This year has been incredible. I chose to focus on the positive and the many wonderful things that have happened to me.
I can’t help but reflect on the words people have said that were designed to hurt me. I don’t spew off my professional qualifications on NLD boards for many reasons. But I have two years of grad school, many post grad courses, work and a license in social work. This does tend to make me think in a certain way.

This is going to sound so elitist and maybe it is but I do understand more than a high school grad and don’t care who hates me for saying that. Few people including doctors know much or anything about NLD in adults. So I say “this is my opinion,” or “I believe.”

People say I talk down to them. But how do they talk to me? Apparently all people with NLD are forever children who need to be talked to as if we are slow seven year olds. I resent that.

I don’t consider my accomplishments amazing. It makes me sad to realize how much more I could have accomplished had I known about NLD prior to age 56. That’s a fact.

Think about that. I navigated through life without being called “disabled,” which I’m glad about but that also meant I got no service. None at all. I graduated from college and grad school–and did exceptionally well. I should be very proud of that. Instead I feel that I didn’t live up to the potential I know is in me.

I’m told I lack humility. I thought about this a lot and if lacking humility means I’m not Mother Teresa well I’m not. But I care about people a great deal and take much pleasure in helping them. I think I succeed more than I fail.

Am I self-centered? I sort of had to be as navigating the world wasn’t easy for me. I see people in the NLD community who are obsessive and self-centered about their children. That’s considered a good thing but making your own way isn’t?

That’s called advocating. People advocating for themselves are considered wonderful but people like me who were raised to question everything and might see another solution to a problem or another problem completely are considered to be troublemakers.

Unfortunately my parents are no longer on this earth. They would have have loved to advocate for me. They did but it was hard when you don’t know exactly what the problems are.

I want to begin the New Year feeling good about myself, and damn it I will because I’m more, much more than a series of negative comments and words.

I am obsessive. I don’t think that’s a horrible trait. I need to make up for time lost. Contributing to the world is very important to me.

I keep thinking it’s September. Probably because we had two and a half inches of rain last night/this morning; it’s been gray and dreary all day without that oppressive humidity I think relaxes every muscle in my body and works as a massage for both body and soul. It’s supposed to be like this for the rest of the extended weather report. I’m a bit excited as I need some time to listen to Warren Zevon (makes me appreciate life so so much) and watch Hoarder: Buried Alive episodes I have been DVR’ing–I run up and clean during the truly gross parts.

I went to two birthday parties for President Obama. One here that was incredible basically because I met wonderful people and one in Wilmington NC in a funky sore/bar/live music venue across from the river.

Going to Wilmington is like going to the big city for me. If we want to go to Wrightsville Beach we end up everywhere else; if we don’t want to go to Whrightsville we end up on the bridge going to it. It’s happened every time I have gone.
This photo was taken about a month ago. I’ll be taking pictures this weekend, probably. The Tabasco peppers are growing like weeds!

Sunday night I went to bed about 12:30. I felt something that felt very much like crushed glass pounding into my leg (yes I know that feeling firsthand.) I moved my arm to my leg and felt the same sensation on my arm. I looked down and ran out of bed.

It was too late to call anybody so I emailed Bone. At the time I was in denial that it was a spider because yuck. Thought about sending him pictures of the bites but my general sense of decorum won this round. I wanted somebody to know about the bite and the date to be on record. OK bugs make me hysterical. I stayed up as long as possible but knew I would have to face a bed sooner or later. I slept in the guest room.

Obviously I was still alive in the morning but the bites looked worse. I walked into the bedroom and the spider was still on the bed. I felt sick. Not too sick to declare war. Only lady bugs are acceptable. I also have lizards and snakes–hopefully not poisonous ones in my irregular sized plot that used to be gross weeds with some grass trying and failing to grow. Now it’s three levels of wood decks. I accept bugs outside. They’re not allowed inside and should know that.

I didn’t have any bug spray as I have an exterminator and no need for spray usually so I took Lysol Clean Up and sprayed the spider for at least two minutes until it finally died. I didn’t care if I ruined the bedding and mattress. This was war. Did I tell you I love my mattress?

I took the bedding and not just washed it but put it through a bleach and then a sanitary cycle. Apparently in war cleanliness counts more than anything.

