The Mother Of All Eff-Ups.

Well, it's been four years since I last posted, and I'm thinking I'll change the name of this blog to M.J. Moore: Walking Disaster. I say that like I'm trying to be funny but my situation is actually anything but. I turned forty-five six days ago, and as you read this I'm putting supermarket bags full of crap onto the front porch of the unit that, until three days ago, I was renting.

Two days after my birthday, I sat in a courtroom and listened as a judge approved an order of possession for this place, due to months worth of unpaid rent. Our local emergency housing office found a place for my son and I at a boarding house, so we're not going to be sleeping in the street, which is a plus, kind of. My son is an introvert with Asperger Syndrome and depression so for him, being forced to share a bathroom with complete strangers is going to be like living Inside a sitcom from Hell. There's fifty votes for suckiest mother of the year.

An even bigger kick to the cahones for the poor kid is that we can't taske the dog with us, so he's going to have to say goodbye today to his best friend of ten years. I was lucky enough to have had my Facebook plea for someone to take care of Pepe answered by a friend of mine, who lives near a beach and has a yard where he can harrass seagulls all day, so I slept a little better last night knowing he was going to a loving home, but that's no consolation to a devastated young man.

There's five hundred votes.

I bet you'd like to know how I got us into this fucked-up mess, wouldn't you? Stop me if you've heard this: an idiot lets her mother buy a phone for her and her son, then proceeds to rack up thousands of dollars in bills, AFTER quitting the reasonably well paying job that was keeping a roof over her little family's heads with the expectation of walking into another job only to find that wasn't going to happen. Way to set an example for your newly adult son, Mel.

Five thousand votes.

Oh, I almost forgot! Another casualty of the train wreck that is the Mel Express is my mother. She lived through a situation like this with my father, the class A fuck-up whom everybody (including her) predicted I would turn out like, and is currently curled up in a ball on her couch awaiting delivery of the aforementioned crap on the pirch over which I have granted her custody for the next fuck knows how long. She also wins the bonus prize of a truck load of misplaced guilt for not being allowed to put us up for awhile (she lives in government housing, and everybody knows what happens when you fuck over the government).

My son has taken the biggest hit by far here, though, being forced to deal with the fallout of my shit on top of his own problems has left him wanting to do nothing but sleep, and just describing the sight of a six foot tall eighteen year old curled up under a quilt with his beanie wedged precariously on his skull doesn't begin to accurately paint what a soul-crushing picture that is.

Five million votes. It's a fucking landslide. Wave your poop-brown banners high, folks. Yay me.

Ball's-out Barbie.

If you're a loser like me who follows these things, you will no doubt be aware that there are more single women over thirty in the world than there are men.  According to one statistic, unattached Aussie women outnumber the guys nine to one.  Unfortunately, there isn't much we can do about that, without the aid of Chris Hemsworth, a time machine, state-of-the-art cloning technology and chloroform, but I think I do have a suggestion to help combat the depression that often occurs as a result of this discrepancy. 

Ladies, cast your minds back to your childhood, a time when nothing seemed impossible, thanks to one elegant, sophisticated, flaxen-haired woman. 

BARBIE. 

She has been a fashion designer, a doctor, a teacher, a veterinarian, a plastic surgeon (I kid you not, it was in 1973 - look it up), an army officer, an air force pilot, a marine, a policewoman, a fire fighter, a rock star, a scuba diver, the ambassador for world peace and even President of the United States, just to name a few.  What's more, she still managed to get married, and ride horses in her spare time, and those perfect, rock-hard bazooms always pointed dead ahead.  Barbie wasn't just a toy; she was an aspirational figure.  She was a beacon for shy, oppressed little girls everywhere who looked at their two pack a day, serapax-gobbling Mum's and thought: That won't be me.  I'm going to be just like Barbie.  Sweet, I grant you, but realistic?

Hell no!

Pure and untainted by the lure of monetary gain as I'm sure Barbie's employment counsellors at Mattel were, they clearly dropped the ball when it came to preparing her little disciples for the harsh realities they would later face.  Sadly, I was one of those disciples, and if I had the multi-tasking-maven herself here now, I would take her to task. 

Where is my dream house?  Where is my non-threatening, ever-present, perpetually-happy husband?  Just how many tiny Ford Pills do you have to chug every day to maintain that girlish figure?  If you truly want to enlighten and inspire your young fans, I suggest you give yourself a make-under.  Force down a plastic roast chicken or three, tell us the true nature of your relationship with Ken, seeing as there obviously can't be much going on after dark, given his little anatomical problem and love of fashion.  Show future generations of women the realities of post-war society and release a new line of likenesses.  Prozac Barbie; Over Twenty-Eights-Night Barbie; Blind Date Barbie (complete with pink bucket and mace); and Settle-For-Less Barbie are some that spring to mind.  Dreaming's fine, but little girls need to learn how to cope should they get past thirty and find themselves riding the bus alone as their friends rocket past in their hot pink convertibles with male model or muscular army lieutenant husbands arms draped over their shoulders. 

Barbie, Mattell, I urge you to address this appallingly neglected niche before it's too late, and another generation of women live out the rest of their lives in small rooms surrounded on all sides by baby pink satin padding.                          

