Girlfriends and Cougars and Tina Fey: To the Rescue

Sometimes you just need to vent.  Sometimes – strangely enough – it’s easier to vent to strangers.  I think many (many) writers already know this, hence…..the blogosphere.

My closest friends know I’ve been struggling this year.  And perhaps since my irreverent, snarky and eyerolling observations haven’t exactly been in abundance these past few months, maybe even my not-so-closest friends have sensed something as well (all hail the Facebooking faux friends!).

Stupid teen: blechh.  Sick mom:  double blechh.   It’s been a loooong year.

The thing is, problems within the family affect every aspect of life and when one’s livelihood is based on spotlighting the lighter side of parenting – and there ain’t no light at the moment – it’s especially hard coming up with knee-slapping anecdotes.  Don’t get me wrong – there HAVE been hilarious moments aplenty under our roof (the – very loud I might add – declaration of a first pubic hair comes to mind) but when you’re not in a funny-kinda-writing mode, one just hopes that these moments will be filed away in a battered, tired brain to resurface at a sunnier point in time.

But I am keeping desperation at bay by surrounding myself with incredibly awesome people.

My friends are cougars.  Really, they are.  But not like the caricatured version we all like to mock.  They’re like actual cougars – with an uncanny ability to sniff out a bleeding victim.  While my life of late has found me submerged in low points, my personal circle of women warriors have swooped in for the kill:  of bad karma, despair, and oh-woe-is-me hand wringing.

Girlfriends will have none of that.

It’s what chicks do.  Cue in the slap from Cher, “Snap out of it!”

Our maternal mantra is simple yet profound:  adversity does not define us.

Ironically, it just may be the glue that binds us.

Sometimes simple words are hard to wrap your brain around.

This too shall pass.

It won’t always be like this.

You’re gonna laugh like hell about this one day.

So…. upbeat I remain, pinning all my hopes on the probability that yes, dammit, one day this period of my life will be hilarious Thanksgiving table fodder. 

(It certainly doesn’t hurt that Tina Fey’s new book made me cry tears of laughter over the past couple of days.  SHE would be an awesome girlfriend indeed.  So would Kathy Griffin.  And Chelsea Handler.  And that actress from “In Plain Sight” who was just on “Ellen” saying one of her daughters was true evil and the other one was utterly perfect.  Said it right on syndicated TV.  How great is that?  But I digress.)

So while I haven’t been blogging and blathering away every week…

(letting the world know that -- after a successful and strappy Valentine’s Day hooker shoe -- I did in fact get the too-butch-for-even-elementary-school-work black clogs from my husband as a recent birthday gift)

….I have been trying to jot down my more amusing moments of time for the book that is half in my head, a quarter on computer and the rest on scraps of paper strewn throughout my home and car (as should be the case for a mom who’s batshit crazed trying to keep her kid from flunking).  It should be noted that I have decided to make this book a reality before one hits bookshelves by NeNe Leakes, Charlie Sheen or Miranda Cosgrove.  If one does, I would like to request a hall pass for my subsequent behavior.

(An aside:  I’ve taken a shine to the word batshit (thank you, Tina Fey).  I’ll try not to overuse it but I really, really like it.) 

-- Tina Drakakis