Eldon, contractor, handyman and househusband came over. Yes I knew I had three more days before the venom could spread. Or did I know this? I had taken a Benadryl so was kinda out of it. And the rain. After months of no rain it wouldn’t stop and I couldn’t stay awake from general malaise I suffer from in temperatures under 80something with high humidity. I need heat and humidity to feel human.

Eldon made a lot of fun of me. Fortunately I had both neosporin and benadryl Gel and used them both probably canceling out each other’s effectiveness.

It’s been almost a week and you can’t see the bites or the swelling anymore. But each night before I go to bed I check my bed for spiders. A girl can’t be too careful.

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I hope that The Tea Party understands no matter what happens they have lost by holding the country hostage to phony “principles.” Raise the now and worry later.
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I don’t do ads on Courting. I change the password often and need the password every day to enter my blog. Don’t get this. The ads link back to WebMD via smart link. I don’t make a cent and have no idea what to do to stop this. I use the latest versions of Askimet and Bad Behavior. It’s not that I wouldn’t make money from the blog if the right opportunity presented itself; it’s the idea that this can be done. Courting isn’t even popular anymore and hasn’t been for years! I just personally love it
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I have been sick all week. It began innocently enough.Though I say last Friday I now realize my voice had sounded, all week, to me like the voice of a person who never speaks and I speak a lot. But nobody else caught it and people here will catch everything though in the sweeter than cotton candy sweet tea Southern manner.

On late Friday afternoons I meet with a group of women for cocktails. They find me funny. Lil Red makes me repeat stories I told her such as the time my next door neighbor, known far and wide as The Professor because he actually was one at The Citadel, had his girlfriend visit for a couple of weeks. They would never use his pick-up that was parked in the communal court lot while her MG was in front of his house.

I watched in fascination as a spider-web grew from a tree to the MG. Then I went away. Eldon, the contractor turned handyman/friend was guarding my house and I told him about the spiderweb and about how the Professor, in his 70′s, diabetic, brilliant and a functional alcoholic, and the girlfriend never left the house. The Professor never walks anywhere; he’s a one man advertisement for staying in or getting into shape. Eldon didn’t believe me.

The first thing, the very first thing Eldon said to me when I came home after ten days was “go look at the spiderweb.” It had tripled in size. For some reason Lil Red and then the rest of the girls–Lil Red’s the youngest then me–found this hilarious. I have a growing audience for my stories here.

After drinks last Friday I didn’t feel well but assumed it was a quickly formed hangover. I’m not a great drinker. But the next morning it felt like a migraine that was getting worse all day–and it was damn beautiful out. By Sunday I realized it was evolving into something bronchial and was so happy when Clo called to cancel the barbecue I was supposed to have and had done nothing for.

Monday, Memorial Day, I couldn’t get out of bed. Kept telling myself what a gorgeous day it was, there were two chaise lounges with new cushions, a swing and a glider just calling my name. But I couldn’t make it the 20 steps from the bed to the chaise though I knew the hot drenching sun would dry my sinuses, nourish my spirit and soul. Though dry sinuses sounded very enticing it wasn’t enough to get me outdoors. And I moved partially for a yard! Couldn’t care less about spirit or soul except in the “if I die and there is a sweet hereafter, I hope…” Cynic that I am I couldn’t even muster guilt about never having believed.

i had been to the doctor Friday morning and spent a lot of Monday cursing him. I thought about going to an Urgent Care, something I had never even heard of four years ago, but couldn’t muster the energy or the will and the thought of the wait to see a doctor on a holiday when everybody would be coming with heat related problems, fire cracker accidents, grilling accidents, too much time in ponds and the ocean…..The whole world was out having fun and all I could think of was what an encumbrance they would be.

Eldon called. Apparently I now had laryngitis. About every third word I said was coherent. I told Eldon to call about 9 in the morning on Tuesday and I would tell him if I needed to go to the doctor.

But it came out that I wanted to go to the doctor the next morning at 9. I didn’t realize that until Eldon showed up the next morning….I wasn’t fine then but was sure that I would live and antibiotics weren’t necessary. I believe one day something horrible will happen and only antibiotics will cure it and only if I hadn’t taken them in years.

After I bought new cushions for the pub table chairs and upstairs glider, I spent the rest of the day, lying on a chaise or the downstairs swing, reading Scott Turow’s Innocent. It’s a truly beautifully written book with characters I actually cared about. It’s mature writing and I enjoyed it. Now I have to reread PPresumed Innocent which I do remember but it’s been awhile.

