The Junk Drawer

There is a neighborhood near where I live. I love this neighborhood. I’m not sure exactly what it is about it that attracts me so, but the attraction is undeniable. There is something homey and lovely about this neighborhood. It’s not exactly old, but also not exactly new. It’s a grid of sidewalks and broad streets lined by well-kept houses with beautiful yards. It is full of bird song, and, sometimes, I even see bunnies or deer, if I walk in the back parts of the neighborhood, where it connects with a city park. There is something that’s just so … “Norman Rockwell” about this neighborhood. The houses, for the most part, aren’t big or fancy. Some have been added onto over the years, expanding to settle in and fit on their lots. Some seem to have been unchanged since the day they were first built. It’s not the kind of neighborhood you would drive through to ooh and aah over the houses. It’s just a normal, everyday neighborhood where people go about the business of living their lives. They go to work. They come home. They tend to their yards. Maybe they drink coffee on the patio and watch their kids play. Realistically, I know there is nothing special about this neighborhood. Nothing at all.

And yet, this neighborhood never fails to give me happy feels. This particular little spot on the map calls to me on a soul-deep level. It’s not too much of one thing or another. It’s just a whole lot of “normal”, and I think this is a big part of why I love it so. I’ve always wanted to live in a neighborhood like this. I’ve always wanted to have a cute, not-too-large and not-too-small, house. I’ve always wanted to have a beautiful yard full of flowers and budding trees and birdsong and the buzzing of happy bees. In my imagination, there would be a porch in front and a patio in the back, both perfect for sitting quietly to enjoy a cup of tea and a book. Maybe, if I were lucky enough, even a nice spot for getting busy with my writing. My kitchen would be warm and welcoming and homey. My closets, table, and hallways would be uncluttered. My floors would be honey-colored pine, and they would always be clean. I would be organized and good about putting things away. In short, I would have all my shit together. And life would be the most perfect kind of beautiful normal I could make it.

I’ve never lived in a house like that. Or in a neighborhood like that. I grew up in the country, so we didn’t really have neighbors. I mean, neighbors existed, but we never saw them because everyone lived far from each other. We might as well have been all alone. There were no sidewalks. There were no manicured yards or perfect flower beds. Not that I regret the way I grew up. I don’t — at all. I had horses and cats and dogs. I was able to experience fresh air and nature and hard work, all of which are beautiful and wonderful things. At night, I could sit on our front porch and watch the stars come out while listening to the scurrying night sounds of life around me. I loved growing up this way, and a part of me wishes I could live in the country, even now.

But the other part of me, the realistic part, knows that I will never live in the country again. My husband is a city person. He needs activity and things around him. He doesn’t like being alone with his thoughts or with the quiet of nature. He gets bored easily. So, that part of me — the part that knows I am destined to be a city dweller for the rest of my life — has wished for a plain little house with a big yard and beautiful flower beds in a quiet, welcoming neighborhood. Instead, I have a townhouse. It’s in a teeny cul-de-sac neighborhood with six other houses. My house is too tall and full of stairs. The closets are too small, and my family tends to hoard things. Seriously, we never clean out our junk. My house is laid out in a way that is aesthetically pleasing, but it isn’t practical. It lacks storage space. The kitchen looks large and inviting, but, in reality, it is too small for more than one person to be in there at a time. It’s hard to find a place to put the Christmas tree. There isn’t enough space for an office and a guest room. My flowerbeds tend to be overgrown. I’ve found I’m not good at weeding them. They don’t seem to have enough dirt, so planting anything is difficult. All the front lawns have to look the same; it’s an HOA rule. Our backyard is smaller than a postage stamp, which means it is constantly muddy and torn up from our dogs.