Soul food

Thanks to the wonders of modern pharmacology, and finally finding a doctor who seems to give a rats arse, I am managing my depression, and the light at the end of the tunnel is getting brighter by the day.  These days, when I say that I like myself, I can honestly attest that I still mean it twenty-four hours later.  I know what I want from life, from myself and from the people around me, and that is immensely reassuring...except when it isn't.  I know I can't even consider resuming the search for 'The One,' (pardon my Meg Ryan moment there), until I'm at least eighty per cent healed, (I'm nothing if not a realist about it), but that doesn't stop me from wanting it.  This is going to sound uncharacteristically wistful coming from me, but I miss the comfort that sharing space with another human being can bring.  Despite my oft-discussed determination to live for myself first, I must admit that it would be really nice just to cook for someone again.  Relax; I'm not metamorphosizing into a fifties house-Frau, I just miss that gorgeous feeling that used to come over me whenever I did something nice for someone, just because I loved them.  That's not to say I don't feel some satisfaction whenever I do things for my son, but parental love is an altogether different animal and besides, it'd be nice to cook for someone who appreciates the effort that goes into a good hollandaise sauce, and doesn't turn his nose up at anything that isn't flat-packed and delivered.

Creating an appetising meal for someone, nourishing them body and soul, is as much an act of love as sharing your bed, your breath, or your blood.  Perhaps that's what I really miss; the notion that there is someone in the world whose existence I value to such a degree that the idea of sharing something of myself with them doesn't seem at all like a sacrifice.

And yes, it'd also be nice to have sex again while I still remember what goes where.     

        

Mel-ancholy.

I decided back in December that this year was going to be my year; I was going to look after myself and get my life together before I shared it with anyone else.  I joined a reading challenge, started a vlog, and actually went out on a Saturday night for the first time in ages, all in an effort to increase my confidence so that I could love myself and make it easier for someone to love me.  And it worked...temporarily.  Every time I finished a book, I'd feel like my mind had been opened a little bit more.  I signed off each vlog post exhilarated and exhausted, thrilled that people would finally hear me sing.  I woke up the morning after my night out, happily hung over.  But within an hour of achieving each of these triumphs, I was in my kitchen, staring out the window wondering what the hell I was doing in a world in which I had no purpose.  I'd stand before that window for hours as a de-motivation tape played on an endless reel in my head.  You're a terrible mother.  You've screwed up your life and everyone else's.  You've made a fool of yourself.  Why were you born?

That tape had been playing since my early teens, and the volume gradually increased until two Wednesdays ago, when a conversation with my mother brought it to an ear-splitting level and I could take no more.  The resultant torrent of blubbering gibberish may have taken a year off my poor mother's life, but it also motivated her into making an appointment to do what I had been putting off for half of mine; seeking help.  I went to my doctor on Friday afternoon and am now finally treating the source of most of my problems.  I'd liken this treatment to cleaning a cut knee and putting Bettadine on it, rather than just slapping on a band aid; it stings, even makes me a little nauseous, but I can already feel the wound starting to heal.  It'll be a while before it scabs over, and when it does I'll more than likely want to pick at it occasionally, but the important thing for now is dressing it before infection sets in, and I think I've done that.  Depression is a very personal topic, some might even consider it taboo, but the reason I wrote about it in this post was because it shouldn't be.  If you're feeling torn apart, tell someone and start repairing yourself, don't smile and deny the fissure exists.

You'd better not cry.

I adore Christmas.  Let me just put that out there right now.  You will not find another person in this world with a more chronic case of the holly-jollies than me.  From December the first to the twenty fourth, I live the life of a manic elf with a Benzadrine addiction.  I hop around the house, draping every surface and inanimate object in tinsel; I make enough shortbreads and truffles to put even the healthiest person into a diabetic coma; and I spend hours perusing store shelves to ensure that every gift I give represents the receiver's personality and taste to a tee.  In short, I'm a poor man's Martha Stewart.  But like late season hay fever, this condition doesn't last.  The place you are most likely to find me on Christmas night, once my son has gone to bed, is curled up on the couch eating my fourth helping of plumb pudding and wondering where it all went wrong.  I'm not unique; Christmas is statistically the time of year when depression and suicide rates are at their peak.  Don't worry, I plan to stick around and confound people with my self depricating ways for the next fifty years or so, but I do share the dubious honour of feeling about as wanted as cheap fruitcake once the last carol has been sung. 

What is it that triggers this horrible affliction?  In a word, anticipation.  Love is something we are told is the be all and end all of existence from when we're too young to know how to spell it.  The princesses in the fairy tales we were read back then always got their man.  Or rather, he got them; all the princess had to do was make a wish and wait to be rescued, (don't even get me started on why that incenses me so much).  Christmas is equally as well-hyped.  Kids are told that if they're good all year, they'll find exactly what their little hearts desire under the tree.  We realise of course that this is a complete crock once we reach adulthood, but it doesn't stop us from believing it until we rip off the expensive wrapping and find a ten dollar Chanel no 5 knock-off that smells like toilet deodoriser.  The truth is, if you build up an experience too much in your head, you will only be twice as gutted if it doesn't happen.  That isn't to say that it won't, and I'm not suggesting that you surrender all hope of finding someone who will cuddle up with you on the couch and feed you truffles, (am I alone in that fantasy?).  I am simply saying that just telling Santa what you want will not guarantee waking up to find your perfect guy under the tree, wearing nothing but a strategically placed festive ribbon.  Us grown-ups have to work for what we want.  Go out, socialise, make new friends.  If nothing else, you'll have other people to swap Surprise Santa/Kris Kringle gifts with, and that sure as hell beats post-holiday indigestion.