(Pantry reorganized…someone needs a real job.)
Monthly Archives: January 2010
Bye bye Christmas
We packed up Christmas in our handy dandy new red and green tubs. No more digging through dusty boxes in the basement looking for stuff. All the tubs are labeled. I don’t believe I’ve ever been this organized!
But with the last tub put away I felt a slight twinge. A bit of sadness that happens every time I take Christmas down. I already miss the lights and festivities, the cards from family and friends, the visits, the music. I know, I know. It’s only been a couple weeks. But still.
Here are some last glimpses of Christmas past:
Pretty lights…
multi generational guests…
brilliant flowers…
and the fixings for fattening food!
Sigh. Just going to have to wait till next year I guess.
Settling down
I met a woman once, not so long ago, who was expressing her unsettled feelings. I only met her a couple of times, but each time she was rapidly and intensely expressive about how she wished she had made different decisions, always anxious about whether or not something else might have been better. She described how she moved from job to job thinking the next thing would be the best, how she moved her family into a big house thinking that would be the best, her children into a private school wanting the best for them. How she had to take a different, higher paying job to pay for the all the decisions she had made and now how tired she was, stressed out and not at all sure that anything was best after all. That in reality her family had been the most happy in their small cozy home, kids in public school, she at a job she liked.
She reminds me of me. Internally, though I rarely express it aloud, I too wonder if living in a different place would be better, a different (or any right now!) job would make me happier, if living alone would be better for me than living with someone else. And yet I know from experience that when the work world was busy I wished it would slow down, and when it slowed down I worried that the work would never come back. I remember when I lived alone and wished there was someone else there. Why is it such a difficult thing to appreciate what we have right now while we have it? Why can’t we just be happy with what we have? Why must we wonder what it would be like if...
Yesterday I purchased a teapot. You’d be right to wonder what that has to do with being satisfied with life as it is. It’s just that I’ve wanted a teapot for a long time. A really long time. And last night while my husband and I were out shopping for other things we wandered by the teapots and actually stopped and picked one out. So now I have a little spot of color in my kitchen, and I’m sitting with a hot cup of tea watching the birds outside my window while fragrant meatloaf is baking in the oven.
I think for the moment I’ll learn from the lady with her frantically scattered fearful thoughts and just sit here enjoying what I have. I have beautiful birds outside, finches and chickadees and nuthatches, cardinals and a big woodpecker, titmice and sparrows. I have Katie asleep nearby and a husband off in the den. Dinner is in the oven. The sun is sort of shining. I don’t have to be anywhere tomorrow. And I’m reading a great book; “Night Gardening” by E. L. Swann.
I think I am content.
Snow play
Late in the afternoon yesterday Katie and I went outside to play Frisbee in the snow. Man what a fun time that was! Here’s what the back yard looked like before we started to play:
She can hardly wait to get going. Can you see her little pink tongue sticking out in anticipation?
And then she was off! Running and catching and bringing it right back so I could throw it for her again!
Sometimes she’d pick up the Frisbee and dump a whole load of fluffy snow into her face. Didn’t slow her down though!
We had the best time! Even when a noise distracted her she mostly stayed close and always came right back when I put on my school voice and demanded her to do a recall. Even after she realized I hadn’t brought any treats with me. I think next time I’ll take treats out and let her know I have them just to be sure since we don’t have a fenced back yard and I’m always a bit nervous. Anyway, this is what the yard looked like after we finished playing.
She and I had a really good time. Now she’s dozing in my reading chair, letting the Christmas tree lights mesmerize her as she daydreams about flying through the air and making that perfect catch.
Silly but very special girl.
Mall walking and blood letting
I’ve been going out to the mall every day in an attempt to increase my exercise level. You know…from zero to anything. The mall is about 4 exits down the freeway from me but it’s worth the drive; it’s in the shape of a long oblong track, with stores on both sides and it’s just over a mile around! How perfect is that! It’s indoors, well lit, warm and there are lots of other people there in the mornings doing their walking. There’s lots of stuff to look at, and if you turn around every other lap you get to see all the store windows! I leave my wallet hidden in the car so I know I can’t spend anything.
One of the funniest things I’ve seen on my walks so far is a young man, walking ahead of me with his slightly heavier young friend. The T shirt hanging large on his slight frame was filthy dirty. His baggy dirty jeans hung low across his hips, puddling over his untied huge and ratty sneakers. The baseball cap worn backwards over his longish greasy hair did nothing to improve the total image. His friend was dressed in an over sized jacket and sloppy jeans, dirty sweatshirt, and backwards baseball cap. They were both eying all the young hip looking girls who were out “shopping”. What was written on the back of the first guy’s T shirt? “Ralph Lauren.” Somehow I’m thinking Ralph would be aghast.
Yesterday I was scheduled to give blood. The Red Cross called and I made an appointment for their blood drive up in Flint. New Year’s Eve morning I headed up there, arrived about 15 minutes early. Turns out I wasn’t on the list of people with appointments, even though the Red Cross had called the day before and confirmed the appointment. So I had to wait in line with all the people that had walked in. Ticked me off, but whatever. Then during the pre-donation interview I was asked for my SS number. I rattled it off and was told by a frowning nurse that I was incorrect. “That’s not your Social.” she said. Well…I said…yes it was. Turns out someone had entered my information with one digit off. But that caused a long argument between me and her as I tried to convince her I knew what my number was. More time ticked by. Finally I get to donate blood. But the nurse can’t get the needle in the vein. The blood won’t flow. She tries for a long long long time! She gets it started, walks away, then it stops and she has to poke around some more. Another nurse comes to help. More poking around. Other donors come and go. I’m still on the table. “Hold your arm this way, or that way.” Nothing helped. This is very weird as I normally have no trouble donating. Eventually they decided that there was a clot somewhere in their needle and they gave up. I think I was on the table for about 45 minutes. I returned home with a big bruise in my arm and a sad feeling that after all that I didn’t really get to donate. But I tried, and I’ll try again next time, hoping that this was just an anomaly and not something that will happen again.
Meanwhile I’m looking for a yoga class and considering starting again to play with the local community band. I’ve decided I should use this unemployed time to do some fun things even if I have to drop them once I find a job.
Here’s to a great new year, productive and fun, for all of us!
Change Is Hard 