I would check my computer every hour. I wish I could get away from the computer for a week. A month would be perfect. But so much of my life’s on it.

I quickly came out of the feeling of suspended animation. I’m just sick enough to be in a bad mood if that makes any sense.

I feel badly that I haven’t been to the beach but the thought of carrying my Tommy Bahama beach beach backpack on my back (it’s virtually weightless) is too much. On the other hand I have spent a lot of time watering my plants and vegetables. By next week the vegetables should be popping.

I missed the limitations as the thought of being near liquor and cigarettes doesn’t sit well with me right now. Lil Red doesn’t smoke; the rest do.

On Thursday I’m getting my first group of summer visitors. It makes me happy when my house is filled. It does.

My latest post for Psychology Today

I know now why I only usually eat omelets for dinner. Sunday morning I was cooking one. The phone rang and I was distracted. Which is a shame as the perfection of my omelets are only surpassed by–well I don’t cook anything else as beautiful.

The smoke alarm went off. I thought I cut the security system quickly but the monitors, I guess you call them, called me. They asked for my password. So I gave it to them. Five minutes later my friend CLo called–they had called her. Apparently I was supposed to give the nickname to my password. Well uh ask for that!!! Not that I remembered. I called the security company back.

It was too late. It felt like half the fire and police departments came to the court. To the wrong house! If it had been a true emergency and I was stuck in the back of the house and they couldn’t see fire….Thanks to CLo’s call I was dressed and ran out to call the police department over from the house Eldon calls “house of redneck country monied trash.”

They were engrossed in a laughing conversation with the police and firemen. My neighbors across from me had lent their house to her son, a middle aged biker with Willie-type hair and a trike cycle, and ten of his nearest and dearest–all of whom were out enjoying the spectacle as were the people who were renting the house next door from the Obama family (the parents voted for Obama, yeah!!!!) My other next door neighbor was asleep or being kind and staying in but his dog, Crazy Dog, was enjoying have a real reason to bark madly.

I continued calling the police and fire over to my house until finally somebody heard me. It was their second smoke alarm call of the morning. They really liked my house, and I almost gave them a tour until I thought about how absurd that was.

I do have to admit it brought back sweet memories of the summer between my freshman and sophomore years of college. Apparently I had a lot of boys visit me. Apparently my father tried grilling. Apparently the entire Jericho volunteer fire department liked coming over. We ended the summer on first name bases with all of them. Good times!

II refuse to be embarrassed by the spectacle I made of myself and can never forget the nickname to my password as I out clevered myself. It’s perfect yet nobody would ever guess it.

This weekend was Mayfest It’s funny as it’s the ultimate beach music weekend but very few shaggers come. Lil Red and her husband have been living here forever and went for the first time yesterday as I forced them invited them nicely!!!
We had perfect seats. Our beach chairs were on the side near the entrance to a hotel bar and bathroom. We could see, drink and….Perfect! And only four blocks from home.

Then this morning for the fourth Sunday in a row my New York Times didn’t come. Yes. I. Am. Taking. This. Personally. I already gave up the other six days of the week as the delivery person only delivered on Sundays. Then she/he stopped. Jobs are scarce here so it really angers me when somebody has a job with a guaranteed salary plus tips and doesn’t deliver. Or am I supposed to be understanding? Does the delivery person only think liberals read The Times and therefore delivery isn’t important? Or did the person notice the Mezzuah on my front door and actually know what it is and dislike it?

When the paper claims they assigned a supervisor to investigate and the paper still doesn’t come–nor does the replacement copy you start asking yourself all sorts of stupid stuff. I don’t want to open my computer on Sundays but need the number and then need to twitter my complaint.* So on Sunday’s I’m a regular Debbie Downer! God do I hate cute and cloying expressions. When did women begin receiving visits from Aunt Flo? It’s the stupidest expression I have ever heard. Just had to get that out.

I know somebody who lost his home to foreclosure this past week and have been both sad and upset. My inclination is to help but I can’t lend money. I was giving this person work but I want to go on vacation. I want to spend some money on myself. I, I, and more I. It’s all about me.

