therobynbirdsnest

What would you like to drink?

Posted on October 29, 2016 by robynbird

In Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, John Berendt recounted what Miss Mary Harty shared with him about Savannahians.

“We have a saying: If you go to Atlanta, the first question people ask you is, ‘What’s your business?’ In Macon they ask, ‘Where do you go to church?’ In Augusta they ask your grandmother’s maiden name. But in Savannah the first question people ask you is ‘What would you like to drink?”

Now, I’m a fan of cocktails…and (mostly red) wine…(some) beers…so YBW and I decided to embrace this particular Savannahism as we rolled in last Sunday afternoon.

We spent Saturday afternoon and evening in Charleston with my friend and mentor. The first thing we did was go for drinks at The Sanctuary Hotel at Kiawah Island.
I had what’s called ‘The Yellow Jessamine’

And let me tell you it was absolutely delicious!
My friend and mentor was quick to share with the staff we were celebrating our wedding anniversary, and it was only a moment before the bar manager came over with a little treat for us.

How precious was that?

Monday we celebrated our anniversary with dinner at a.lure. Were the food was to die for!
YBW had what he called the “Warner Brothers Dinner” starting with the braised rabbit “open ravioli” then duck a la rootbeer float. (Yes, we actually sat at the table and said, “Duck season. Rabbit season.”) I started with deviled eggs and house made pickled vegitables. The rosemary pickled purple carrots were some of the most delicious things I’ve ever eaten. I had the pork shank for dinner, served with some of the best grits of all time.
Cocktails before dinner looked a bit like this.

YBW had “Apples & Oranges” and I had “The Black Cat” martini.

We went to Crystal Beer Parlor where I had a blackened salmon BLT with house cut onion rings and Abita Amber. YBW had a cup of chicken and sausage gumbo and half a BLT with Treehorn Dry Cider.

The city of Savannah has an open container law. This means you can waltz around the streets of Savannah with (only plastic) cups of alcohol. We took full advantage of this when we were visiting the city. In the afternoon we carried boozy slurpees as we walked and shopped down on River Street. In the evening we poured left over margarita from the Cuban joint into styrofoam ‘to go’ cups and went down to the Savannah Film Festival hosted by SCAD (Savannah College of Art & Design)

I don’t remember what else we drank…but I can assure you that I was all about taking the advice Joe Odom gave John Berendt:

“Rule number one: Always stick around for one more drink. That’s when things happen. That’s when you find out everything you want to know.”

Categories: me | Tags: A.lure, anniversary, Crystal Beer Parlor, John Berendt, Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, mini break, open container law, Savannah, vacation, what would you like to drink | Leave a comment

road trip

Posted on October 22, 2016 by robynbird

Headed to Savannah.
Gotta love a place where there are that many squares, late night ghost tours, and you can legally walk down the street with a ‘toter’ in your hand.

These adorably fluffy Betsy Johnson socks are keeping my feet warm in the car.

I ate a Waffle House breakfast for the first time since I moved away from SC.
(Yeah, my white trash was showing but I don’t give a damn. I freaking love Waffle House!)

Talking Heads on the radio as we drive through the cotton fields of North Carolina. (teeny little ‘squee’)

Imma have a little nappy now. Don’t wake me till we’re in South Cackalacky. That way I’ll miss all the annoying South of the Border billboards.

Categories: me | Tags: 95 South, Betsy Johnson, road trip, Savannah, South of the Border, vacation | Leave a comment

I can’t necessarily spell necessary.

Posted on October 20, 2016 by robynbird

So this post is random as all get out…but it’s relevant to where I am at the moment. And since the universe revolves around me…that’s where we’ll spend our time this morning.
This all started because I was trying to write an email…digress much?

I’m an excellent speller. Always have been. Even back in elementary school, I kicked ass on spelling tests. It’s rare that I make a spelling mistake, and most people I know ask me how to spell words.
That said, there are two words I absolutely cannot spell to save my skin. Now in fairness, the words are kind of different versions of the same word..one is an adjective, the other it’s companion adverb.
The words are: necessary and necessarily.
Thank the Gods for spell check! Because I seriously struggle to spell these words.
How can that be? They seem simple enough…

My mom used to always add an E to the end of the word salad. She wrote it: salade. No matter how many times we had the conversation, she never stopped. Even though she knew better, she would say that it looked unfinished and felt it needed the E.
I mean, that’s a deliberate misspelling…and it suddenly occurs to me that all my stubbornness wasn’t strictly inherited from my dad.

