So I'm still treading water, account is at like 60ish, but I'm too lazy to post a screenshot atm. Basically I just haven't put in the hours that I've needed to put myself in a better spot than I am now. With that said, I am prediction an awesome comeback this week, you heard it here first.

On an unrelated note today is Mother's Day and, for better or worse, I can attribute a lot of the person I am today to my dear old Mom. So with that said, I'd like to tell you a story about my Mom, and hopefully you'll learn a bit more about me.

So Imagine you're a young woman circa the mid-late 1970s. You've been raised in a very ethnic (Hungarian) Catholic family. You've got 4 full blood siblings and a plethora of "halfsies" and the like. Now you've just graduated high school and have had a life changing experience: you commit the rest of your life to Christianity. And at this time in your neighborhood, Christianity is the hot topic, you meet a lot of cool people and they are all on fire for the movement.

You end up dating a quirky fellow whom your mother is less than willing to give her whole approval for. You end up hitting it off and having a great time, and then after a while you realize this guy is for real, he pops you the big one and your first reaction is a sold NO! Then the (semi)unexpected happens; he breaks down in tears and begs you to stay with him, he insists that you are the only one for him and that he will pledge the rest of his life to make you happy. You don't know why, but you change your mind and agree to marry him. Maybe it's pity, maybe it's sympathy, maybe you do really want to spend the rest of your life with him at this moment in time, or maybe you just have no idea how to deal with this sudden crisis and saying yes is the quickest way to end it.

So you're married, and soon thereafter you're pregnant; the news hits you like a ton of bricks. You never expected to be so domesticated so early in your life, that is if you even thought you'd ever be the cookie cutter housewife.

And when you are much older, you look back and realize this was the turning point of your young life. Every desire of your freedom seeking soul is pushing you to bail now; have the child and then let your husband know that this thing, this life he wants, it's just not your thing and you hope that he can understand and move on with his life while you still have the rest of your youth ahead of you. OR you hunker down, change your life plans for the immediate foreseeable future and be a mom.

It's the toughest decision you've ever had to face but after a lot of thought, you decide that you'll have more time later in life, after the kids are grown, to pursue the rest of your dreams. And giving a kid a wonderful childhood with two parents is worth much more to him than your own selfish lifestyle desires are.

So you drop out of college, hubby goes off to work a blue collar 9 to 5, and you are gung-ho about the mom thing. You and junior are bonding and, surprisingly, having fun together sometimes. 8 years later and that quirky husband of yours has knocked you up for the 2nd time and you again are feeling the strains of motherhood. Your two boys end up being up being more than a handful, trying your patience and your sanity on a daily basis. Yet you keep your cool, and somehow along the way manage to find a night program where you can finish up your BA and then get your MA.

After a very grueling and painful senior year of high school (for you), your oldest boy goes off to the other side of the country for college and things become tougher and more strained at home as you realize more and more that your husband is just no the man who is supposed to be with you for the rest of your post-motherhood life. And just as your youngest son is approaching the end of his legal childhood, you emotionally crumble. You just can't do it anymore and you enter a painful divorce from your husband. It's tough on everybody at first, but after all of the initial wounds have healed you emerge a much healthier and renewed spirit. Thus begins the rest of your life.

Ok, so now time to switch gears I (frostbrn) am the oldest son in this story, and I, much like my mother, met a quirky girl during my senior year of high school, and we hit it off. And after a couple of similar situations of begging and pleading I decided to marry her.

Then a few years later she was pregnant and I tried to just ignore the situation in hopes that it would just magically go away. It didn't, and I very vividly remember driving home by myself from the hospital after my daughter's birth (Mom had to stay overnight), sobbing my eyes out the entire way. The funny thing was I had no idea why I was crying. Did I finally realize my happy go lucky lifestyle was over and just couldn't? Were they tears of joy for my newborn child? No, I had cried these same hard tears just a few years prior (that story some other time). These was weeping of the "this is not how my life is supposed to be happening" nature.

Months passed and we were in couples therapy at an impasse; this was not the life I wanted, but the one that my fiancee desperately did want. And sometime shorty after this I realized I had 2 options. I could bail. I would just let Kelly know know that this just was not going to work. It wasn't my thing, and I wasn't going about to sacrifice the next 20 years making it my thing. OR I could hunker down and do the dad thing. After much thought, I came to the same realization that my mom did: that my livelihood and youthful pursuits were just not worth as much as a solid two parent childhood was to that youn'un. So I firmly decided on the latter and committed the next 20 years of my life to being the best dad that I could for that baby.

Then about two years later my parents got divorced and it hit me like a sucker punch to the back of the head. I knew they fought and didn't get along sometimes, but had no idea that it was this serious. I eventually accepted it and moved on. Then a year later my fiancee and child went back to the home side of the country to visit with the extended fam. She ended up spending a pretty significant amount of time with my mom, and when she came home she told me all of the things that my mom told her that I had never imagined were a possibility. That my mom never wanted to be a mom, that my dad was never going to be the man she dreamed of being with, and that she was a now a new person; a phoenix rising out of the ashes of a previous life.

Then things really started to sink in. All of the pieces started coming together, and I did my best to fight back tears in front of Kelly. It felt much like I imagine the series finale of Lost will feel; a beautiful understanding of the big picture, and a supreme appreciation of all of the groundwork that had been laid in previous episodes.

I chuckled to myself a few times as I started to fully understand and respect the sacrifice she made just to give me the best childhood and upbringing she could. It was the same sacrifice that I was embarking on for the good of my daughter. I am becoming my mother.

And now I realize that she had me fooled good. I will put my childhood pound for pound against anyone else's with no fear. When I remember those days, I always feel like I was spoiled like no other to end up having it so good. But put aside all of those Christmases, all of the winters at Waite bowl. Forget about the cakes, quilts, and the signature "Barb" dinners. Don't even consider how awesome it was that my mom not only allowed me to get my ear pierced as a teenager, she pierced it for me!

No, whenever I reminisce about those treasured times, the one constant among everything is love. My parents loved each other, and loved Seth (my brother) and I like no other. That love was the cornerstone for every good thing that happened to me as a child, and nothing can ever erase that from my history.

So now the next time I see my mom I think we can have a good chuckle together about, well all of this I suppose.


Ok, end Mother's Day post, more poker content to follow either later today or tomorrow. Also I just picked up Lupe Fiasco's newest record, and it is hot.

Ugh! Today was an utter disaster. I took breaks, didn't tilt at all really just ran like complete garbage. It's kind of funny because whenever I start running THIS bad I take a minute and Imagine I am Artie Bucco talking to Stars support at the 1:00 mark of this clip , because that's just what it feels like for all you donkamenters who've been down this road before; non-stop ass rape. So I'm back to full time .02NL, and the only glimmer of hope I can grasp onto now is the fact that there's still a lot of time left in the month. Hopefully I'll have better news tomorrow.

Test post:

I'll be posting here with updates on a poker challenge I will be doing in May.