H.R. PUFNSTUF

Do you remember the TV show from the early 70's called H.R. Pufnstuf?  I can't remember exactly what it was about except that the main character was a large, fluffy creature named . . .

you got it . . . H.R. Pufnstuf. I don't know why this show should stick in my head . . .  my kids weren't even born yet so I wasn't watching it with them . . .  I guess I knew of it because I was teaching Kindergarten at the time and had to be current on what the little people were watching.  ANYWAY . . . .

Today it came to me that I am now living with G. J. Huff-N-Puff. If I had a dollar for every "HUFF" and "PUFF" and grunt and groan directed at me over the past 40 years I would be a millionaire.  Add to that a dollar for every time I asked God to "GIVE ME STRENGTH AND PATIENCE" I could cure the national debt!
For some reason Husband seems to feel it is too much of an effort to actually SPEAK to me so instead he makes noises. Most often those noises are in the form of a HUFF. Sort of like a HARRUMPH !  It is like a cross between a groan, a huff and a grunt. What ever it is, it drive me nuts.  Which, I am sure, is exactly why Husband does it ! I really don't think it is a very nice way to treat someone.
Lately Husband has been huffing and puffing a bit more than usual. I'm not really sure of the cause. I honestly do try not to aggravate him on purpose but I am thinking that lately just my mere presence is annoying him. I understand how my trying to vacuum while he is watching TV could be annoying but I have to clean some time. And then there are the times in the car that I clutch for the dash board while screaming, "WE'RE GOING TO DIE!". I suppose that could upset him.
 Maybe he just needs to get more sleep. I'll try not to turn on ALL the lights tonight when I come to bed at 2 AM.    

THE HONEYMOON IS OVER

It has been 4 days exactly since I pulled my back and apparently Husband thinks that is enough time for me to recover. It does not matter what the doctor says or how I feel, 4 days is all I get !  That is usually about all Husband can take. Not only does he not like having to take care of himself but his tolerance for taking care of me is really short. I can see him getting more and more restless and cranky as the days go by. Husband likes to be entertained constantly and the whole "care taking" thing gets really old really fast. The two of us are in BIG trouble if one of us gets a serious illness that necessitates us taking care of the other person. I see myself laying in a dark room waiting for someone to come to feed and clean me. Husband won't put me in a nursing home because he will think he can take care of me. If it is Husband who is in a disabled state he will find himself in a nursing home so fast he won't remember any other life. I may visit occasionally but hope he doesn't hold his breath.
So as today began I knew the honeymoon was over and I was back up at bat. Ger did put in a wash for me and then return the clean wash to a pile in the center of the bed. I don't see any sign of the clean laundry moving off the bed so I guess I will have to take care of that. Forget breakfast, I slept through that and made it up just in time for lunch. Ger decided to go to the store again, (third time in 3 days) to get milk. I suggested he get himself a sandwich for lunch, something he would not have figured out for himself. As he sat on the patio eating his sandwich he asked what I was planning for dinner. Another sign that the honeymoon has come to a screeching halt.
But I do NOT take this all in stride.  It is 7:45 PM and dinner is not ready yet. I threw together a chicken pot pie and it is now in the oven. Perhaps we'll eat by 8, perhaps not.  Husband was so kind to bring me home a bouquet of flowers which he put on the kitchen counter top and left. I finally trimmed them and got  them into a vast about an hour ago, just before I decided dinner really was back in my hands.
There has been no asking how I was feeling today, no question as to what I could use help with and apparently no memory of me hurting my back and being crippled for 3 days. Nothing new there. 15 years ago when I had major surgery and then a staff infection on top of that I was up cooking dinner 3 days after I got out of the hospital because Husband couldn't find anything in the kitchen and got all pissy when I tried to tell him where things were.
Yep, the honeymoon is over ! It is a wonder the marriage has lasted this long.