My phone’s autocorrect is a total dick!
First I had to teach it to spell curse words. Now, is that something I’m proud of? Not really, but if I want to use curse words, they better damn skippy be spelled properly, yo!
I also had to teach it my last name.
I also had to teach it Thing 2’s given name.

When she called me the next day, she was all, I had half a mind not to call you at all! That’s not even my name! I can’t believe you spelled my name wrong! You gave it to me! You’ve been spelling it to people my whole life! (P.S she called, I’m just sayin’.)
I was a whole lot of, Wait! What?
So I went back and looked at the text message…Ohhhh.
Then we laughed about it.
But I was mad! Stupid phone! Can’t spell my kid’s name right. Loser phone.

Anyway.
God love, Thing 1. That kid can’t spell for anything. She got that from her dad, he can’t spell either. Now Thing 2 has the handwriting of a serial killer, but she can spell. Did she get that from me? (not the serial killer bit)
YBW can’t spell either, neither can Thing G.
Is it in the genes?
Beats me.

Does it matter that I can’t spell those words? I suspect not. What’s curious about it to me is no matter how many times I work on it, I just don’t seem to get it right. Am I doomed to misspell them for eternity?
Probably. But I don’t necessarily care, because spell check is my friend. (see what I did there?)

Are there words that you know you can’t spell? That you are so grateful for spellcheck that you weep with joy?
Let me know in the comments!

Categories: me | Tags: fun, grammar, language, silly, spelling, spelling mistakes | 2 Comments

I don’t love anyone (but you’re not just anyone)

Posted on October 19, 2016 by robynbird

Pete Doherty’s new album Hamburg Demonstrations gets released December 2 of this year! Happy Christmas to this little Robynbird!
Here’s the first single, I Don’t Love Anyone (but You’re Not Just Anyone)
Please listen responsibly.

Categories: Uncategorized | Tags: babyshambles, Hamburg Demonstrations, i dig music, music, Pete Doherty, the libertines | Leave a comment

givin’ all your cinnamon away

Posted on October 18, 2016 by robynbird

From their 2003 album Youth and Young Manhood, here’s the Kings of Leon with Red Morning Light.
It’s a song about being a prostitute…but it’s a good jam to start your morning.
Please listen responsibly.

Categories: me | Tags: i dig music, Kings of Leon, music, Red Morning Light | 1 Comment

pony in the middle

Posted on October 15, 2016 by robynbird

I went to see my therapist Friday morning.
Mostly it was all, blah blah living my intention…love and gratitude and grace blah blah…my friend’s email…moral courage blah blah…changing my life and lives of others blah blah…love and joy and calmness and fortitude blah blah…
(pretty much the stuff I told y’all the other day mixed in with a bit of “none ya”)

And then she said something that triggered a thought I had the night before right as I fell asleep.
It was something about how I’m the linchpin holding my family and YBW’s family together…only I knew that wasn’t right the night before when I tried to put language to the nugget of thought…

So, when I explained it to my therapist I said, “Imagine a venn diagram.”

It’s not that I’m a linchpin. It’s not even that I’m in that overlapping space alone.
It’s that I’m not really in either family.
I’m no longer in my own family because one member of that family is 500 miles away from me and the other is 900 miles away from me on a daily basis.
I’m not really in his family either.
I’m the “mom of this house” according to Thing G, but being the person who prepares their daily meals is me being a house elf, not me being their mom. That, and they’re 23 and 16, they hardly need the mom they have, much less a surplus one.

At first I thought what bothered me was that in the middle should be both YBW and me. I had this naive idea that even though we each came from a family, we would be creating a new one together. This isn’t really happening…and I’ve gotten to the point where I no longer worry about whether or not it’s OK, I simply accept that he’s not ready for that phase of his life yet. Eventually we’ll get around to it…

The more I think on this, journal on this, I discover that’s not what bothers me about it. What bothers me about it is that I don’t really seem to belong in either family.
Not the one I made.
Not the one he made.
I’m the monkey in the middle.

