A blog inspired by the comments

What still fascinates me about this blog (and whole experience really) is that people from all over the world follow me. I'm never sure if people want me to call them out by name but two of my longest running supporters are from Europe. With the time difference it means that I often wake up to some very thoughtful, supportive and even insightful comments. I always feel bad that I'm never able to respond like they deserve; mornings in my house are always a little chaotic. Bubs is usually out for a run (although he's been a lot of help lately since he can't run until December), I have a daughter who can't get to school fast enough and a son who somehow manages to come down with a new illness every morning so he can stay home. That menagerie needs to go over to my mom's house so she can get all the elementary age kids to school then I have to stop by and pick up my niece since her school is on the way to my job. It's actually a lot of fun but it means by the time I've stopped to take a breath, I usually have forgotten to respond to two very, very nice people. 

This morning I woke up to a comment asking me to talk more about some philosophies that may have guided me through growing up in a relatively strict and conservative environment. I've also had another long time poster say that some of the more interesting things I write are about what it was like growing up in the state that everyone loves to hate. Maybe I can do a little of both tonight. 

So I think to do this maybe you have to understand a little bit about my parents. I love them both dearly but up until I was in my mid-20s, I knew almost nothing about my dad. I always knew he was a very hard worker, I always knew he wanted the best for us, I now know the he sacrificed a lot of dreams he had because my mom got pregnant with my older sister and he felt he had to do the right thing. Now that isn't to say they aren't happy or don't have a loving relationship. They very much do, but its a little hard to see from the outside. My dad was very strict and in his own way very conservative. He was also a devout Christian who took the teachings of the church very seriously. 

My mom on the other hand is a type of woman that are surprisingly common in Texas--a true free spirt who believes in her role in the family. I'm not sure if this will make sense but my parents were always on the same page when it came to raising the 3 girls, but my mom was also a real pragmatist and would do things without my dad's knowledge so we would be safe in the real world. I don't think she ever lied to him, rather I don't think he ever asked and put her in a position to lie. For example, I've talked about my mom getting me on the pill or taking me to talk to our pastor about my bi-sexual attractions. Had my dad ever asked, I believe 100% that my mom would have told him the truth--but as far as I know he never asked. 

This is a great time to talk about the true enigma that is my parents. We always knew that they more or less grew up together, graduated high school 3 years apart but from the same school. We thought they were no more than family friends that reconnected in their mid 20s and had a family and to us that seemed like the entirety of their lives. I think it was 2 years ago we were sitting at Thanksgiving dinner and out of the blue my dad said something like "yeah you used to be able to hitchhike across the country and be 100% safe, like your mom and I did." The look that my two sisters, my brother and myself gave each other could have cut glass. My younger sister asked them why they would need to hitchhike if they both were college graduates when they reconnected and both had jobs. Well it turns out when my dad was 17 and my mom was 15, they had dated. That in itself a massive shock that we didn't know. The even bigger shock was that they had decided that after school let out for the summer that they were going to hitchhike from central Texas, up the Pacific Coast to Vancouver Canada. My parents had never mentioned it, my aunts and uncles had never mentioned it and neither set of grandparents had ever mentioned it. But at Thanksgiving my dad just dropped that bombshell like he was asking to pass the turkey.   When we asked up why they neve told us, they both basically said "you guys never asked." For me, the former 11 year old kid who got a wooden spoon to butt when I was caught sneaking out my window to go meet a boy IN THE TOWN, maybe that would have been a good chance to learn that my parents had been teenage runaways?