RETURNING TO REALITY - - KICKING AND SCREAMING ALL THE WAY

It's nearly 1 AM and I am writing this now because once I return home I will probably not have a moment alone for at least 3 weeks. Husband has been on his own for 10 days and I will pay the price. He is his mother's son and has learned well the art of guilt from the Queen of Guilt. Rita should have been Jewish but was a Brooklyn Irish Catholic, which is the next best thing in the art of guilt. Husband will have subtle ways of letting me know that he did not appreciate being "abandoned" for the week. The mail will all be stacked on the table waiting my return. The dishes and laundry will likewise be waiting as will the messages on the answering machine. I don't even want to think about what the kitchen and the bathroom will look like.

I will return home tomorrow to endless stories from the news broadcasts of the past 10 days and updates of the various storms brewing in the Atlantic. I will get blow by blow accounts of what husband has done for 10 days, what he has eaten and who he has talked to. There will be a 30 second period of him asking how my visit was only to be cut short by another tale of something that happened while I was away. Things as important as the shrubs getting trimmed, the exterminator spraying the house or a neighbor stopping by to chat. All these things are of great importance for husband to share because I WAS GONE and left him alone to deal with life.

I have had a fantastic time with my friends. It has been cathartic in so many ways and my heart, soul and mind are refreshed. I have been validated in my thinking and actions. I am relaxed and open, all guards dropped and all anxieties removed. The only thing better than a friend is TWO friends. We have talked and talked and talked and could go on like this for months more but reality calls in the form of one simple phone call to husband this evening. "HI Ger, it's me." To which husband responded "Oh, I thought you forgot to call". I was calling because I wanted to talk to husband, NOT because I was supposed to call. I was immediately transported back to where I was 10 days ago when I left FL. My hands and teeth are clenched, I'm starting to get a headache and my stomach hurts.

WELCOME HOME !

I KID YOU NOT

Husband lost me in Chick-fil-A today.

We took Kaelin and Keri to the airport today to return them home to MD. I hated to see them go! The past 2 weeks have been filled with joy and laughter that only a daughter and grand daughter can bring into my life. This morning Kaelin was up at 6:15 AM after a terrible nights sleep. She seems to have caught her daddy's cold and spent a lousy night coughing and snuffling. And even with all that the poor little thing was full of smiles and hugs. But it was time for them to go home so husband and I drove them to the airport and sent them off with love and kisses.

Once I stopped crying husband and I decided to stop at Chick-fil-A for lunch before meeting up with Bridget, Abby and Roman at the Palm Beach Gardens recreation complex. It being lunch time the place was fairly busy but not Grand Central Station at rush hour or Times Square on New Years Eve. There were empty booths and only a few people at the counter. The store is average size, counter on one wall, booths on the other 3 and a few tables in the center. A play ground off to one side and bathrooms off of another side. There are very few places to get lost in and yet the man managed to loose me. We both went to the counter and ordered our lunches and husband then TOLD me to get a booth and he would bring the food. I GOT A BOOTH. I SAT IN THE BOOTH. I WAITED IN THE BOOTH ! Knowing how crazed husband can get and how he likes to sit and face the center of the store so he can watch everyone, (rather than talk to me) I sat in a booth with my back to the center of the store. And I sat, and I sat, and I sat. After a while I decided they could have hatched the chicken and waited for it to grow for all the time it was taking to fill our order so I stood up and looked around the store to see what was keeping husband. And there he sat . . . 2 booths away from me on the other side of the aisle, FINISHING HIS SANDWICH ! He had walked away from the counter and "COULD NOT FIND" ME!!!!!!!!!!!!!! (Being so very petite at 200 pounds I do tend to blend into the woodwork.) A BLIND IDIOT, on crutches could have found me, yet husband could not because I was not facing him, waving both arms over my head while yelling. "GER, GER, . . . HERE GER, . . . I AM OVER HERE! SITTING IN A BOOTH LIKE YOU ASKED ME TO!" H.F.S. !! (Holy Freaking S--t!) His comment to me, (with his mouth full of the last bite of his sandwich) . . ."I couldn't find you. I thought you went to the bathroom or something." I KNOW BETTER! As if I would ever go pee when I am supposed to be SITTING IN A BOOTH !

