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One of the reoccurring comments that popped up when I announced my site’s branding was “great. Just keep the confessions”. Oh, friends, Confessions are here to stay. We’re in it to win it.
If you’re new here, confessions are a (mostly) monthly series where I share really stupid stuff with you all. Then you share silly stuff with the class, we all have a fan-freaking-tastic time and go about our days.
Let’s get this party started!
- I’ve never seen the movie 16 Candles. And I have no plans to ever change that. You hate me right now.
- We have popcorn and movie nights every week. After I drizzle the butter on the popcorn, I shake it a few times to distribute. Then I pour some more butter. And then I eat the top of everyone’s popcorn bowl before I bring it out into the living room. Because that is where all the butter is and that is the best part.
- I don’t understand Reddit. And based on what I hear, I don’t really want to understand it. I already have so much in my life that can help me waste time.
- I have weird man hands. They’re ugly AF and my nails are always jacked because I work with my hands a lot. There are scars, and the backs become bright pink in the cold due to a gas oven exploding when I lit it back in 2005. But my hands are really strong and can do so many things and have served me well. Maybe I should use nail polish or something to try to fancy them up.
- I do 99% of the laundry in our house, including my Dad’s. One morning Troy was getting dressed and I hear him yell “what the fuck”?! Apparently, when I was putting the laundry away, I accidentally put my Dad’s underwear in Troy’s drawer and he had inadvertently put them on. The reaction was so swift and hilarious (to me) that if it wasn’t for Troy’s mental health, I’d likely do that once a month.
- I hate flossing and I resent that I have to do it. Yeah, I mean, I want to keep my original teeth so I continue to floss. But I freaking hate it.
- When you blog, everyone has tons of advice on how to do it the “right way”. One of the things that consistently comes up is the idea of an “avatar”. No, not the blue creature from the James Cameron movie, but a compilation of your readers. I’ve lost you here, haven’t I? The idea is that when you write, you write for that person. Back in the old days of blogging (2010 ish), you just wrote whatever and it was generally word diarrhea. Feel free to check out my older posts. 🙂Now, you write for your avatar because that means you’re writing for others and therefore are helping someone.In most cases, an avatar is a mix of your friends and who you were two years ago.So, when I sit and write my posts, I write for Mae. Mae is the nickname I was going to give Bennett if Bennett had been a chick. Other than my Scattered Sundays and Meal Plan posts (and I guess this one too), when I write a post, I write for my friend Mae. Want to hear about Mae? She’s pretty rad.
Mae is 34 years old and lives outside of a major city with her family. She likes to be close to a cultural center but really craves small town life. On the outside, she totally looks like she has her shit together, but inside she is often a mess. To anyone observing her she looks like a duck calming swimming, but underneath the water, she is paddling her flippers as fast as she fucking can.
Mae loves healthy food and cooking most of the time, but can do some extreme damage to a Costco sample cart full of crappy processed food. When she is on the real foods train, she is fully on it. From scratch meals, organic ingredients – the whole shebang. But then when something happens and she stress eats a sleeve of Thin Mints, she feels like a failure and a fraud.
She loves the idea of quick and healthy meals to serve her family, but 90% of the recipes she pins or tears out of magazines are desserts. As much as Mae wants to be creative with cooking, she finds herself making the same 15 meals over and over. She reads blogs for new ways to serve the same old foods.
She is all in when it comes to a sustainable lifestyle (or at least the idea of it) – garden, cooking, canning, DIY, and dreams about a small hobby farm. But then she keeps trying to do it all at once and burns out and just wants to light a match to everything. She has yet to figure out that Balance is Bullshit.
Mae works her ass off but often feels like she is pushing a rock up a hill with her little toe. She always has big life and work plans and when things are going well she attributes it to chance or luck. When things take a dive and something goes wrong or doesn’t work out, the self-doubt creeps in and it becomes all her fault.
She likes being around people and has good friends but often feels isolated and turns to blogs and social media for connection. Mae loves to be entertained and finds comfort when she reads experiences of others who don’t make her feel so weird or odd. It makes her realize that maybe not everyone has their shit together.
Mae doesn’t know when she will ever be considered a grown up. She has no idea how her parents made it all look so easy. She is trying hard to improve herself and wants to make a difference in this world. She keeps paddling and tries to take one step forward every single day.
Alright friends, your turn! Confess away.
Confession: I am 100% Mae. 34 years old and everything. Wow, that was really crazy to read about, ha!
Welcome to the club “Mae”. We all need each other. And there are cookies.
1. I have never seen any of The Godfather movies. At this point, I feel like they wouldn’t hold up well. Could be wrong? I love almost anything John Hughes though – big fan of the “brat pack”. I recently went back and watched an old favorite- The Saint with Val Kilmer – and although still an excellent movie, it was kind of sad to see what passed for “cutting edge technology” back then.
2. I LOVE the smell of coffee but I don’t drink it- don’t like the taste. McDonald’s Diet Coke FTW.
3. I have catcher’s mitts for hands and snausage fingers. Ironically, I can’t catch for sh*t.
4. I only figured out , a couple of years ago, that there is a difference between real butter and margarine and other products claiming to be like butter. Although I figured it out sooner than I did with butter substitutes/alternatives, I also did not realize that Miracle Whip was not real mayo.
