Introductions, or Why You Might Love My Blog

If the image of my befuddled self wearing a muppet-skin coat didn’t tip you off (yes, they actually sell those at Target), I’m not one who takes things too seriously any more.  I’m a middle-aged white girl, and I don’t care if someone calls me a middle-aged white girl.  (Hell, as long as you refrain from calling me a fat cow to my face, we’ll probably get along fine.)

I was born in a much less stringent time … namely, the 1970s.  I ate nutritionally-worthless white bread with real butter.  I drank out of the garden hose.  My birthday cakes had lard-icing roses and Care Bears on them, and when my mom took pictures of them, we had to wait for her to finish the film off, then wait another week for them to be developed to see if they turned out any good.  After-school hours were filled with playing Frogger on our one-joystick, one-button Atari controller.  I was over-the-moon excited when we got a VCR and a cable box.

I had a single mom who was a nurse, and thus, always tired … so much so that I’d feel guilty when I got sick.  I was ugly and bullied relentlessly.  One kid took my lunch desserts for an entire year (Kenny Stroot, I am vindictive enough to hope that you’re now diabetic).  I knew something was “off” when I was about 8 years old … but I didn’t start getting help for another 24 years, because no one thought kids or teens had depression back then.  

There have been a lot of road bumps we could talk about, that you’ve probably experienced, too … a job layoff, a hospital stay, dealing with depression, crises of faith, wanting to punch your husband in the throat … and absolutely the worst, losing my mother.  Any of these could annihilate the average person at any time.  I certainly came very close.  And while I admit to being average in many respects, Life By Laura keeps going — and even succeeding — because of all the bumps overcome.  And because I realize this world is absolutely ridiculous and we just need to take the sticks out of our asses and friggin enjoy it.

So, if you, like me —

1. Still think Pluto is a planet,
2. Occasionally discuss poop with your friends, because that’s real friendship, yo,
3. Get weary and slightly annoyed trying to remember all the letters in the most recent social movement, lest you not appear WOKE,
4. Realize and accept that adulthood is really just Googling how to do shit and wondering where your bruises came from,
5. Mourn the loss of your freakish hummingbird 21-year-old metabolism that allowed you to eat an entire stuffed crust pizza in one sitting; and are now wearing jeans sizes in the teens, but still realize that you’re pretty damn fabulous,
6. … then come and sit by me, my friend.  We have a whole lot to talk about.