Why I don't hate Facebook anymore

I have been resistant to the idea of joining Facebook for a long time.  For one, I was busy with two little kids.  For two, I wasn't particularly interested in reconnecting with high school classmates I hadn't seen in fifteen years.  I also didn't like the idea of random people poking through photos of my kids or snippets of my daily life.  It seemed a little creepy.  I didn't really understand why some people are so persistent about staying connected with people from the past  with whom they no longer have anything in common, save having gone to the same high school.  It seemed, well, lame. However, as time goes on and more of my friends and family plan events or share pictures and information via Facebook, I have increasingly been left out of the loop.  So about a month ago, I caved and set up an account.  I cautiously friended a few close friends and family and was instantly rewarded with posts from them on my wall, most to the effect of, "Yea, you're finally on Facebook!" "Okay," I thought,"this isn't so bad," as I discovered privacy controls and set everything so only my approved friends could see my stuff.  I discovered Facebook as a really easy way to share photos and funny stories about the kids, and I began to enjoy keeping up with others better than I had in years.  I found out about my aunt's new boat the day she got it, and I knew when my cousin's kids got strep throat.  I felt more connected to people than I had in a long time. Jason made fun of me, but I knew about the heinous turf burn his sister got on her leg for sliding into second base wearing shorts before he did, so there (envision me sticking my tongue out here).   I was happily hooked on the world's most prolific social media site.... Until I tagged my sister in a photo of my mom's birthday party.  I tagged her, innocently wanting to be sure she saw the picture.  I did not, however, anticipate that HER friends would see the photo on her wall, realize then that I was on Facebook, and then friend me, send me messages, and post old high school photos of me on their own pages.  You see, my sister, it turns out, is Facebook friends with a number of people we grew up with, including my high school boyfriend. I must admit, the onslaught of communication from past friends and acquaintances somewhat freaked me out.  After mulling it over for a day or two, though, I decided to accept most of those friend requests.  While  it may initially have been a little unsettling to realize people I haven't laid eyes on in fifteen years were looking at pictures of my mom's birthday party at my house last weekend, what's the real harm?  I know, I know - stalkers.  But I put the risk of being stalked as a non-celebrity up there with being struck by lightning or winning the lottery.  Besides, isn't it sort of narcissistic of me to think there are people out there chomping at the bit to be my stalker?  But I digress... I feel I'm at a point in my life when everything has come together and is working harmoniously.  It started with Jason.  Being with him, observing how he handles himself, has given me the strength and insight to be my whole, real self and to love that self, even with its flaws.  We have two wonderful little boys - something I've wanted for a long time.  We live in a peaceful neighborhood near parks and trails and the lake.  I have discovered yoga, which has improved my fitness, both mind and body, tremendously.  My dad and I own a business together which gives me a sense of purpose and allows me to set my own  hours.  I feel like I've achieved a good degree of balance in life.  So maybe I needed to be here, at this point in my life, before I was ready to reconnect with my past.  Now that I feel more secure in who I am than ever before, whomever I was or whatever I did in the past is no longer a threat to undermine my self- confidence. After thinking it over, I decided I might actually enjoy a few virtual chats with old pals.  Now that I'm feeling such satisfaction in my life,  I've been thinking about my life's lack of continuity - how it seems much of what happened when I was young happened to someone else.  I've changed so much over the years, I don't at all feel like the naive girl with long blond hair and braces that I was in high school.  I examine old photos of her and feel very little connection.  Even though the messages I've now exchanged with a few long-lost  high school buddies have been brief and superficial, they've given me a line to my past reminding  me it was real.  That  innocent girl (who does not know what the hell she is doing, though she thinks she does, by the way) is still a part of me.  It's given me a feeling of continuity from then to now.   So, in summary, my life is now complete....because of Facebook??