I understand that times are tough and we have to help each other. But what happens when you have helped and helped a person and the money doesn’t go to the mortgage? I was taught that you pay rent, mortgage, whatever keeps a roof over your head first, then I guess anything to do with a car, then electric.

Oh hell I’m overly responsible, and almost offered to pay this persons bills for him but that wouldn’t help in the long run and I hate paying my own bills. So I’m sad and feel guilty that I can’t help more when he ignored the problem for too long. Round here and in some conservative blogs I read it’s assumed that Republicans are responsible and God’s gift to the world when Democrats aren’t responsible.

Well he likes Palin and Bachmann and I am very proud of President Obama. Bin Laden and stem cell research all in one week!!!!!!!!! Even Bill Clinton couldn’t get government funded stem cell research passed. As I said on Facebook where I’m actually funny when appropriate and clever when needed, if stem cell research had been passed years ago I might be bitching about having to celebrate Mother’s Day instead of wistfully remembering my mother as her only problem was macular degeneration and they kept waiting for stem cell research.

My Mom was always ahead of her time. She made motherhood look like a walk in the park, was older though looked younger and I miss her everyday.

I finally made it to the front page of Psychology Today though it might not be by the time you read this!

That’s three essential reads and one front page which is very rare for Personal Perspectives so I’m proud. But I thought that a post about a birth mother–separating the reality from the fantasy–would be well received. And it’s an indirect homage to the only Mother I care about and no longer feel guilty about that!
So I think my Mom would like that post. Actually she loved most things I wrote. But she only read my researched articles which were pithy, factual and she claimed, fascinating!
*I realize how absurd that statement is. Many people here don’t have health insurance. Tourism is the only industry. Many people are a paycheck or less from eviction or foreclosure. So when a person has a job they should do it and be glad to. If I knew I wasn’t going to get the paper I would read the magazine and other sections during the week. But I always think “this week it will come.” Never pays to be an optimist or relax about anything–and I moved here to optimistically relax

Eldon’s parents came to visit.  They’re divorced.  He’s remarried; she lives with her boyfriend.  So he felt a bit strange when he made hotel reservations for the two of them.  Made sure to get separate beds.  They came to surprise his brother.  Apparently his family lives to surprise each other.  I asked how the weekend went:

I couldn’t get them to do anything.  All my family wants to do is sit around and watch each other grow old.

For some reason I found that last line both hilarious and profoundly moving.  It made me think that sitting around watching people grow old is perhaps the ultimate example of famil/friendy love and perhaps not. I don’t know whether to apologize to the people who came here last summer and I made them run around both Carolina’s in 100 degree weather.  They did come to see me, not for me to prove culture exists here.  So I’m pondering Eldon’s line .

Dissertations have been written on lesser lines.

And maybe that’s why I enjoyed this article in The Atlantic a little too much. And am still left with the question: what makes us happy? Does it turn out to be the story we invent for ourselves about our lives as we age?  The rationale for having lived the lives we lead.  So often spent sent sitting around watching each other grow old. I needed a more closed-ended answer but I understood.

Though I would like to think that the girl I was at 20–idealistic, fun (at least to me), inquisitive is the woman I am today–but hopefully I’m a better version

I’ve been working on a two or three part post for Psychology Today.  It’s not completed yet and I’m spent.

Like Cooper, who apparently I once called a germophobic slut–must have been under the influence of the moon or something, I’m archiving some old posts.  Only mine all have coding errors in the contractions and at the beginning and ending of sentences, so they take hours and I lack patience but if I’m going to leave a blog it’s going to be easy to read.

Here are 49 posts from Courting Destiny: the early days

I got a comment in one of my old PT posts by somebody who is either a student in mental health, a wannabe or somebody who just likes using language in as complicated form as possible.  I can’t imagine this person is actually a professional yet….

It made me realize that no matter how concretely I explain things people are going to think that NLD is a mental health problem not a neurological one.

Do you blame the mother when a child has Asperger’s?  Or do you say that the child is acting up to get love from the parents?  No of course not.  You would be stoned to death metaphorically.  Yet it’s OK to say that about NLD?  I don’t think so.

So much of my life was wasted in therapy trying to find answers to problems that are neurological not psychological.  I can’t stress that enough.  I see the difference between young women with NLD and me.  They are much more confident.  They haven’t spent their lives being blamed for not being able to organize themselves properly or looking at things their parents did wrong yet knowing that can’t be the true problem because they were secure in their family’s love.  Yet maybe this happened or that….No I can’t do this to myself anymore.