Well, maybe I’m the pony in the middle…

What does that mean?
And that’s where I get stuck.

What I’m supposed to be doing is figuring out how to live my intention. Not just live with love for other people, but for me too. Live with love for me.
Being the pony in the middle doesn’t feel like love to me.

Need to keep the focus on me.
Not on “his family”.
Not even on “my family”.
Must focus on that little sliver of me in the middle.

Here’s what I know about me right now.
I am so resentful.
I don’t get to enjoy the company of my daughters, but I am without choice that YBW’s sons enter this house every six days.
I don’t actually resent his sons. I love them greatly and have incorporated them into my brood. It’s more that I resent what they represent. I’m not even sure I resent their father…but I absolutely resent being their bitch.

I love food.
I love to cook.
Feeding these people who only like a handful of things, who complain at every meal has made me hate food so much that I don’t even want to feed myself anymore.

I don’t know what the big deal is. I mean, it seems a bit dramatic to be resentful about feeding people. But there it is.

I’m resentful because my life has to be put on hold every other week.
I’m resentful because I want to give more time and love to my own family.
I’m resentful because I’m lie to myself about who I really am in this life.
I’m resentful because my biggest fear is that I’ll never again be in the circle labeled “my family”.
I’m resentful because I’m not comfortable in my own home…because it’s not really my home.
I’m resentful because I have all this freaking resentment!

Perhaps I should consider my own independence before the wishes of others?
Perhaps I should put myself first?
Perhaps I should stop doing things because I think I should?

It has come to my attention that I’m deeply unhappy and need to make some changes or possibly lose myself completely.
I’m the only me I’ve got.
I’m the only Momma Thing 1 and Thing 2 to have.
I need to be me for me.
I want to be me for them.
Can’t lose myself.
Don’t want to be unhappy.
Don’t want to be resentful.

It’s not actual hard work to feed people. But it’s really emotionally hard work.
I don’t feel comfortable in the house I live every other week. But I have no recourse of action. It’s a hand-me-down home for my hand-me-down life.

I don’t know how to put myself first. It feels selfish.
I feel a bit like Carrie Bradshaw asking questions…but here’s another: When is putting yourself first self-preservation, and when is it just selfish?

I’m not sure where I found this quote:

We can only go so far in making our life the way we would wish it to be.

I’m feeling it, yet I question it at the same time.
If we can only go so far…how do we end up where we want to be? Where we belong?

Categories: me, on being a mom | Tags: blended family, build a life together, carrie bradshaw, family, focus on self, intention, love, monkey in the middle, resentful, resentment, self love, venn diagram | 2 Comments

love, grace, and gratitude

Posted on October 13, 2016 by robynbird

I’m not sure where I came across this Denis Waitley quote, but I can tell you I rather like it.

I find myself in complete agreement with this sort of definition of happiness.
I wonder if wisdom truly comes with age? I’m not sure I could (or even wanted to consider how to) understand this idea of happiness as a girl, or even as a younger woman.
Only very young children seem to know of happiness instinctively.
The rest of us spend a lifetime struggling to grasp the concept.

Here’s the thing though, new shoes make me happy. Sometimes, deliriously happy. Now that can be bought…but it’s not the kind of happiness that lasts a lifetimes. (Though most of my shoes still bring me joy when I pull them from the box to put on my feet.)
Perhaps new shoes are immune from the “being worn” portion of this concept?

I live my life in a way that finding joy is no longer a chore. I’m learning that they way I live; the way I interact with other human beings, even the way I interact with my God helps me live as many moments as possible with gratitude and grace. (And if y’all really knew me, you’d understand that grace, at least for me, is in short supply.)
I’ve always attempted to live my life with love. Seriously, even when I was being a hater, there was underlying love. It’s as though I somehow retained that instinct, and knew the importance of living life with love was the key to my own sanity. Happiness would follow.

Because I’m on this Journey of Life, I’m on a Journey of personal discovery. And so far, I’ve discovered that grace and gratitude and love are becoming the only way to live. I’m learning so much more about myself living this way. I’m learning so much more about the world, about life in general.
About a month ago, I wrote that love was the intention with which I’d live my life.
Even though I was kind of already doing that, I realize so much has changed for me since I made it my conscious intention. It seems for me that love promotes gratitude and grace.

