Road Trip, The Finale

So our road trip to Indiana, PA and Pittsburgh, PA went fairly smooth. Of course, we started off much later than anticipated. Dani had play practice for the Murder Mystery they do every year at her school. Then she still had to pack! That actually didn't take too long. It's now 5:30, I was hoping to leave 3:30-ish. But before we could really get on the road, we had to drive 20 miles to a dance apparel shop because she never got the leotard, etc. that she needed for her auditions! Fifty Dollars later, we're finally on the road. Luckily the shop wasn't too far from the PA turnpike. So off we go, to Altoona, PA,where the closet Marriott is to Indiana University of PA is located, approximately an hour from the school. (but hey! the room was free, so no complaints here!) A quick stop for a sandwich enroute and we finally get to the hotel at 10:30 pm (it was supposed to be a 3 hour drive.... how it became a 5 hour drive, I'll never know) We check in, grab a few snacks and drinks and settle in for the night.

Up bright and early on Thursday to check out and drive to the college. And it's raining... and cold and just icky outside. We get to the college and I really like it! Dani checks in. They have her listed as a theater major, not a musical theater major. So they fix that. All the Arts prospective students are there... music majors, voice, art, theater and musical theater. When it's all said and done, there are 4 theater/musical theater kids left. Her audition is set for after lunch (sure am glad we got there at 8:45 am!) Dani thinks she did well on her audition.

Indiana University of Pennsylvania

So it's back in the car at 2:30 for the drive to Pittsburgh. That drive is 2 hours. Dani's GPS is awesome! We get to the hotel, with hardly any problems, a few wrong turns but not a big deal. We settle in to our room and we don't need to be at Point Park University until Saturday morning at 9 am. At this hotel, we need to pay for parking (what a rip-off!) I wasn't budgeted for parking! So I need to keep $33 to store my car for 2 days. Wander around the neighborhood and find a little Chinese place and have dinner. There's no extra money for nice restaurants, cabs, shopping, etc. But that's ok. It's too damned cold to be wandering around Pittsburgh in the dark anyway! So we go back to the room and watch a few movies. Dani absolutely crashed by 8 pm and slept until she woke in the morning!

Point Park University Campus

Friday afternoon, we get the car, drive to the college and discover, it's only about 1/2 mile from the hotel! We also did a little driving around to see the Duquesne Incline, a trolley car of sorts that takes you up the mountain. We decide to do that, but the GPS took us to the TOP of the mountain and it seemed pointless to take the trolley down then back up when we can see the sights from up there for free, so that's what we do (Dani's idea, not mine). I'm sure the view in the summer is terrific!

The Duquesne Inclines

The concierge at the hotel gave us a cool place for pizza that delivers, so that's just what we did. Hawaiian pizza (yummy!) and buffalo fries (so-so) for dinner in our room.

Saturday morning, we're up bright and early, get ready and decide we should walk to the college and leave the car in the garage until afterwards. Now, I am a middle-aged, over-weight, out-of-shape mom and Dani is a skinny, long-legged teenager. That kid left me in the dust!! We get to the school, I try not to have a heart attack and she gets registered. Then we wait. There's a tour of the school.. well, the building we were in. This college is right in the heart of the city. I didn't like it and I found out later, neither did her dad when he brought her there for visitation last summer. It just didn't feel like a college at all. I found the students there to be snooty and many of the prospective students to be snooty as well. The kids all do their auditions and we have lunch and wait for the callback list to go up. While we're waiting, I look out the window and it's snowing! Now I love snow when I'm home and it's warm inside and I don't have to drive anywhere. I don't like snow when I'm 300+ miles from home and I have to drive through it to get home! Over mountains!!! So, finally the list goes up and Dani finds out she's not on the list. We get our stuff together and start walking back to the hotel to get our car. I see that Dani is crying. Not the loud tantrum crying I'm expecting but quiet tears. She says, "That's it. I'm out of it." I'm secretly relieved because the school is $35,000+ a year, and IUP is $13,000+ a year. She'll also get a bachelor or arts degree from IUP and she'd have gotten a fine arts degrees at PPU, meaning she would have graduated knowing how to sing, act and dance and nothing else.

So, now we wait to hear from IUP to see if she was accepted into their theatre program. The good news is she's already been accepted academically and she wants to double major in Theatre and Education with a concentration in Literature. So if she doesn't get into the theatre program she can still go as an English major and audition for the shows anyway.

Ok, back in the car, we start for home. Dani turns on the GPS and because the buildings are so high, it can't find us at first. I'm driving aimlessly around Pittsburgh trying to get a signal. We finally get one but it's being retarded and telling us to turn on streets that aren't there. The snow is coming down and it's so cold (25 degrees), it's freezing on the roadways and driving is becoming treacherous. That damned GPS had us driving up these little steep one way streets going from one end of town to the other. FINALLY, it finds I-376 and traffic is bumper to bumper and we're crawling. But that was good because I did the sliding thing when we were in town and it scared the crap out of me! Traffic opens up when we pass an accident on the other side of the highway! That crawling was all gaper delay!

