After the anonymity of NYC, being in a place where everyone knows your name sounded appealing. But small-town friendliness only works if you're friendly. If you're mean and gossipy, it's not good. Even if you do your mean, gossipy thing while hiking up a jagged peak in the middle of nowhere. Because your middle of nowhere is the same nowhere that everyone who knows your name likes to hike. So you should keep your mouth shut when you hike. Idiot. I mean, what were you doing hiking anyway? You hate hiking!

I promised when I started blogging that I wouldn't spare myself from scrutiny and judgment. So I give you another tidbit from the Crabmommy vault of shame. This time, I was doing what nobody should ever do: I was gossiping about another mom, remarking on how overweight she had become since having her tot. Appalling, I know. But when I hike I get nasty, and when I get nasty I'm liable to insult even another mother. Especially another mother. Yes, I know! I'm AWFUL!

So I said she was fat. And then I said she had a pretty face and my husband said no she wasn't pretty and I said she was lovely pre-partum when she was thin and he disagreed. And then we looked up: directly at her brother making his way down the hill toward us.

I wanted to slip on a boulder and disappear forever into the lake to my left. But I held it together and we paused and chatted as though this were a happy surprise. And after he disappeared, we did a volume test: Crabhubby went up, I assumed our original position and repeated the nasty things I'd said. He shook his head as I gabbed. No, he couldn't hear.

We decided the wind direction had saved us. But we'll never be sure. Maybe the brother had heard. But, unlike some Crabtowners, he just knows when to keep his mouth shut.

Crabmommy bio

My proverbial glass is always empty. Not half empty, but like, almost totally empty. And the grass—always greener elsewhere! When I lived in New York, this was just fact. A child needs grass beneath her feet!  She needs nature! Now that we live in an exquisite western town amid nature's bounty, I can no longer complain. 

Wait, actually I can.

But a professional recently advised me to think positive thoughts. To learn to think of good things. Okay. Let's try it. Here goes. Thinking positive:

1. In Wyoming trash never smells because it's frozen 9 months of the year. And you can leave your ice cream in the car all day.
Too cold to drive to Smith's. I miss FreshDirect. Groceries right to your door in that nice truck. Oh heck, it's garbage day tomorrow. Got to get up at dawn's freezing crack. Can't leave trash on the street all night or BEARS WILL COME, they tell me. Uncivilized, crappy ice-hole.

2. Here, we have nature. Witness the beauty of the canyon, the aspen, the kestrel on wing!
Here, we have KIDS NAMED Nature, Canyon, Aspen, Kestrel!  I'm not lying. What's up with these rural-peeps, man? Seriously, NATURE?!

3. Goodbye gray skies of NYC winter. Every day is sunny here.
Yeah, but I have to drive Crabtot in the car. "Mom, the sun is biting me!!!" (Genetically predisposed to negativity, Crabtot claws at her eyes as if the sun is bleach... Stupid First Years sun-shade. Why's it so small? Sun gets in from the sides...Gotta write and complain.) 

Okay, I give up, 'cos my inner voice won't shut up. Unfortunately I can't blame that on where I live. Ruralmommy, urbanmommy, I always want to be the other mommy. So I remain the Crabmommy.

Crabmommy bio