I make husband sound like a beast. He isn't ! He is just a man who has his head up his ass and can't see his hand in front of his face. And so he "looses me" periodically. . . . In our "massive 2 bedroom home, in the back yard, (when I am IN the pool he cannot find me because I am no longer at eye level), and any number of other places that are the size of a bread box. The thing that I CAN NOT figure out is WHY I keep letting him know where I am. If I think about it, this is the perfect opportunity to escape from this insanity. I have tried all sorts of ways to loose husband and none of them have ever worked. Next time he looses me I think I will just stay lost and slip off into the sunset, NEVER TO BE FOUND AGAIN !

P.S. I don't recommend cold Chick-fil-A sandwiches . . . by the time I found husband my sandwich was colder than the melted strawberry shake.

The GREEN ONE

My daughter in law, Kristen, has a blog on which she will occasionally do "Roses and Thorns". Here she lists things that she likes and dislikes or things that are going on in her life, good and bad. I have decided to do something similar and name it "Stupid and Stupider". This will be a list of things that husband says and does that I just stand and wonder at. I have been told by many persons that IT IS NOT ME ! who is crazy. I know that when you are the crazy person in the room you are the one who absolutely, positively believes you are SANE. Well, after 41 years of thinking I was the crazy one I have it on good authority that I am not nuts!
But then let me share with you some of the stupid and stupider things that I encounter in a day and you be the judge.
Today's exchange went something like this . . .
Ger and I are in the kitchen. I am making breakfast and he is watching.

GER . . . "Your plant is dying".
(We live in South Florida. My house is filled with potted plants and the yard and patio are covered with potted plants. All of which are presumably "mine" since I bought them, potted them and care for them.)

CATH . . . "Which plant?"

GER . . . "The one outside"
(This now narrows the choices down to about 40)

CATH . . . (who by now knows I should just stop here but can't help myself)
"Which one outside?"

GER . . . (ARE YOU READY FOR THIS . . .) (he answers in dead seriousness)
"THE GREEN ONE"

(As opposed to what . . . the pink with purple polka dot one?) THEY ARE ALL GREEN !! (Except for the BROWN one that is dying!)

I kid you not . . . this was an actual exchange that went on here today. After the response of "The Green One" I stopped playing . . . I just gave husband an "OH" and left it at that. I usually don't bust out laughing but rather walk away to a quiet room, shut the door, put a towel in my mouth and SCREAM! I really do need to just start laughing but that would hurt his feelings because he is dead serious when he says these things and finds nothing odd in them. In fact he thinks it makes perfect sense and he is perfectly sane. And yet I am the one in therapy and taking drugs. I wonder why?

Not About England

The vacation is over. A week of being "parents" has returned husband and I to the primal state of survival of the fittest, kill or be killed, very man for him/her self. The fact that the World Cup is on TV EVERY DAY is not helping. Also the fact that being in a foreign country Husband is not going to get in the car and go someplace on his own . . . OH, wait, silly me . . . he doesn't do that when we are home. Bottom line, all this freaking togetherness is REALLY getting to me. 24/7 is not a healthy state to live in with your spouse so I am looking for one of you out there to volunteer to come get Husband and take him AWAY for a month or two. PLEASE !!!!!!!
Today we returned to the grocery store for the umpteenth time. It is the only place I know how to get to. Of course Husband came along and clutched the dashboard the whole way. I thought about going alone but it is like leaving a small puppy home. They look at you with those big, sad eyes and you just can't walk out the door without them. Once we get to the store it is TORTURE to shop. I am followed a foot away so every time I stop I get plowed into. Forget trying to turn around. I have tried giving the cart to Husband but then I get my ankles smashed every couple of minutes. "Focus" is not in Ger's vocabulary. Along with the physical abuse I have to put up with the endless questions like, "Why are you getting that?" "Can I get something for you?" Where would I find that?" (If I knew the answer to that question I would get it myself!) The HELP is more work than it is worth.
Then when we are finished shopping and are on our way home I have to reward the Husband with a treat. Usually this is some sort of "Fast Food" because Heaven forbid we should go home and eat some of the healthy food I have just bought. Today's stop was at KFC. (Yep, the Colonel has made it across the pond.) When we get home Ger brings in all the groceries and pulls them all out of the bags, leaving them on the counter tops and the bags on the floor. By now he is exhausted and has returned to the TV set all proud of himself for having done so very much to help.
I, on the other hand have gone up stairs, into the bath room and stuffed a towel in my mouth so I can scream! Once I can catch my breath again I pop a happy pill or two and continue on with the day. Picking up Abby from school is a similar experience except that the extent of "help" is limited to walking with me to and from the school. This trip is accompanied by the various questions, "Does Abby have her lunch? Does Abby have her water? Did you put sun screen on Abby? Did you sign her book list? . . ." This morning I waved my hand in Husbands face and asked him if he saw my hand, because it was about to slap him silly if he asked me one more thing. He got that message but I am sure tomorrow will just be more of the same.