5. I let my 12 year-old son swear occasionally. Growing up, my sister and I were discouraged from even saying “crap” or “fart”. I swear like a trucker now (although not in front of my kid). I figured maybe if I let him swear a little now, it will lose its appeal. He has very strict rules – he must always consider his surroundings (locker room is okay, classroom with mixed company is not). And he stays away from the really hard hitters – mostly just the “D” and “S” words. The worst part? I absolutely would NOT extend this privilege/concession/whatever you want to call it, to my daughter, if I had one.
The first and second Godfather movies totally hold up. I hadn’t seen them until my early 20’s and I was looking to kill some time after wisdom teeth surgery. Completely ignore the third one and pretend it doesn’t exist.
Mmmmm, once you go real butter, you’ll never go back!
Hi, I’m Mae. Especially the “I will never feel like an adult” part. I’m a teacher, mom of two, married for almost a decade, and I still sometimes look around for an adultier adult to tell me what to do. (It probably doesn’t help that I come across quite young and look like I’m barely out of high school … I still get asked for ID all the time. I’m 35.)
I’d like to be a total hippy for all domestic things, but it just isn’t happening. I outsource my canning to my best friend. I switched to hippy soaps and stuff but changing eatings habits is HARD.
My comment about your change of blog is that I’m disappointed you didn’t go with the name you said you’d pick a while ago – The Swearing Lutheran. I loved it.
My confession for the month: despite constantly reinforcing that daily reading practice is imperative for early elementary students, I almost never do nightly reading with my own kid. Teacher fail.
Hold onto that baby face for as long as you can girl! Troy is almost 5 years old than me but has the babiest of baby faces.
Tell me more about this outsourcing of canning. Like do you buy the stuff, she does it, and gets to keep some? I’m so intrigued!
Lol, the Swearing Lutheran would have been so fun. But my goal was to shorten my site’s name and number of words in it.
My mom was a second grade teacher and I don’t ever remember her reading with me once I hit kindergarten and could read chapter books by myself.
I prep the food (most just broth and sauces at this point), bring them to her house, provide witty repartee, and go home with canned goods. She gets to kick her husband and kid out of the house and have some ‘girl time’ and wine.
I also don’t remember my parents reading to me once I was about Gr 1 and reading chapter books. Only have memories of us all reading Shel Silverstein poems together.
Sounds like everyone wins in that case!
We also read Shel Silverstein together! My dad still has Where the Sidewalk Ends downstairs on his bookshelf. 🙂
Confession: I’m 75-80% Mae.
🙂
Geez. I thought I was so unique in my struggles and dreams. At least I know I’m in the right place? 🙂 Any chance Mae is an actually person? Because I’m going to need her digits so we can be soul sisters in real life.
You are unique but you’ve found your tribe of fellow unique people. 🙂
So I share your blog a lot and referred a newbie the other day who responded,”well, she doesn’t mince words…” and that made me laugh. Don’t misinterpret her comment, she really likes the fact that there isn’t the flowery life is always perfect vibe that we find in so many blogs. Once I start rolling my eyes while reading a post I’m done with that site. Anyway, just wanted to share that we appreciate your candor and lack of desire to “keep
up with the Joneses”…. and the occasional f bomb so I don’t feel like the only parent on the planet who has a running wtf commentary in my head.
Ha! That’s funny to me because my language is actually so toned down compared to when I first started. But thanks for pimping me out. 🙂
#1 I LOVE popcorn with all the butter, buttttt it gives me raging shits. TMI? I hope bowel movements are a welcome part of confessions.
#2 I eat it anyway 🙂
Bowel movements are the most welcome part of confessions!! 🙂
I do not have man hands, but I do have Barney Rubble feet. Instead of being curvy like a normal foot, they are rectangular.
I don’t wear sandals because I can’t stand the gritty feel of dust between my foot and the shoe.
I love to eat chicken in pretty much any form, but the smell of it cooking makes me gag. Ditto for bacon.
If I don’t stop myself, I can eat an entire can of Pringles in one sitting.
Hey, if the end of the world happens and oil is gone, you’re going to do an amazing job pushing a stone car with your feet through the floor.
Ah ha, yes! All those people with normal shaped feet will bow before me in jealousy when that happens.
1. I dislike Star Wars and Star Trek movies. Pointless.
2. I love Mae.
3. I tell my classes all the time to eat clean, no junk, cut the sweets… then i eat chocolate chips when i get home.
4. I’ve never read Harry Potter.
5. There’s this chick who is really tall, thin, has no boobs what so ever and a heart bigger than her face. And i have a huge girl crush on her.
The M in Mae was inspired by one very lovely red head in my life.
Chocolate is full of antioxidants my friend.
1- I ran a half marathon in January and am set to do more races next year. I hate running. I do it for the medal and the vacation. Because I runDisney
2- I hide gummy bears in with the cold meds. They are mine and the family can’t have them!!
3- I don’t bathe my children nearly as much as I should. 3 girls with long hair is exhausting.
4- I spend too much money on my hair, nails and Dunkin’ Donuts. I’m a bit of a basic bitch at times. And I’m ok with it.
5- I don’t drink coffee. It tastes yucky
6- I don’t camp but will happily spend my summer on a boat
7- I hate the smell of cooking eggs.
LOL, I know you and your Disney love “runs” deep my friend.
Ok, let’s talk gummy bears. What are your favorite brands? I love all of them, but I think Black Forest are my favorite.
What are you getting at Dunkin’ if not coffee?
Iced tea, black with extra ice. Green tea if at starbucks.
Legit, target brand are really good. I also like black Forrest. Harribo are good. I really like “available”