Mama is Sad

She was my best friend for 6 1/2 years. We went through 2 pregnancies together. We learned to be moms together. We called each other often for no other reason than we were needing to chat -- to be ticked at our kids, to bounce weird kid behavior off another person, to complain about laundry, to share what we'd been thinking about.

Suddenly, around Christmastime, she began pulling away. I didn't see it at the time, maybe because I was so busy with holiday activities. First she pulled out of gymnastics, where our girls were studying together. She said her daughter was overwhelmed with activities and needed a free night. That seemed reasonable; I didn't think too much of it. But in January I began to realize that she wasn't calling. I called her the day of the inauguration and then decided to see how long it would be before she called me. Not trying to be petty, just wondering if my impression of distance was legit or if I was having a PMS-induced delusion.

Three weeks later, she called. That seemed like a long time from someone I had talked to 2-3 times a week for the last 6 years. Then, a week ago, we met up accidentally at Little Ninjas, where our sons are learning to break things. She didn't seem thrilled to see me. In fact, as we were getting ready to leave, she met someone she knew, started a conversation, and drifted out of the building. No introductions, no goodbye, just gone.

So, trying to be nonchalant, trying to shake off this confusing behavior, I called her later in the week. I kept it short, fearful of annoying. We talked about 1/2 an hour and things seemed okay. But still, no return phone calls. Then last night, when my husband took our son to Ninjas, she was there and completely blew him off. Smiled at him like he was an importunate stranger and sat alone, reading a magazine.

For 6.5 years she's been my go-to friend. The only one home, like me. The only one with kids exactly the same ages and genders as mine. The only one I could call just to vent when my momming wasn't working. The one I could be really honest with about my fears and frustrations with my kids. I have other friends, but none who seemed to fit so well as she did. It would not be understating things to say that she's been like a sister to me. And I have a sister I'm close to, so I know what I'm talking about.

I have racked my brain trying to think of how I might have offended or angered her and can't come up with anything. I've been myself, like I have been for the last 6.5 years. I know this shut down/shut out behavior is something of a pattern with her. I've seen her do this twice before, but both times to people she hadn't been friends with for very long. And I certainly never thought I'd be on the receiving end.

And now I'm in this very painful position of watching one of my most important, valuable friendships die for no reason that I can discern. I have walked around weeping for 24 hours, struggling to find some measure of peace, struggling to cope with my grief. I think, ultimately, I'm going to have to talk to her about this, if for no other reason than that I need to know what I've done to alientate her. I can't just stand idly by and watch our relationship sink into oblivion. Worse, I can't let it go as though we were never friends at all. Like it was just some casual thing of no importance. I can't just turn off my friendships like that, chuck my loyalty out the window and snap my fingers at the whole thing.

I'm too fragile to deal with it today, and she's leaving on vacation on friday, but I am going to pray about it and try to meet her for coffee in two weeks. I guess if I can't get her to meet me, I'll have my answer.

Hair Today, Goon Tomorrow

I am having a bad hair day. A real one, where my hair looks just awful, though I meant it to look much better. This is because I am in the frustrating process of growing out my bangs and I have reached the no-man's land of hair growth where I can't do a dang thing with it. It's too long to style and too short to blend. In a word, it's blech.

I've had bangs my entire life. The rest of my hair has gone from Little Dutch Boy to Mullet to Marcia Brady, but the bangs remain eternal. Until now. This is my first concerted effort at growing them out and they are now just at the base of my nose. My husband mentioned that he thought I should see what my face looked like without the lovely squared-off fringe that has defined it for so long, so I am gritting my teeth and pushing on, though I itch to just whack them off with the scissors.

Secretly I am afraid (and at least partially convinced) that I am one of those people who can't really wear bang-less hair. Even now, at this length, my part looks a little Alfalfa-esque and if I try to part more to the side I get a curtain of hair falling in my eyes about 5 minutes after I leave the bathroom, no matter how much hairspray I use. I can leave the lavvy with bulletproof hair and it still falls gently down in little stuck-together clumps. I am experiementing with clippies, but so far I look like Early Trailer Court. Yummy. I just need a cigarette and a houserobe to compete the effect.

I have made a deal with myself that I'll wait 'til they're down to my mouth before I do anything drastic. If they're still driving me loony by then, it's sayonara.

Brace Yourself

Today, I visited an orthodontist. An orthodontist. I haven't seen one since I was sixteen, so that's about....well, a long time ago. I experienced a mild sensation of recoil watching a few teenagers get their braces adjusted, but on the whole it was less intimidating than I remembered. And the actual orthodontist was vastly different from old Dr. S---, who perpetuated untold tortures on my poor mouth.

Dr. S--- was a Big Game Hunter and his waiting room was filled with the stuffed heads of his various trophies. He had obviously been on safari a time or two, and judging by the giant moose head on the wall, the Great White North wasn't unknown to him either. Everyone in his family drove a Mercedes and he sported a wristwatch made of little nuggets of gold. Doncha wonder how he paid for all that? Hmmmmmm.

Worst of all, in the middle of the treatment area, clearly in violation of some health code somewhere, was a big, wrought-iron cage with a scarlet macaw inside. An unhappy scarlet macaw. A macaw that felt the need to shriek its displeasure periodically in a way that made the orthodontic assistants jump. Since this often happened while they were tightening my braces, the macaw wasn't the only one who was unhappy.

Why today's visit didn't give me flashbacks of my last gruesome experience with braces, I'll never know, but Dr. M--- might have been the reason. She was nice; she spoke to me instead of around me, and she didn't charge me for a consultation, which I thought was jolly decent of her.

Unfortunately, she did use the "B" word, and that made me go all crawly inside. Yes, it would be short term, yes, it would be only a partial set, but braces are braces and I don't know if I can face them again.

Certainly there are worse things than mildly crooked teeth. Being trapped in a cage in an orthodontist's office springs to mind.

I guess this is where I decide how vain I really am.