It's Raining, It's Pouring...?

First timer pin

This summer we get a wet July, it's a nice change from last years draught.  Got to love Louisiana seasons.  Our second bowling tournament went off without a hitch, I'm not sure how much money anyone actually won but I know I didn't win anything (didn't really expect to).  I went into it with a different attitude, and tried my best, that's all I could do really.  It's a little funny to me how such events as these threw me into an insecure panic.  I felt out of place and completely out of my element.  For me it's a mirror of how I feel about my life in general these days.

Look at the activity from the surface, one would say, "well, it's a sport, meant to played and have fun with".  This, to a point, is true.  Until it becomes a true competition.  I'm not really a true competitor, I was told once when I first started college that everything was a competition to me, the statement hit me like a brick so I tried to eliminate that aspect from my personality.  I'm not sure how well it has worked but I like to think I'm not trying to constantly out do someone, even with a hobby.  It's a bit hard for me to understand why someone would do something, so say for fun, but get so competitive with it they forget the fun.  Anyone who knows me knows, I'm all about the fun, piss on the serious stuff. 

3516 Cat

Here's where it starts to be a mirror for my general way of being.  In the last few years I've been struggling with living in the city and having  a particular way of life.  Now don't start thinking I live in any way high on the hog or some such, I don't.  I do my weekly 40 and go home to do chores and whatnot like any other blue collar American.  I wasn't raised in the way of life I've developed however, I was raised in a much more simple environment.  There was a different kind of stress and a different way of looking at things.  Again, I feel out of place, out of my element.  I think I cling to the type of work I do because, there's a familiarity in the people I am surrounded by.  Tattooed mechanics and fathers who can afford their women time at home with the children, or women as rough and unrefined as myself. 

I figured our a long time ago what world I felt as though I fit in.  Yes, I have enough culture and education to enjoy some fine things, but that is not the world I fit in.  Not for an everyday basis anyway.   No, I fit with the beer drinkers, the "Dale Gribbles" of the world, the paranoid rednecks who don't want the gub'ment all in the Kool-Aide. 

It gets fun right about here though, my fella is from that other world.  He tells me constantly how his family is working class like the rest and I do see that.  What gets me though, is the statement that I've heard come out of his mouth in regard to our own home life, "I have maintained a certain way of living for my home and I want to keep it that way".  Never in my life has a "certain way of living" been a such a choice that you forget how to roll with what life throws at you.  Maybe I'm just a cynic I don't know.  I always hope for the best and expect the worst.  Things being tight or tough don't phase me, I actually prefer a simpler way of being.  If there are things I can't afford, I take it in stride, I try to be grateful for the littlest of conveniences, i.e. a running vehicle and a cold coke or beer in the evening.

So where's my struggle?  Do I give in and try to accept and embrace the way he's accustomed to living (with the exception of the years following his divorce), or do I push for a simpler life that has less demand?  I don't want to resign myself to the idea that I've got to continue this career path for the next 10-15 years.  Maintaining the comfort level leaves me in the work force full time for at least that long.  The intent in my own mind when I married the first time and found out I was pregnant was to forgo any type of career and raise my child and take care of my home.  That obviously is not what happened.  She has landed in the care of sitters and day care centers since she was a baby, my houses for years were simple apartments with no love or character.  Once I realized that I'd never not have a job, I caved in and made it a career path. 

I know in my heart I'd what I'd like to have, and I'm very worried I'll have to make a decision between achieving simplicity and having the man.  Like all adults who don't want to relinquish control of their own lives, I've caved in on that notion.  I go where I'm lead and try to find the silver lining in it all.  Yet I still find myself having those days, those, throw myself on the floor and kick and scream and say "This isn't the way I planned it dammit!!!". 

So silver linings....house in the woods, well cared for children, happy pets, cable TV and *good* beer.

My dream back yard/garden