A personal snapshot of 2011

Every year I stay sober is another miracle in my life.  When I decide to seek the Will of God instead of my own I inevitably avoid disaster and not just from the booze.   With God in the center of my life I can face anything.  For a poor girl from Brooklyn that’s huge.  Only with God.  Without him I was a frightened bunny afraid of her shadow.  I was also a horribly SELFISH bunny who didn’t give a shit about anyone but herself and what she wanted.  I never cared WHO I was hurting with my actions.  I hated everybody and I hated myself.  With the help of another (wonderful) sober woman I learned what God truly had in store for me.  When I was in ENOUGH PAIN I became teachable and now I am grateful and STILL teachable.  I look forward to the future each morning waking up instead of dreading it.

This year was pretty amazing.  Not perfect but inspiring.  At the beginning the year (due to some life changes) I started doing more things on my own and that was okay.  My son relocated from Geneseo and became a part of my day to day activities and soon our “Dinner and a Movie Night” was born.  Our relationship developed in a such a mature and respectful one that I know it was God who directed it.

In April I lost my brother Bobby to alcohol-related throat cancer.  He was only 49.  His death awakened a pain inside me I hardly knew what to do with.  I used the tools of my recovery and surrounded myself with women who are worth their weight in GOLD.

I finally came to a decision to stop “messing with a man that wasn’t mine” and lied and told him I was involved with someone else and he believed me.   A week later God stopped me from being a liar and brought a man who was once a friend and made him something much more.

The idea that I could not only date again but be in LOVE, is, as they say, beyond my wildest dreams.  God brought me my match someone who lives and follows God as I do.   Plus he is a phenomenol person, friend, lover, confidant besides.  My adventures with him have been wonderful and brought immeasurable joy to my heart and my life.

When we started dating I knew he had stage 4 lung cancer but decided to just enjoy whatever time we had together. I’m so glad I did.  God performed a miracle in him and he is as of now cancer free!  I got to hold his hand as he said good bye to his mother, who raised 4 loving children, who no doubt were a reflection of who she was.

My man and I got to see Steely Dan something I’ve always wanted to do.  I have a special someone now, and its someone who thinks I’m pretty special too.   He joins in so many adventures together something I never thought would be possible.  I know that God is at work as we both serve him remembering to give back what was so freely given to us.

My oldest and dearest friends were blessed this year too. By the grace of God they adopted a little girl and now are in full fledged parent mode.  Last night I was remarking to Paul how he and I have come full circle after 17 years.  That he is now raising a little one and I am the one in the beginnings of a loving relationship.

 

I also became reunited with a “long lost cousin” Michael Jeremiah.  It was during this summer that I got to have the great opportunity of seeing his film debut and reuniting with another cousin April Lindner in NYC.  Pretty awesome.

Another blessing I saw unfold this Summer was the wedding of good friend Rebecca & Eric Weissman. 

I am getting ready to celebrate Christmas & New Year’s with someone special.  I haven’t had that in a long while.  And  I never needed that before, and honestly I still don’t.  All I ever needed was God, though it took me a very long time to get that.  God is the cake!  My man is the icing.  Cake without icing is enough.  Cake WITH icing?  Pretty awesome!

MOMIX Botanical - a dance (& restaurant) review

So until the end of December The Joyce Theatre presents:  MOMIX Botanica http://www.joyce.org/performancestickets/calendar_detail.php?event=397&theater=1 surely a performance worth seeing.  What the Blue Men group is to music MOMIX is to dance!

The use of imagination, skilled artistry-use of props & music make this performance for all ages to enjoy. If you want a "taste" of what I saw click on this link: http://youtu.be/_SJ4NLLbO8g but if you are brazen enough to go sight unseen you won't be disappointed.

It’s a 90 minute performance without intermission and at no time was I bored.   It’s the best bargain in the city.

Afterwards me and my man went to dine at Lasagna Ristorante, 196 Eight Avenue (Corner of 20^th St Chelsea).  Unfortunately the service was slow and the food not as spicy as advertised, on the upside it was a respite from the cold temps of yesterday.  http://www.lasagnarestaurant.com/

The menu had lasagna choices for vegetarian, meat and seafood lovers.  Though I came for lasagna ultimately I stayed and ate Penne La Vodka.  The calamari was good though.  Many “boys in love” were there but it was Chelsea and no news to me.

Everything Must Go - a DVD Review

So last night my son made me watch “Everything Must Go” the dramedy starring Will Ferrell.  Okay so he made me, it wasn’t exactly at gun point but the child-to-parent guilt equivalent.  Not knowing much about this movie other than it wasn’t Will Ferrell slapstick I figured I’d give it a shot.

It’s a film about an alcoholic man living in Arizona having the worst week of his life.  The film opens with him sitting in his car romancing a flask, drinking down the courage to drive home and tell his wife he’s been fired from his job of 16 years as Regional Sales Manager for a nameless corporation.