Eventually we get back on the turnpike, heading east. Speed limit is 65 MPH but I don't think I drove any faster than 55 or maybe 60. It seems like the Allegheny Mountains take up half of Pennsylvania! I drove not more than 40 MPH for most of the way home. It took 7 hours when it should have taken 5 or 5.5 hours. We left Pittsburgh around 2 pm and arrived in Pottstown at approximately 9 pm. And when I got to town, I did the sliding thing again! Sometimes those wet roads aren't just wet, they're frozen! Thankfully, I didn't hit anything (except a curb in Pittsburgh).

So that was my big adventure this past weekend in western Pennsylvania! Hope I didn't bore anyone too much!

Road Trip.. with a teenager.. a GIRL teenager!

After work on Wednesday, my nearly 18 year old daughter, Dani and I will be heading to western PA. Last summer, Dani and her Dad did the trip to check out colleges. She's been accepted at the 2 universities she applied to. This trip is for her to audition for their Theatre Programs. She wants to major in Musical Theatre. This kid doesn't seem nervous at all! She's very different from her older sister who also majored in theatre. I knew everything that Gina needed and/or wanted for her auditions. I knew the songs, I knew the monologues, I knew what dance clothes she needed to bring. Gina's theatre teacher at the high school wrote letters of recommendation, helped her choose the perfect monologue that would showcase her talents, gave her lots of input about the colleges she was choosing and things of that nature.

Dani, on the other hand, is VERY independent! Her theatre teacher (the same teacher Gina had) didn't even know she had applied to colleges, never mind had gotten accepted to them! Dani never asked her advice, never asked for letters of recommendation, nada!

So, on Wednesday, we leave for Altoona, PA because the closest Marriott Hotel to Indiana, PA is in Altoona. Dani had a 9 am appointment in Indiana University of PA for her audition, and the hotel is an hour and a half away (hey it's free! the ex is giving me Marriott Reward Points!). These auditions usually take several hours because she needs to sing, dance and act, along with lots of other seniors hoping to go to this school. Actually, IUP is Dani's second choice of schools.

When the auditions are all finished, we leave IUP and head west again for Pittsburgh, PA because Point Park University is in Pittsburgh. Dani's audition at PPU isn't until Saturday, so we have Friday free to explore the city. This is Dani's first choice of schools. I'm not sure of the time for the PPU auditions but I'm guessing 9 am. At least we'll be near the school this time and won't have to get up at 6 am to get on the road! Once auditions are done, we have to head straight back to the Philly area where we live, a fun-filled 6 hour drive! I just hope we don't hit any snow! I HATE driving in snow!

On Sunday afternoon, Dani is going off on a religious retreat called Kairos. Of all 3 of my kids, I think she needs this the most. After an intense 4 days they come home, full of love and God, but in time, it does wear off and the old teen emerges again. I was trying to find some clear info about it because I'm not good at explaining it. My daughter, Gina (My Inner Monoblog) might chime in here since she went to Kairos when she was a senior and it made a big impact on her life. I know it was started by Jesuit priests.

So, in the long run, I'll have TWO Drama Queens with degrees to prove it! Well, they are both very talented young women, if I do say so myself!

UPDATE: My good friend, Kathy recorded 2 songs for Dani to use in her auditions this weekend. And she was kind enough to lend Dani her cassette recorded so she can practice... all the friggin' way to Pittsburgh! So I get to hear Shy from Once Upon A Mattress and Someone Else's Story from Chess. My car has one of those regular outlets, so Dani can sing these 2 songs over and over and over so she has them down pat by the time we reach Indiana, PA and Pittsburgh, PA. I'm SURE I can find a way to repay Kathy for her generosity!

Update on The Stepmother

Well, there isn't much to tell. Dani behaved herself. But that's not to say that Pam and Greg are off the hook.... not by a long shot! There will come a day, when they least expect it... right when they think she's finally coming around that she will blast them. I've seen it happen. She's done it to John and me on numerous occasions.

Dani basically said she (the stepmother) didn't talk much at all the entire day (they had lunch, saw a bad play, had dinner before dropping Dani off at her car). Greg left them alone for a few minutes and they didn't exchange one single word. The only time she spoke directly to Dani was when they took her shopping for shoes (he ALWAYS takes her shopping) and Pam said, "Oh! they're pretty!" Brilliant converationalist. I can see why he married her.

I, for one, have not met her yet and barely know what she looks like. If I had my way, I'd meet her at Greg's funeral and I just might spit on her then. But they say only the good die young, so I expect Greg to live for a long long time. I will have to meet her and be charming when my older daughter gets married (I swear, Gina! I'll be good!) But that is somewhere down the road.