Twenty years ago yesterday my father had a stroke.  He died five days later.  I miss him more than ever.

I hope to be out of this mood shortly.  I also hope that during my lifetime people begin to truly understand that the depression and suicide rates for NLD are so high because it’s not a matter of trying harder.  It’s a matter of learning how to work around what doesn’t work properly in your brain.  It sounds so easy!

Sometimes this world hurts.  And by this world I mean the world of social media where people proclaim their expertise and want to teach you their tricks every damn day.  For a price of course.  They usually don’t even have a Google Page Rank, even a bad one like mine is currently or a proven track record but they’re experts just the same.  I want their chutzpah but my overblown sense of morals prohibits me from charging for something I’m not truly an expert in.

I have an overblown moral and ethical value portion of my brain but I don’t believe in God so my values are false to a lot of people–I’m talking both blogging (remember Pastor Craig on BIO?) and real world, here. I keep expecting Kevin Bacon to sweep into town….Oh we still do allow dancing though some of the clubs have been closed for more Godly ventures such as diners.  Southern diners complete with fat as a food group.  Our just chicken restaurant–don’t get me started on how unhealthy it is.

Back to the Internet.  Where I wasn’t supposed to be allowed to have opinions because some way sick radical rightists decreed so.  And the people I political blogged with would have rather seen blog than back me so it was up to my friends who I thank profusely and will always care about.

It’s hard for me to read blogs not by long time blogging friends as I read about being raped or getting nasty comments and people will comment about the blogger’s courage and how nobody talked about such things before.

Hello, here I am. Bet you weren’t told you kill little children because you’re pro-choice, etc, etc.  There was a time when I had to have Bone and The Wombat google me because it was too scary to look myself.

I did hate it and can’t help but want it validated that everything people talk about now as fresh and noteworthy is somewhere in the abyss called Courting.  I know how sick it sounds.  Credit for having blogs set up to diss me; blog posts changed to make me look like an idiot; comments that made me cringe.

The day I realized you weren’t going to go to bloggers hell for deleting was a wonderful one.

But I guess four-six years ago is too long in the new world of social media where all that matters is how many tweets you get.

I’m jaded.  I understand that.  I was so psyched about Psychology Today and the day after I was offered it Congresswoman Giffords was shot and that took the wind out of my sails.  I can’t help feeling nor would I want to change that about me.  But I wish I could have had one week no one month of pure enjoyment.  It’s that damn overblown sense of conscience and caring.

Summer’s coming and I’m getting my house ready.  But something inside me feels so sad as if I had a chance and blew it.  I’m good at not seeing what’s in front of me.  Maybe what’s in front is pure joy.  I hope.  I know I deserve it.  And it’s not going to cost anybody $499 plus materials and shipping & handling

Life goes on

I spent all weekend writing.

And my writing became darker and darker.  Yet I feel as if I’m not even a pebble that ripples through a lake that finds a tributary that finds a river that finds an estuary that works its way into the ocean–or something like that.  My waterway geography is a bit rusty and I’m from Long Island.  No excuses.

I have been staying away from TVs. Studies done after 9/11 showed that people who watched the most were the most depressed.  It’s just common sense I guess.  But there wasn’t the Huffpo then, and despite all the reasons I have never liked Arianna I find myself drawn to her paper as its coverage is the most dramatic and I think “no Pia, stop!!!.”

I miss home now.  Home being New York where I understand the people and they claim to understand me.  It’s not that I don’t like it here.  This is my home now.  But my closest friends here won’t be back for another two and a half weeks.

I wish I were a better person. One who could roll with all the punches and not feel so much.  But I do.  And then there’s the matter of the rapidly disappearing money.  Which is insignificant but it would have been safer under  my mattress.  Long story for some other time.  Maybe.

So I really have to focus on whether the world is falling apart or not.  Because maybe the world will come to an end in 2012, or I have heard the coasts will fall into the sea in October and now anything horrible seems possible no matter how crackpot the theory, and then I wouldn’t have to worry.

But I like to think I have focused on living a healthy good life so it could be a long and good one.  My own personal screw you to malevolent forces.  But it’s so hard.

I just have to remind myself I’m not even a pebble.