The GUNNAS

Being from Brooklyn Husband has his own language. His absolute favorite word is "GUNNA", as in "I'm gunna fix that today." or "I'm gunna get my hair cut tomorrow".
To those of us not from Brooklyn this all translates to "I AM GOING TO . . . ".
Now the "gunnas" usually never actually happen. They are put out there a few hundred times a day but they very seldom materialize. I guess just by saying them we are getting closer to actual action but I never hold my breath when "gunna" is spoken.
Gunnas are very closely related to the "DIDJAS". Where the gunnas are spoken by husband with the action supposedly coming from him the "didjas" are meant for me. As in "'Didja' get any milk while you were out?" Or "'Didja' call the doctor's office to make an appointment for me?" (That statement is so wrong on so many levels!)
Usually if left alone long enough the "gunnas" turn into "didjas". I haven't really figured out how that manages to happen but it is happening so much more over these last few weeks that I think there must be a great deal of procrastination in the area. Three weeks ago husband had a whole list of "gunnas" and now that list has turned into "didjas" right before my eyes.
At this rate I am "gunna" get myself a gunna and shoot somebody right in his "didja" !

Husband And The Swordfish

Now if you think this is going to be a story about Ger deep sea fishing, think again. Husband is not into macho things like sport fishing, hunting, motorcycle riding or pretty any thing that involves moving. He is the sort of sit/lie there kind of guy who if it involves any sort of interaction, energy or movement it is beyond him. Rather, this is a story about the type of swordfish that you buy at the market and bring home to cook. This is about the most chalenging thing husband has done in months.
We have house guests . . . and rather than stink up the house with the smell of cooking fish I decided we would cook the two beautiful, inch thick swordfish steaks on the grill outside. This automatically becomes Ger's job because it is a MANLY job to BBQ and he takes great pride in mastering the art of cooking a steak or a burger on the grill. But now I have thrown him for a total complete loop . . . I have asked him to cook a F I S H on his sacred, manly grill. He will not admit that this is something he would rather not do because then he would have to admit he is not the KING of grilling. So instead he agreed to take on "THE FISH". Because I knew he was breaking out in a cold sweat and starting to hyperventilate I went on line and checked on recipies for grilling swordfish. (I mean, really . . . how freaking hard can this be and how freaking different from a piece of beef can this be?) I gave him the fish steaks and told him the internet said to cook them 6-8 minutes a side. YOU WOULD THINK I ASKED HIM TO WALK A TIGHT ROPE ACROSS NIAGRA FALLS ! I left him and our house guest out at the grill and went back inside before I either lost it in hysterical laughter or choaked him to death. In EXACTLY 15 minutes husband came running (well, as close to running as he can get, which really amounts to a quick walk) into the house with the fish on a platter. He charged into the kitchen asking, "Is this fish done?". Like he couldn't take a knife and cut into it like he would a steak? As it turned out it was not done and needed about 10 more minutes on the grill. I was now in the dog house because I TOLD him 6-8 minutes on each side and that was what he had done so I was WRONG ! (capital letters, exclamation point!) What do I know about grilling fish? Only what I read on the internet.
Bottom line, the fish was a little too well done and dry but what the hell . . . at least my house doesn't stink of fish !