OH! And after all this rigamarole (another of my mother's words) the stepmother didn't show up for Thanksgiving dinner! The whole point of this meeting was so poor Pammy could go to the family functions as well as Dani. But I got the info from the older daughter that she (stepmother) already made plans to go to her mother's for Thanksgiving. Now... what do you suppose her family thinks that, for the past 4 years, her boyfriend/husband hasn't been with her for Thanksgiving and Christmas because he has to be with his kids, including the one who refuses to meet the stepmother and she's not invited to go??? Does she tell Mommy Dearest that she can't go with her in-laws because her youngest stepdaughter is mad she was fucking the daddy while he was still married??? Oh I'd bet good money she says it's all my fault. I had more here but deleted it.

Good therapy though, writing it all down and getting it out.

Maybe I'll Just Sell Tickets

This weekend, my ex-husband is making my youngest daughter meet her stepmother. I wish I could be a fly on the wall for this meeting, because it could go several ways. She could 1) sit in sulky silence at the restaurant of choice, making it VERY uncomfortable for the adults at the table, 2) walk in, punch stepmom square in the mouth (which she has threatened to do) and walk out or 3) be mature and tolerate the event. I doubt very much #3 will happen, but my kid has been known to surprise me.

The reason this all occurring is because 4 years ago, I caught my husband cheating on me with a woman from his office (some of this is mentioned briefly in my first blog entry). After months of begging, pleading, etc. and basically me completely humiliating myself in the hopes of saving my marriage, he chose HER. I didn't handle this well at all. I told my kids I didn't want them EVER to accept her (and I secretly still wish they'd never accept her). Granted, I was loaded at the time (I don't do that any more either)

Fast-forward a year or so. I'm getting used to the idea of not being married any more and that he's with her now. I talked to each of my 3 kids separately and tell them that if they want to meet Pam and even (said through gritted teeth) want to have a relationship with her, I wouldn't be mad at them. Gina and Tim, my 2 older ones were cool with that, but Dani, my youngest, who was 16 at that time was NOT!!! She was the one who had to be here when I was at my lowest and she saw me go through the hell I went through. The other 2 were away at school or living on their own, so they weren't around as much. Dani said, "Wait a minute! I had to sit here, night after night, for how long, watching you crying all the time and now you want me to be FRIENDS with her? All I want to do is punch her in the mouth!"

Fast-forward another year or so, and my ex tells me and the kids that he's getting married... in Las Vegas.... and he wants the kids to be there. He doesn't invite Dani because he knows she won't go. In the end, the kids don't go (Tim had finals and Gina couldn't decide in the short time he gave her) Gina, did, however, want to meet this person who was marrying her father. She talks Tim into going with her and they meet at a restaurant. Apparently this was kept quiet from Dani who FLIPPED OUT when she found out they were doing this! Now, remember.... 3 years have passed and my kids have not met this woman yet! The wedding took place in May 2007.
Some funny stuff (in my mind anyway) that has happened since then.... first time the ex comes to the house to see the kids, he's not wearing his wedding ring. Next time I see him, at Dani's dance recital the next month, he keeps his left hand in his pocket the entire time he's in my company (I guess he thought I'd freak out if I saw the ring... WRONG!!!) I am quite happy without him at this point and had been for quite a while. A wedding ring on his hand is NOT going to send me over the edge! LMAO!

Fast-forward yet another year or so and Dani still has not met her stepmother. My kids see their Dad every Thanksgiving and Christmas at one of his siblings homes, like they did for the past oh, 30 years. And because Dani wants nothing to do with Pam, she (Pam that is) is not in attendance at these family get togethers. For the past 4 years, he has had to choose which one goes to family functions... his child or his fiance/wife.

Now, you have to understand, Dani is very headstrong. If she wanted to meet this woman, my wishes would not keep her from doing this. This is all her decision.

So the ex and I actually sat down with her a couple of months ago and told her she needs to get over this and meet Pam. Because it isn't fair to poor Pammy that she doesn't get to go to family functions. A few weeks ago, I get a phone call from the ex, telling me he told Dani he wants her to meet Pam this Saturday (Dani has had 4 weeks to prepare for this... I KNOW she's completely ignoring it, probably hoping it will go away). And he wants my support. LOL!!!! I said You got it! I always gave Dani the option if she wanted to go to a family function if Pam was there or not go. Greg (the ex) doesn't want me to do that any more because it's giving her permission to not go. The reason I'm supporting him in this effort is I've been with someone for a little more than 2 years now and Dani HATES him and is quite verbal in her hatred. (another time I'll tell you the John story). So my reasoning is, why should John and I get all the abuse from her when Pam is part of the reason why I'm no longer married? (for the record, Dani has dished out some mean abuse to her father too). I really do think it's time Pam take some of this off my shoulders and see what it's like to have Dani in her life.

So, maybe I'll sell tickets to the event and make some money on it!