at a time.

*Shut up. It’s been a long day, which I started by kicking my own ass on the elliptical before I ate breakfast.

*Again.

*Not kidding. I’ve been instagramming and tweeting my new addiction progress with shots of my total time and calories burned like it’s going out of style.

*No, I’m not showing off.

*What I’m actually doing is building a case for myself to prove to the rest of the world that it is entirely possible to work out every fucking day because it makes you feel good and then have to get back on the elliptical to work out again (to feel good) after you forgot the scale likes to make you feel bad that you are working out every day and not losing a fucking pound.

*No, of course I’m not bitter.

*I’m actually typing this as I elliptical again (is that a verb?) so I feel just great!

*Funny thing….

*The Husband had announced a week before our ninth wedding anniversary at the end of September that he wanted to buy an elliptical because with his crazy work schedule he doesn’t have time to join a gym.

*He hasn’t been on the damned thing once yet and I’ve been on it almost every day since.

*Which brings me to the actual point of this blog post.

*The Bastard played me.

I can and will fuck up anything when I put my mind to it.

It’s like a gift.

A rare talent that not many admit to possessing.

I can’t exactly blame those hiding their mad I Can Burn Boiling Water skillz from the general public, but I would like to make an argument for not hiding behind a veil of secrecy anymore. The world is a depressing place and I, for one, honestly think a few more idiots like me running around asking anyone who will listen where their glasses are and then running away before it can be pointed out that I misplaced my glasses on the bridge of my fucking nose would really liven up the joint.

Take today, for instance. We got that new elliptical delivered today and not only did I not crack and ask The Husband to confirm that it is not, in fact, his 9th wedding anniversary present to the fat ass that split the seat of her pants while bending over to dust the entertainment center because, to be fair, I haven’t actually told anyone that this little incident actually happened and it would be entirely unfair to blame him for an imaginary game of connect the dots that he isn’t aware of happening inside of my wee little head, but I actually hopped on and used said elliptical, y’all. First workout in about six weeks. And yes, I am perfectly aware of the fact that my pants might still be with us today if I hadn’t waited until this baby showed up to get the ass that split them moving again, but that thinking is so incredibly circular that it’s making my head hurt and I’d really rather move on to my next point, thank you very much.

As I was saying…

The incredibly large men who entered our home and so valiantly hauled our monster piece of exercise equipment up to the second floor of our home and then proceeded to so deftly put that thing together also were kind enough to show us how to adjust the incline and such before taking the boxes and leaving. I swear on The Husband’s ego that I only nodded and smiled and said I understood at the time because I did, in fact, totally understand what they had showed us…

At. The. Time.

After they left and The Husband went to bed (he’s still on midnights) I purposely ignored the new elliptical. I didn’t want to seem to eager. I mean, I survived high school and college and it’s safe to say the most important lessons learned involved playing hard to get so the football player I had my eye on might consider for at least five minutes before deciding to take someone prettier and more popular else to the homecoming dance. There would be no immediate and enthusiastic usage of the elliptical because it’s a known fact that the faster one embraces a new piece of exercise equipment in their home is directly related to the amount of time that will pass before said exercise equipment outlives its Shiny Newness and becomes nothing more than a glorified coat hanger.

So I waited. I even changed into my yoga pants in another room so it wouldn’t get too cocky. And when it wasn’t looking, I jumped it.

That’s when I remembered that Hefty and Heftier had set the elliptical at its highest incline when they put it together. Not wanting to start out by killing myself, I jumped off to readjust it. Just like they had showed us.

I knelt down in front of the machine and scrunched my nose. That silver knob looked familiar. I was supposed to grab that. I was sure of it. Was I supposed to unscrew it? Yeah. That sounded right.

But it wasn’t. The silver knob in hand, I sat staring at the exposed screw. How the hell was I supposed to grab on to that to readjust the incline? Maybe if I put the silver knob back on and unscrewed it again I could…

Nope. Still clueless.

So I repeated the process a third time. I imagine monkeys learning to type had to go through the same trial and error I did with the notable difference being that they actually succeeded in achieving success. I, on the other hand, was still holding a silver knob and staring at an exposed screw with no means of grabbing hold of it to pull it out toward me in order to lower the incline.

Unless…

Could it be?

Yes! Yes it was! The answer had been in the palm of my hand the entire time! All I had to do was screw the silver knob back on and use that ingenious piece of technology to pull the lever out that the screw was attached to so I could lower the…

Clank!

Oh.

Shit.

That’s when the silver screw, which had nothing else but the knob in my hand to keep it from getting sucked back into the inner workings of the elliptical, finally gave me the mechanical finger. It had given me three slow pitches and plenty of time to figure out how to fix what I was breaking and I had struck out. All I could do was climb back on and huff my way through a thirty minute workout trying not to focus on the fact that I’m a bloody fucking idiot.

475 calories burned later, The Husband woke up and asked why the silver knob was on the floor and what the point of his paying to have the elliptical put together had been when he was now going to have to take it apart to fix it.