So I'm off on a tangent and the commenter more specifically asked how I grew up in such a strict environment, yet still be so comfortable doing things like wearing a bikini in public and working at Hooters. As with everything, there's no simple answer. For one, my dad would have killed me had he been the one to see me standing out on median screaming "car wash" in a string bikini top. I think that's probably one of the reasons my mom called my cousin to tell me to knock it off. So it wasn't like I didn't know I was pushing the rules with things like that. I think the roots of me being comfortable in my own skin com from gymnastics. I was in gymnastics leos exerting myself for an audience from the time I was about 4. I've gotten my period in the middle of routine and had blood run down my leg. I've gotten a full on wedgie in the middle of a meet and had to make an on the spot decision to pull my leo out of my butt crack and take the deduction or continue more or less bare ass. Wearing a bikini to advertise my boyfriends car wash and getting nekkid in the middle of a dark park because my boyfriend was just so charming didn't seem like that big of a deal I guess. I also think that I'm a pretty sexual person, again I never want to be titillating when I talk about this kind of stuff so please don't think that's what I'm doing. I had my first kiss when I was in 4th grade and I knew at that moment that physical touch was for me. By the time I'd met Bubs at 13, I would bet that I'd kissed and made out with 20 or 30 other boys. I was hooked and I loved making more than anything. I actually don't know how I made it to 17 when my virtue intact but I know that once we did it for the first time, I was utterly insatiable. Though I've calmed down a bit as I've gotten older, I can confidently just say that Bubs had a very exciting time in his late teens and early 20s. I honestly think that its one of the reasons he was ok with me hooking up with other girls--the poor guy needed a break every once in a while. 

Now, it comes to working at Hooters. My parents absolutely knew about it and I think my mom was secretly envious and I know my dad didn't like it. But at the same time, I was an adult and fully self sufficient so while my dad would always want to make sure I was safe, he never said anything to forbid it either. I guess it also probably helps that I was six hours away from home and wasn't coming home wearing the orange hot pants (though that would never happen anyways, we always got into the uniform at work).  

But it's also worth noting that about a year before I started slinging chicken wings and upping my take home tips because of my boobs, we had the family event that I think forever softened my parents and made them both realize that they needed to be a lot more more honest and forgiving with each other and life doesn't always go to plan, even for the family that never missed a day at church. For those of you who've paid really close attention to my ramblings, you'll remember that Bubs and I have been married for 11 years as of September. You may also remember that one of the main things that inspired me to elope was my sisters wedding that summer--also 11 years ago. You may also remember me saying that my oldest niece is 13 years old. For a good Christian family from Central Texas, that math ain't mathing.  

My oldest sister got pregnant while she was in college and the guy's parents despised her--and that's putting it mildly. There's a lot to unpack here (and thankfully I won't fully do it now) but it's such a Texas thing. It's old ranch money vs a small town Ag family. It's North Texas and the Dallas area thinking everyone else needs to look up to them and praise them--which thankfully my sister was never willing to do. It's the hypocrisy of place that screams family is incredibly important but putting huge pressure on a son/grandson to abandon his own child and the child's mom. Because what was truly important was they thought my sister was a gold digger--and they weren't going to tolerate that. It's a very long story about how my sister and brother in law got back together, but they are happy and my sister is quite literally the strongest and most intelligent woman I have ever met. 

But what that meant for me was that when I was living in sin with my boyfriend, getting myself arrested, hooking up with other girls and serving beer with my boobs and ass out, my parents had far bigger things to worry about. I still talked to my mom pretty much every day but the calls would be interrupted by my infant niece who my mom was babysitting while my sister was trying the best she could to make a life for herself with no help from the baby's dad. I could have probably started stripping and my parents would have been annoyed but wouldn't have had the energy to deal with it. When all of this started, my younger sister and little brother were 17 and 11 and they had a couple of years of very little supervision and they both went off the rails pretty hard--which meant my parents had their hand even more full to notice what was going on with me six hours away. It is interesting that the third time I was arrested was a direct result of my younger sister being able to disappear from the house for days at a time and my parents no really having the energy to note her absence (that arrest is one I'm still trying to figure out how to talk about because it was really scary and I'm lucky that I wasn't hurt or that I didn't really hurt someone else). 

Dang this is going on a really long time and Bubs is chewing on his own T-shirt because I guess the Dodgers aren't messing up as bad as they normally do. And apparently there was a perfect throw to the home plate to get a Yankee out--Bubs scream actually scared me and the dogs. So I'm not going to wrap this up as efficiently or as full circle as I would like but I should see what all the excitement is about with Bubs favorite boys in tight pants. But I hope this isn't just stream of consciousness rambling and I answered the question!