Waxing my lip

I had to take a "strengths assessment" a few months ago at work. I am convinced it was a direct result of me answering "no" on an "anonymous" survey regarding worker engagement to the question of whether or not I am given the opportunity, every day, to do what I do best. The fact that 5 people answered the same way, and I know a total of 5 people who were asked to take the strengths assessment kind of proves my point. My new "assignment" confirms my suspicion even more.

Anyway, my second strength was identified as "Connectedness." Which in lay terms, the book tells me, means I am accepting of all kinds of people, I see boundaries but look at them as fluid, see myself connected to everything in the universe, more than likely "know" a higher power, and am very unlikely to question why bad things happen to me rather than other people. I am "spiritual in nature."

I guess some of that Buddhist meditation has worked--though I am far, far away from enlightenment. For the record, I don't recommend TRYING to get this strength on any assessment, because it means you will be put into a position where you get to deal with the difficult people all day, EVERY day. It does NOT mean you will get to work with the gay guy who gives awesome advice about shoes and the best and cheapest wine.

To be honest, I was pretty shocked at how well that little quiz described me. Seriously, I am the type that will stand at the bananas at the grocery store, eying the regular bananas and the organic bananas. And, having had to read some paper in Environmental Philosophy back in 1999, regarding the amount of greenhouse gases produced to bring us bananas (I actually picture the boats and trucks in my brain), all the workers exposed to pesticides in the banana farms (I will actually see some guy named Pedro in red, faded cut-offs, and a blue shirt going home to his family on hard red clay, his children running to him), the labor, the lack of fair wages, and deforestation, and I will spend no less than 15 minutes debating whether or not to buy to the organic bananas for 3 more dollars or to say to hell with bananas all together.

I will give the guy on the corner by Wal-Mart the few bucks I have in my pocket, and if I don't have any, the whole way home and most of the night, I will lie awake in bed wondering if he would have taken a check and think about how cold he is right now, or how he had a shitty day and really needed a beer and ponder my Karma.

I don't usually view this as a strength. It drives me f*n insane! But, it gives you a little background to my day today.

Since Grandma died, well, honestly, since Sheridan's dad died, I have been trying to run from catastrophe and just tread water--which means I drown myself in things that take my mind off bad shit. So instead of finding center and listening to the universe, I run like a chicken with its head cut-off creating ever more stress and a higher bar for achievement while convincing myself I have conquered the OCD because I no longer wash the windows every two weeks.

So, I got a massage today, for the first time since I found out Grandma was sick, which my masseuse kindly reminded me was in '09, bought some new essential oils from her, came home, put some lavendar in the bath, and soaked with a glass of wine.

To be totally honest, I haven't been this relaxed since college when Treasure and I had that four-foot bong we named "Eddie," after the Iron Maiden skeleton, put a towel under the door, filled him with wine, and proceeded to see how big we could go without passing out. We then watched Oliver Stone's "The Doors" which somehow led to a deep discussion on Freudian theory. But, what you should really know is that when I got out of the tub and was as mellow as the Dalai Lama on 5 klonopin, I decided I needed a pick me up without losing the mellow, and mixed the lemon oil and a little more lavender with my lotion. I now smell like lemon scented Pledge. I. Shit. You. Not.

So, while being convinced this must have been exactly how June Cleaver smelled, and then convincing myself that I was one aromatherapy session away from my husband deciding we need separate twin beds, I was checking out the 'stache on my upper lip and the chin hairs that need only a big mole to grow out of to convince me I'm officially old.

See, before my brother was born, my great grandparents babysat me quite a bit. My Grandma Viv drove this huge car, but she was so short, she looked through the loop at the top of the steering wheel to see over the dashboard and out the window. I remember driving down Blattner Lane, for some reason I think it was summer, on the way to Wanda's, the lady with seriously PURPLE hair, (not tinted, F*n PURPLE!!) and the light was just right, and she had this mole on her neck with this LONG-ass black hair growing out of it, and being all of three or four (my brother was born when I was four and she died right before he was born, so I know I was YOUNG) I remember thinking, "She's a WITCH!" And, by God, she was a GREAT-GRANDMA so she was old--as in "Little House on the Goddamn Prairie" old!

So, my mind immediately went to all the women in my family who have these hairs in unnecessary places. I remembered the tiny pan my mom kept her wax in that she would put on the stove--usually a Thursday before Dad came home for the weekend. My aunts telling jokes about Italian women inventing Velcro when their sweaters stuck to their mustaches. The Pied Piper working construction and all the iron workers making fun of her for icicles, yes icicles, forming on her 'stache.

Which led to me to grab the wax and proceed to walk around the house with blue blobs on my upper lip and entire neck...a spectacle to which the four year old commented from the peanut gallery, "Dude! (yes, it is the new vocabulary word of the week) You really DO have a MUSTACHE!"

Yes, I have a mustache. And, just in case you suffer from ASSburger syndrome (SIC intended) or a mild case of autism and cannot read social cues, I'm pretty f*n sensitive about it. It immediately takes me back to when I was 6 feet tall as a twelve year old and all those smart ass little boys calling me an Amazon.

So, I was standing in the mirror, ready to pull that wax off, contemplating all the girl-power in the family that those mustaches symbolize, wondering if my great-great-great grandmother in Sicily ever worried about such trivial B.S., and if not, if maybe that was where all the no nonsense, take no shit or prisoners, attitude comes from in this long line of bitches, when I grabbed and pulled.

All I can say, is it hurt like a motherf*er; I said words I would like to say my children NEVER hear, but do, and the stream of profanity was only matched by the tears that welled-up in my eyes. All deep thinking ceased, all thoughts of anyone or anything outside of my own realm of pain stopped. Me, myself, and I were all that mattered in the whole universe.

For all of my "connectedness," I could give two shits about how this hair on my lip ties me to the women I love. It seriously, honestly, PISSES ME OFF!