But, really, the only thing wrong with my house is that it’s not what I wanted. It’s not the kind of home I ever imagined having. It’s not the kind of house I wanted. I was so excited when I moved here and we started looking for houses. My excitement lasted exactly five and a half minutes, because that was about how long it took for sticker shock to set in where property values were concerned. Even so, I was pregnant when we moved in, and I was ready to nest. I wanted a home I could put my heart and soul into, a place I could LOVE. But we had a long-term houseguest when we first moved in, and I quickly discovered my husband didn’t want to do anything new to the house. And I was too pregnant to do any of it myself. And then, I had a baby and a toddler and a little kid. So, life just kind of zoomed by me. I think I gave up. I gave up on the possibility of loving my house. Instead, this house, in my mind, is the compromise my husband and I made. We never planned to stay here. It was a “temporary thing”. We have now lived here for almost 15 years, partly because the economy unexpectedly tanked and partly because my husband hates change. And I am beginning to believe this is the only house I will ever have.

This is where that neighborhood I love so much becomes dangerous to me. Even as I enjoy my walk through there, taking in the smells of flowers and the sound of birdsong, I feel this aching longing inside of me. I am proverbially standing on the outside and looking in, just inches away from what my heart wants. But still impossibly cut-off from those hopes and dreams. It makes me sad, sometimes. And, sometimes, I can feel my depression creeping in on me.

And that’s when I have to remind myself about the junk drawer. As I walk these sidewalks and look at these houses, it’s so easy to think about how perfect and beautiful they look on the outside. When I see the swings and the toys in the yards, I think about happy children running and playing and screaming in delight. When I see the flowers blooming all over the neighborhood, I think about quiet cups of tea on a perfect patio. Each house looks kept and loved and beautiful on the outside. It’s easy to think that life on the inside must be perfect, too. It’s easy to fall into the trap of believing that all these people have everything figured out, that they have managed to do what I seem to have failed at in magnificent fashion. In contrast, my mind thinks about my own unmade bed, my overgrown backyard, my overstuffed closets sorely in need of a good clearing-out.

But, if I think about it, really hard, I bet every single one of those perfect-looking houses has a junk drawer. I bet they have at least one place where all the flotsam and jetsam of life ends up collecting. One place where they put all the things they can’t manage to toss or all the things that don’t seem to have a place. And, if there is a junk drawer, maybe there is also a cluttered table top. Maybe there are times when the people who live in that house can’t get along. Maybe they sometimes yell at each other, or they are late for dinner, or they forget to put gas in the car. Maybe their kids have problems in school. Or maybe they are sad over the death of a relative.

And then, I feel a little better about my own life. Because, maybe, my life looks perfect from the outside, too. I know my bed isn’t made. I know my kitchen table is cluttered. I know I have an overflowing junk drawer. But no one else knows this.

The point isn’t that I’m happy thinking about the potential unhappiness of strangers. I’m not. I actually hope the lives of all these unknown people are as perfect on the inside as they seem on the outside. The point is this: None of us has a perfect life. We all have to compromise, here and there. We all have to make the best of things. We all have to learn how to be happy with what we have. We all have to learn to count our blessings. But, in spite of not being perfect, life is beautiful. My life is beautiful. I have a husband I love. And he loves me back. I have a daughter who laughs with me and plays Pokemon Go with me. I have two dogs who love to snuggle with me. I laugh, every day. I love, every day. So, yeah, it’s not perfect — not on the inside, and not on the outside, either. But this life is mine.

And, once I learn how to cherish that idea, maybe I can start learning how to fall in love once again — with my beautifully imperfect life and with my unexpected house, too.

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A New Hair Day … Again

I got my hair done recently — maybe a week ago or a week and a half ago. My natural hair color is just about the same as my skin tone. I think I’ve talked about this before, probably more at length than anyone cared to hear. (Or … read …?) But, the short story is this: In my younger years, I was a natural white blonde. As I got older, it turned to more of a honey blonde. And then, in my early to mid-twenties, a strawberry blonde with golden highlights. My twenties were great for my hair. I look back at them as my best hair years, by far. Heading into my thirties, I already had a good deal of gray interspersed throughout my head ‘o’ hair. And the hair that wasn’t gray was starting to turn into a mousy sort of ash blonde. I have very fair skin, and my natural hair color doesn’t present enough of a contrast with my skin color. I’m not sure how to explain it, but I look like I’m all one color. The ashy blonde of my hair makes my skin look sallow and ashy, too. And, thus, I become rather invisible in my natural color, which caused me to turn to dye. I was a bottle redhead for a number of years.