The Balance

For a long time now, it's felt like my life is one big game of catch-up.  With little kids, after getting everyone fed, clothed, napped, pottied, diapered and entertained, at the end of the day, I had no brain space or energy left for anything else.  I lost track of friends, especially ones that didn't have children, and therefore did not fit into our play date-oriented schedule.  I abandoned interests I previously pursued avidly.  I gave away most of my african violets - with real babies to take care of, the plants became just another task needing doing.  My mountain bike collected dust as it hung in the garage, just like the pile of books on my nightstand.  And my pre-paid, fifteen class yoga pass hung on my key chain unused for months.  I would see these things in passing - the bike, the books, the yoga pass - and frown.  I'd wonder if I ever would get back to doing the things I loved.  Would I, in fact, ever get back to writing, or would this blog sit on the internet, gathering metaphorical cyber-dust?  I was afraid I'd been away from these things for too long and that, by the time I had the time to get back to them, I'd have somehow lost the inclination - that I would no longer know how to enjoy my previously loved hobbies after spending so much time and energy with the little people.
Here's the thing:  I love my children dearly.  I'd wanted to be a mother for years before I had them.  I have a degree in child development, and I find children and the way their minds work fascinating.  I sometimes sit in rapt attention, watching Jack talk to himself as he builds a wall with blocks or observing Gage as he repeatedly dumps sidewalk chalk from one container to another.  The way they solve problems, explore their surroundings and begin to make sense of their worlds is amazing to me.  BUT, the other thing is this:  children are not the only thing that fascinates me, and even my own brilliant, creative, lovable children can get tiresome every now and then.  Sometimes I need a break from cars and blocks and chicken nuggets and constant noise.  I missed my other interests.  I wanted to explore the trails in our neighborhood on my bike.  I longed to buy the plants I saw thriving in the garden center to see what I could do with them.  I needed (yes, needed) to have friends I interacted with on an adult level.  I had writing ideas overflowing the cup of my mind, but those ideas were often lost, as I had no time to write them down before I forgot them.
Now, with Jack being four and Gage fourteen months, I am getting to a point where I can at least begin thinking about other things, like adult friends, vacations, and interests I had pre-children.  My life feels like it is very slowly beginning to swing back into balance.  I know my life will still be mostly about my kids for years to come, but as they get older, I seem to have more mental energy to make plans with friends.  I can water plants and pull weeds while they play in the sand box.  I'm also able to share some of my interests with them, like when Jack and I planted seeds to grow carrots and peppers last weekend.  Jason and I actually managed a mountain bike ride a couple of weeks ago while my parents kept the kids, and it turns out you really don't forget how to ride a bike.  This all goes back to my belief that one person's happiness and contentedness with life does not exist in a vacuum.  Now that I am able to do more of the things that make me who I am, I am happier.  I feel more peaceful.  I have more energy to do nice things for my family, and we are more harmonious as a family.  Because, in short, as I have written before, "If Momma ain't happy, ain't nobody happy."