“Um, I love you?”

“You are such a dumbass,” he said. “If you could take the single-mindedness with which you attack stuff like this and apply it to, I don’t know, actual thought, the results would be staggering.”

“I know! I mean, those monkeys and their typing skills…”

Sort of.

I went in to see my doctor a few weeks ago convinced I needed testing for a bunch of crazy stuff and go all kinds of insane with the diet limitations like I did in November with no grains/gluten/dairy/sugar not because the scale is pissing me off right now but because, well, I felt better then. I wasn’t bloated, moody, tired, as easily depressed, and I sure as hell wasn’t craving sugar all the time. So whaddya think, Doc?

“Sweetie,” she said slowly, “do you really think you need tests your insurance company might not cover if you felt better when you were eating that way?”

Well….when you put it that way, I guess not.

Doctor Obvious did clear me for celiac disease testing, though. I may have gone mostly gluten-free before the new year rang in, but I haven’t always been strict about it because I don’t get sick like my husband and daughter do. But, says Doctor Obvious, just because I don’t have the same symptoms doesn’t mean I don’t have the same diagnosis.

Fair enough.

The twist is that in order to get an accurate test result, you need to eat the crap that might be the reason you’re feeling like crap to begin with. Enter the breads and flours and baked goods I have avoided like the plague. Add in a few extra Since I’m Already Eating the Rest of that Craps, and you’ve got me sitting here counting down till Thursday so I can get tested and wake up on Friday the dieting equivalent of a born again Christian.

Was that all supposed to be capitalized?

The funniest part of this whole thing is The Husband’s response when I relayed Doctor Obvious’ unscientific findings.

“That’s what I said, isn’t it?”

Semantics, buddy. Semantics.

I can’t wrap my mind around what I don’t know.

Disclaimer: Wait, what? Me? Sex? With my husband? If you know me in real life from before social media existed, please stab yourself in the eyeballs with the nearest semi-sharp object and let yourself continue to believe that we brought Buttercup home with us after holding hands while skipping through a cabbage patch field.

Of course, the deed *ahem* has been done and I can’t undo whatever fate may have in store for us anymore than that hairdresser at Great Clips can emotionally unscar the teenage boy who broke into tears after she complimented him on his new Justin Bieber-esque look before he left with his mother who kept reassuring him that he and every other boy in America or at least Tucson younger than 20 do not, in fact, look like Belieber groupies in denial.

Even though he totally did.

I can’t undo. And it’s not the um, doctors-orders-homework that has me all a titter. Life is good in the land of The Married. He drives me crazy. I drive him crazy. And when things get boring we pretend to argue just to spice it up a bit. The issue that has me wondering WHAT THE HELL DID I JUST DO? is the fact that I may have voluntarily and irrevocably changed the simple reality I know and love for allowing me to not go any crazier than I already am.

She can walk. She can talk. And she’s fairly self-sufficient on the potty front. She goes to school a few hours for a few days a week and makes herself laugh silly with really bad knock-knock jokes. She’s four going on fourteen going on forty and she’s the miracle we waited almost two years for that I didn’t know would become the reality I wanted until I held her in my arms for the first time because I’m the kind of person who is so afraid of change that I’ve trained my brain not to want the unknown and instead accept the new today once the wind has already changed direction.

It’s true. I don’t want to go to Paris or Italy or dream of cruises or tropical islands because I have never experienced them. I have no desire to try something crazy just so I can say I did it because that would require planning and foresight and a willingness to not be so rigid but if I happen to be out on the town with a friend and she decided on a whim to stop in a piercing shop I can’t promise I won’t come home without a dainty little nose piercing. I didn’t plan my wedding as a girl growing up or sign my name with the Crush of the Week’s in doodle hearts while dating because I that would have required me dreaming about What If instead of focusing on What Was. And when I finally came to the moment where The Boyfriend became The Fiance who became The Husband as I walked down the aisle to become The Wife, I was In Love and In Awe and In Flux between states of complete calm because Life was Happening and Utter Terror because Life was Happening.

It wasn’t until the day after graduating high school, arriving on my college campus, graduating with honors, starting my first job, moving in with The Boyfriend who became The Fiance who became The Husband, pushing the baby out, moving cross-country Anything Important that Has Happened in My Life that I’ve had pretty much the same thought process work itself out in my mind: That wasn’t as bad as you thought it was going to be, you jackass. Well, except for maybe the pushing the baby thing out. She was totally worth it but Dude! That pretty much sucked. This is what was meant to be and where I was meant to end up. This moment is magic and I really need to lighten up and allow more magic to just spontaneously happen because that’s how life works.

I know this. And yet, I sit here…wondering what I want the doctor to tell me when it’s time for results and how I will react. Wondering if I can love another baby as much as I love the miracle that already is. Wondering if I am enough to mother more than once child and nurture them both completely in the way that is singularly unique to their own beings and needs without falling short and thinking I should have quit while I was ahead.