The Palm Trees

Husband is sitting in the back yard staring at a tree! No joke . . . He is in the lawn chair watching a couple of workers cut branches off one of our palm trees. But this is not something new. He often sits in the yard and stares at the palms. He is obsessed with the trees. They occupy much of his time and enter into almost every conversation with anyone who comes to our home.
Living in South Florida we are surrounded by palm trees. I never knew there were so many types and that most of them are NOT native to this area. And that is all I know or care to know about palm trees. They are very lovely, they provide shade and they do not require any care. Or so I thought. It seems that all palm trees produce some sort of "off-spring". The most familiar is the coconut. But then there are "date" palm and "grape" palms and heaven only knows what other palms. Our Palm trees produce PODS ! Think horror film of the past . . . Pod people invade the Earth . . .
well, that is what is growing in our trees. And they DRIVE MY HUSBAND CRAZY !! He is obsessed with these things. As soon as one starts to form he is out in the back pacing. Muttering about the PODS. Wondering how he can get up that high to cut them down. It is problematic because #1. The trees are over 10 feet tall and #2 they have spikes growing out of them close to the trunk. We have learned that in Florida most things that are growing have needle sharp spikes that are just waiting to attack you. On the occasions when Ger does get on a ladder to attack the PODS he comes out the looser with numerous punctures and wounds. These trees are VICIOUS ! That and the fact that a 70 year old man has NO business climbing on an 8 foot ladder all make it seem totally ridiculous to let these pods bother him. But the pods do ripen and open and drop the most God awful mess into the pool. (But isn't that why we have a pool boy?)
Anyway . . . there were landscapers working their way through the neighborhood today and for the paltry cost of $10 a tree the palms are now NAKED ! NO fronds, no pods, no shade ! But husband is happy so that is all that counts.

HAVE YOU SEEN THE MAN I MARRIED ?

I lost him some where over these past 40 years. There is someone here in his place who resembles that guy I fell in love with but this version really isn't all that great. I want the original copy back. Or maybe I need my rose colored glasses and simple mind back. Either way . . . I'v been robbed !
The original person I met all those years ago was handsome, fun, clever, witty, funny, sexy and smart ! He listened to me and we talked endlessly and easily about everything and anything. OR . . . is that just how I remember it ? Was I so snowed by this charming older man that I didn't notice all the things that drive me NUTS today? Was he really charming or just full of shit ? Was he witty and funny because I had never heard the jokes and stories before? Now after 40 years of hearing the same thing over and over and over he isn't quite as entertaining. Was he really all that smart or was I all that stupid ? It is a proven fact . . . (ask any woman) . . . men get stupider with age and women get smarter. It is a survival thing. As young women we listen raptly with adoring gazes as our man spews out his wisdom. As we age we realize that the wisdom is really 90% bull shit and we get smarter and smarter the more we dig our way through the piles of BS. We also realize that in order to survive we MUST take over the running of the family. The check book with CF (correction factor) scratched across each page because husband will not/cannot balance the check book and refuses in this day and age to learn to use a computer for on line banking ! And how many times do we have to ask for something to be done around the house before we either do it ourselves or hire someone to do it?
Husband's world has become a black hole of emptyness centering around the TV set. All those times we used to talk about nothing and anything . . . If it doesn't come from Fox News it isn't part of the conversation.
I don't know if I have had to become stronger and take on more responsibility because Ger just can't be bothered or has he just let go of everything because I have become more responsible? It is the old "Chicken or the Egg" thing. But whatever the reasons, I don't like it. Today it is just bugging the hell out of me that I am running my ass off and the Little Prince sits on his throne (recliner) and ALLOWS me to go nuts. Some days are worse than others and I guess I am tired. But damn it, what was I thinking all those years ago when I chose this man to share my life with me? I guess I should have looked up the defination of the word "Share" in the Brooklyn Irish Catholic dictionary or at least taken a good long look at his family before I made my decision. My Mother-in-law did try to warn me when she told me. "He doesn't have a clue" but I thought she was kidding. Stupid me !!