Shenanigans of the USPS

I have just had the most ridiculous experience with the United States Postal Service.  I am inclined to rant and rave here about gross incompetence, rudeness and mountains of inefficiency, but instead, I'll just tell the story.  It speaks for itself:
We have been living in our new house now almost a week.. The previous owner left us a mail key but not the number for the mailbox.  I emailed the seller's realtor for the information, but unsurprisingly, he did not respond.  He has been a pinnacle of unresponsiveness throughout the entire house-buying process.  It's a miracle we ever completed the transaction, but I digress...
So as I approached a bank of mailboxes near the park intent on simply trying the key until I found the right box, I was dismayed to find there were literally hundreds of boxes.  Even if I wanted to stay there for hours looking for the right box, there was no way Mr. Impatient One and Mr. Impatient Two (a.k.a., Jack and Gage) would put up with that.  I was even more dismayed when I found there were two more banks with just as many boxes that could very well be ours.  So, on the advice of our realtor, I packed the kids into the car this morning, grabbed my HUD-1 form (proof that we bought the house) and headed over to our local post office to get the number for our mailbox.  When I got there, I parked, changed a poopy diaper in the parking lot and discovered upon approaching the counter, I'd accidentally brought the HUD-1 form from the sale of our old house instead of the purchase of our new one.  The postal worker behind the desk was unfazed, however.  She is apparently not that into security.  She was happy to give me the address for our mailbox bank and even the section number.  She could not, however, according to her, give me the exact number, because only the mail carriers have that information and they'd already left to deliver mail for the day.  It made absolutely no sense to me that the information wouldn't be stored somewhere at the post office, but I thanked her, strapped the kids  in the car and headed back to our neighborhood, figuring with the numbers narrowed down, maybe I could just try the key in each box in the section.
When I got to the mailbox bank, I was thrilled to see our mail carrier there.  I hustled the kids out of the car, stuffed Gage in the sling and grabbed Jack by the hand.  I hurried up to the lady sorting mail and said,"hi, we just moved in.  Could you tell me the number of our box?  She asked for the address, which I gave her.  She said,"oh, that's the bank over there," pointing about 50 yards away.  Seeing a carrier sorting mail at that bank as well, I thanked her and hustled us over, as he seemed about to leave.  Out of breath, I repeated my request for a box number for the third time that day (still very politely, I might add.) He replied in a very aggressive, irritated tone,"I can't just give that information out.  I don't know who you are.  You could be anyone.  You need to go to the post office for that." Gritting my teeth, I briefly recounted my post office experience to him.  He said,"Well, I don't know why they wouldn't give it to you.  They do have it."I asked if he'd give me the box number if I showed him the HUD-1 form.  He looked at me quizzically, but did not admit he didn't know what a HUD-1 form was.  He said he'd give me the number with picture id and something showing my name and the new address.  He said he'd be there for twenty more minutes, and just as I was about to hustle off to try to go home and get the right form and get back in time, he asked,"wait, what's the address?" When I repeated it, he said," Oh that's on her side," pointing back at the woman I'd talked to first.  I exasperatedly told him she'd said it was on his side, and he responded with an oh so helpful, "well, it's not." I clamored off back towards the first set of boxes with a sigh and a loud,"this is absurd!"
When I got back to the first mail carrier's set of boxes and told her what the other one had said, she said,"oh, did you say 'Cowden?' I'm so sorry; that IS mine!" Right after she said this, Gage, in the fastest baby move I've ever seen, grabbed the piece of paper out of my hand with the info on the general location of our box and crammed  it into his mouth, entirely obliterating all writing.
Luckily, despite our mail carrier's flakiness, she was willing to tell me which box was mine without any identification (so much for security.) She pointed me to the right box and... my key wouldn't work.  "F-ing figures," I thought.  Feeling thoroughly beaten, I asked her if I showed her my driver's license, would she please give me my stack of mail, and I'd figure out the key some other time.  "No problem," she said, and handed me a banded stack of mail without my showing her anything to prove my identity.  I glanced at it.  It was for the Patels down the street from us.  "Uh, this isn't mine," I said.  She looked at it,"Oh! Sorry.  What house number did you say again?". I repeated it... AGAIN.  It turned out she had told me the wrong box to start with.  In the end, I got my key fitted in the right box and collected our mail.  It only took me just shy of two hours.  By the time we rolled into our driveway with the mail, Jack was bored, Gage was fussy, tired and hungry and I had a gargantuan headache.
Looking back, I met two nice yet incompetent postal workers today and one marginally competent one who was unnecessarily rude.  I wish I'd said something to the rude guy like,"Now that you've told me everything you can't do, how about telling what you CAN do?" or "Is your tone that rude all the time or is it just today?". But I didn't, because I never think of the good stuff to say at the time and because I hadn't set out to be witty or put anyone in their place.  I just wanted my goddamned mail.  Due to this experience and several others I've had lately with the postal service (lost mail, lost packages, etc) I will gladly pay more to use UPS or Fedex whenever possible.  In fact, if the private sector were allowed to deliver letters, I'd pay double to have mine delivered by UPS, Fedex, Lonestar Overnight or a damned camel - anything but the United States Postal Service.