Only when he gets home he finds he’s been locked out and all his possessions are abandoned on the front lawn.  This movie HAD potential if the dialogue had been sharper.  One of the high points include Ferrell befriending a neighbors’ kid teaching him everything there is to know about sales, as they try to sell off Ferrell’s possessions.  There is also the rawness of his interaction with his sponsor who later surprises him (and the audience) in the best meaty part of this movie.

At best its missable, even on DVD, its truly only for Will Ferrell moviegoers OR people who enjoy aimless indie films.  And the irony, even my son (a die-hard Will Ferrell fan) fell asleep two-thirds the way into this movie.

Instead a better rental will Will Ferrell in a semi-serious role is Stranger Than Fiction.  Good flick.

Requirements to dating....

I remember growing up as a teenager and wanting to date.  My foster mom told me “No dating til your 16 yrs old.”  Sixteen?!  What was THAT all about?  Well she had her reasons, one of them most likely being “Cuz I said so."  But today her requirement had me thinking.

In my personal adventures and experiences in the last few years I’ve had the luxury of picking people’s brains.  So many women I’ve met, dealt with that same tender subject: low (to no) self esteem.  Where does it come from?  And when we date without it how badly are our choices? At sixteen I was dying to date, which was a joke because I HAD no self-esteem whatsoever.

What if the requirement to start dating wasn’t about age at all.  What if the requirement was one much higher.  Try this on for size: No dating until you love yourself completely.  No dating until you are totally in love with God the Father.  Wow.  As I sat in Starbucks today languishing over a drink this thought came to me.  If only I’d known then what I know now.  Hindsight is 20-20 and all that I guess.

But still I had to get this on paper.  Because I do believe that every girl should have this requirement met before dating and every WOMAN, yes grown ass women should have these two requirements met before they can have anything to offer to a man.  Because the love of self and the love of God are the FOUNDATION we need in order to love another completely, truly and most importantly without need. 

When we need someone to complete us we are doomed to failure.  When we need someone to save us we are doomed to relationship failure.  Guess what no one is coming to save us except HIM.  I’ve taken the last two years of my life to get to know God the Father.  He has saved my ass more times than I can count, even when I wasn’t asking him to.

HE taught me to love myself.  HE taught me to love everyone else and without his tender guidance which I seek daily, I am NOTHING.  But thankfully HE’s available 24-7 and guess what?  He’s even open on holidays ; )

A Year Without a Santa Claus - a Christmas memory

So my life wasn’t always as drama free as it is now, that’s one of the blessings following God had provided me.  Back when I was ten years old, daily chaos was always a constant.  Back then my Dad has already left us, and my mom was an active alcoholic and she was usually either “away” or “missing”.  My older sisters always picked up the slack.  Being the youngest of seven I always depended on my brothers and sisters to look after me.  And they did.

On Christmas that year we had little to no money.  My sister Sue managed to get money for a tree and all of us went out together to get it.  Me and my brother Bobby were looking around for boxed ornaments in a discount store of some kind.  He starts stacking boxes of ornaments onto my arms.  Next thing I knew he was telling me “Everyone is leaving, lets go”.  He starts pushing me from behind, but not towards the register, he is pushing me TOWARDS THE DOOR. 

Its then that I realize we aren’t paying for these ornaments we are stealing them.   Yep the old 'five fingered discount'.  This was nothing new to me.  Once I realized what the story was I ran out with him and ran for the next few blocks as to not get caught.

That year we had a decent Christmas tree but no gifts to open.  I don’t remember how I felt about that.  Looking back on it in some ways makes me feel shitty and gyped.  I know I liked the tree and was accustomed to having little in way of extras back then.  I had my brothers and sisters and I know that part was really important.

I know God has given me a world of blessings since then and I pray I will never take for granted all the blessings he has given me.

I remember that Christmas and hope that in helping with this toy drive no child will have to have a Christmas like that.   I hope you've read my story and are inspired enough to make a donation to the toy drive I'm collecting.  Please know that everything you've read is indeed TRUE, and I do believe God wanted me to use this experience to benefit others.

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In the coming weeks and months there are a few  films I think I will see as they have me “mentally salivating” already.  In no particular order they are:

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, the suspense thriller based on the Swedish best selling novel of the same  name.  Though I’ve already seen the Swedish version with subtitles, a good journey deserves a second look. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1568346/

    A Dangerous Method.  A story of Carl Jung and Sigmund Freud give birth to Psychoanalysis.  http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1571222/

      Shame.  The story of the journey of a sex addict played by the delicious Michael Fassbender and how he is forced to have feelings for something other than getting his “swerve” on.  http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1723811/

    Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy based on the novel of the same name is a thriller set at the height of the Cold War, starring the consummately talented Gary Oldman.  Nuff said. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1340800/

    Coriolanus based on the Shakespeare tradegy, starring Ralph Fieness (who stars and directs this film) along with Gerard “300” Butler.  http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1372686/

Plenty of reviews to follow  : )