I wonder because I don’t know. And I won’t know until tomorrow comes. Until then, I concentrate on this breath…

And then the next…

8:33 a.m.: Dammit.

8:34 a.m.: “Mama, we need to get out of bed. The sun is awake.”

8:35 a.m.: Dammit.

We get out of bed and in between choosing an outfit for school and nuking the leftover pancake from yesterday’s breakfast, I can’t shake the nagging feeling that I should have just stayed in bed. I’m reminded why when I talk to my mother, mother-in-law, and husband  about Insert Random Family Drama Here puppies.

Again.

Somehow, the hours between 8:30 a.m. and 11:25 a.m., which, coincidentally, is the time I am supposed to have Buttercup physically present in her preschool class, fly by. It could have something to do with the fact that I’ve been on leaving messages for someone with a medical degree at my fertility clinic to call me back about the whole cycle-15-days-early-and-what-the-hell-do-i-do-now and alternately bitching cooing about over Insert Random Family Drama Here puppies. The school is a three-minute drive from my driveway.

There’s a mad dash for the door with much flourish and internal swearing. Backpack, lunch box, my purse, Buttercup, got everything, lock the door, close the door, realize I left my keys on the buffet table. Inside the house. The Husband is sleeping because he works midnights. I’m pretty sure the dogs are snickering at me through the window while I hit the doorbell and try calling The Husband on his cell phone while Buttercup asks why I didn’t bring the keys with me when I suddenly have a brain storm.

The Husband rigged up a button on the inside of the Yukon for me to press and the garage door opens. Inside the garage is The Only Unlocked Door In The House.

Today.

But the car keys are on the buffet table. Inside the house.

I try the car door anyway, mostly out of desperation. It opens. The Husband might choose to Not Believe and yell at me for leaving the fucking thing unlocked again. I, however, choose to Believe that I magically wished the door open.

We show up five minutes late. Buttercup suggests I do the Mountain Pose to calm down as I leave her with her teacher.

11:30 a.m.: I try calling the clinic again. I have an appointment in two weeks to get me some more Clomid to try and get my ovaries in baby mode and um, well, there’s this time sensitivity factor here, ya know? Yeah…about that…

Nothing.

12:30 p.m.: There’s a needle in my arm drawing blood at a lab 40 minutes from my home to get more baby-making levels checked. While the needle sucks me dry, I try to figure out how to best use the two hours I have left, which happens to include the 40 minutes I still need to get to the preschool on time so I don’t have to pay $3 for every minute late after pick-up time.

On the List of Things to Do is grocery shop at the Sunflower, (which is Smack in the Middle of Where I am Now and Where I will Be When I Pick Up Buttercup) because The Husband wants homemade, gluten-free fish sticks. Because I’m hypoglycemic and about to jump the old woman in the lobby for her dried prunes, I choose to drive to the nearest restaurant selling grape leaves.

2:00 p.m.: I am cursing Arizona’s crackpot policy which gives drivers a 30-year window before licenses have to be renewed. No, I’m not kidding. My own license is good until I’m 62. Which means? The 70-something man in front of me on the one-lane road which happens to be The Only Way to Get Where I Need To Be On Time doesn’t have to have his driving skills examined until his great-grandchildren are getting their learner’s permits. It also means I am driving 15-miles Under The Speed Limit.

2:22 p.m.: Phone in hand, I call information for the main office number and plead for mercy. It’s granted. I arrive 10 minutes late and have used up my one free pass.

2:35 p.m.: Buttercup and I are now driving back to the grocery store. She wants to know if I’ve done Mountain Pose yet.

3:10 p.m.: Buttercup decides to “birth” the stuffed kitten she has been “carrying in her belly” since I got her out of her car seat. She announces the new arrival to every shopper that will listen by loudly stating her baby “has finally Been Borned.” The momentous event occurred in the snack aisle.

3:58 p.m.: I contemplate the financial perks of getting a Sugar Daddy solely for the purposes of funding our Gluten-Free/Organic food habit as the clerk is ringing me up. Seriously, people, life was so much cheaper when I didn’t give a shit what we were eating.

3:59 p.m.: I look at the receipt as I wheel our cart out to the car. I’m pretty sure the Husband would totally be up on me cheating on him for the sake of our budget.

5:00 p.m.: Home. dogs fed. Buttercup fed. Groceries unloaded.

5:02 p.m.: Buttercup wants to know if I’ve done Mountain Pose yet.

5:03 p.m.: I am standing in my kitchen, Buttercup facing me, breathing in and out, in and out, as Buttercup leads me from Mountain intro Tree and from Tree into the Volcano pose she learned in her kiddie yoga DVD.

“When you are upset, you just do this, Mama, until you are calm again.” She looks up at me. “Is it working?”

“Yes.”

“Yeah,” she says doubtfully as she gauges my expression. “We need to do this for a few more minutes.”

My kid just called me a liar.

Fair enough.

So I climb back onto my mountain.