This morning, I received these words in an email from a friend.

Because I value and appreciate your abilities, knowledge, and opinions, I had to fundamentally reevaluate the way I feel, think, react, and act in any given situation. You see the world differently to the way I see the world, and that doesn’t mean that either of us is wrong.
You have helped me to see and believe that real moral courage is being prepared to listen to the counsel of others, and even if I profoundly disagree, then I should still weigh the opposing views and accept that someone else may be right.

My living with love isn’t just about my own happiness. By simply sharing my love, gratitude, and grace, I was able to help create a shift in someone else. (Moral courage. I never considered that, but I like the way it sounds. I’m going to realize I wear it and work to wear it well.)

You know, I really do live my life just getting along and singing my song…but I do it with love. I think of the people in my life that I love. I know they’re fortunate to be loved by me. But I also know that I’m fortunate because I love them with such a frightening ferocity.
With love as my intention, gratitude comes easily. Grace comes too, but I find that trickier. I find I still give grace a bit of a fight. But I’m learning.
What more can I ask for than the ability to keep learning every single day of my life?
Now that’s real happiness, y’all!

Categories: me | Tags: Denis Waitley, ferocious love, gift of love, grace, gratitude, happiness, love, moral courage, new shoes | 5 Comments

“a command performance”

Posted on October 12, 2016 by robynbird

I’m feeling a little Kay Thompson this morning.
Here’s Kay and Fred Astaire singing Clap Yo’ Hands from Funny Face (1957)
Enjoy!

Categories: me | Tags: Audrey Hepburn, clap yo' hands, Fred Astaire, Funny Face, Kay Thompson | 1 Comment

what a great Sunday

Posted on October 9, 2016 by robynbird

All the leftover wind from the hurricane arrived in the DC metro area about two o’clock this morning. With it came cool air and gorgeous sunshine.
Finally! Autumn air!
YBW and I went out this morning, without a real plan, just knowing we wanted to be out on this beautiful day.
We went into Haymarket to a little coffee shop called Hidden Julles Cafe for carry out coffees and small treats.
Then we went down to the railroad crossing…pretty much because I’m a sucker for train tracks and YBW indulges my wacky. The track bed had recently been replaced with brand new wooden ties. All the old ties were stacked up along the tracks.

There were even rails lined up on the other side of the railroad ties.

We found loads of railroad spikes. I’ve been collecting railroad spikes literally since I can remember. YBW kept picking them up and handing them me, until there was a total of nine. Gah! I can’t abide odd numbers! As I’m saying this to him, YBW leans down and picks up another spike. Then he looks at me and asks if I really need all these railroad spikes?
Well…no. Not really. So I lay them all out and pick through to find the two I want to keep.

We left Haymarket for Manassas Battelfied.

We walked through the woods to the teeny bridge over Young’s Branch. We wandered the battlefield, where the long, end-of-summer grasses were blowing in the crazy wind. After a trip to my beloved Henry House, we went down to the Stone Bridge over Bull Run.

We came home in time to watch my Washington Nationals win the second playoff game against the Dodgers with a score of 5 to 2.

#IbacktheNats #Natitude #OnePursuit
What a great Sunday!

Categories: me | Tags: #falliswhereitsat, #IbacktheNats, #onepursuit, autumn, hidden julles cafe, manassas battlefield, Natitude, NLDS, railroad spikes, railroad tracks, train tracks, Washington Nationals | 1 Comment

the trick is knowing how to look for it

Posted on October 8, 2016 by robynbird

I came across this Jac Vanek quote on Pinterest (I think? Maybe?) and I kind of dug it.
It sounds like me. It pretty much encapsulates the way I think and feel about life. We are the sum of our experiences, but I believe it’s how we choose to incorporate them into who we are that really counts.

Inspiration is all around us.
The trick is knowing how to look for it.

And remember, even Hannah Montana sang,

“Life’s what you make it, so let’s make it rock!”

(You may be having a pretty big WTF? moment right now. Asking yourself why I’m quoting Hannah Montana. Well, the girls were the right age to watch Disney channel shows when they were still fairly decent. The moment I began this post, this song came into my head. Just be glad I didn’t post the video.)