I had my daughter in my mid-thirties, and pregnancy wasn’t kind to my body. Or to my hair. For several years after my daughter was born, I did nothing at all with my hair. I didn’t cut it. I didn’t style it. I didn’t color it. I barely even brushed it. I would like to say this was because I was too busy being a super mom and having all kinds of fun with my growing daughter. But that would be a lie. The truth is that I was depressed. I suffered from depression for many years before I finally sought counseling for it. I felt like my hair was thinning, but I didn’t know what to do about it. Frustration plus depression all added up to: “Screw it. I’m not going to care any more, because it takes too much damn energy.” It’s not a great place to live, but I floated there for a long time.

Eventually, things got better. That’s a really simplistic explanation, but I could write post after post about depression. And this isn’t about that. It’s about hair. I started caring once again. It didn’t happen overnight. But it happened. Once I started caring, I didn’t want to be invisible any more. So I went back to dying my hair. I started out quite normally, moving from a dark brown to the darkest, blackest of blue-black. And then … I took a deep breath and decided I would try “crazy” hair colors. I had always wanted blue hair, and my stylist was fun and supportive and completely willing to give it a try. She didn’t treat me like I was silly or ridiculous or insane.

There is no going back. It’s like I crossed some sort of no-man’s land that exists only in my mind. Or, maybe, like I finally found the truest, most honest form of my own existence. I’m not sure how to explain it, really. I’m an introvert. Like … Introvert, with a capital “I”. You would think I would hate having crazy hair, because people notice it. Some people love it, and they aren’t shy about telling you so. Some people hate it, and they aren’t shy about glaring at you in disapproval. But I love it. I freaking LOVE it. It’s like I wasn’t truly alive until I started going crazy with my hair color. It gives me joy and makes my spirit lighter. It makes me feel, really and truly, like ME.

My latest hair adventure is something I like to call “Grunge Mermaid”. I wasn’t expecting it to look exactly like this. My last hair color had a very ocean or mermaid look to it. It was two kinds of blue with a little bit of green thrown into the mix. Having been off of my beloved blues for a while, it felt refreshing to have my favorite color back on my head. This time, I thought it would be more of the same. That’s the thing I love about crazy hair adventures. You kind of know what you’re going to get, but not really. And, so often, the reality far exceeds any expectations.

My latest hair is bright blue. And peacock green. And red. And even a little bit white, where some of the bleached strands show through. It is bright and vibrant and kind of like “KAZAAM!” up in front. In back and on the sides, it is this unexpected mix of colors that look like the ocean and graffiti at the same time. It’s the best hair yet. I say this every time, and I think it’s true every time.

I’m already thinking about what I want to do in a few months, when this hair fades. Purples were good. Maybe it will be time to revisit them. Or, I could go pink once again. One thing is for sure: I hope I never have to go back to “normal”.

 

An Interesting Outing

I think I live a pretty boring life. I don’t mean this in a bad way or a negative way. I just mean it as the truth. I look at blogs where the owner/writer seems to have a constant stream of daily adventures to post. Ditto with Instagram accounts or Podcasts. (I don’t actually listen to any podcasts. I just read the descriptions of them and think about how interesting they sound. I know. I am strange …) And then, I think about my own life in comparison. For the most part, my life is a never-ending series of “same old, same old”. I don’t have daily adventures. I don’t even have weekly or monthly adventures. I am a creature of habit and routine. I suppose no one wants to admit to this, but I’m pretty much okay with it.

But, every so often, an interesting day or outing comes along and surprises me. Like today …

I had a nice walk this morning. This, in and of itself, isn’t interesting. I didn’t see anything unusual or bizarre in my wanderings around my little neighborhood. But I got to start my day off feeling rather accomplished. And then, I got to have breakfast with my sweet husband — an even bigger treat! I indulged in two glasses of iced cold brew coffee, which has had me buzzing all day. I love that giddy coffee buzz!

This afternoon, I headed out to my favorite restaurant for a late lunch. It’s Tuesday, which means my favorite dish is on the menu. I mentioned I’m a creature of habit, right? Um … yeah. My server had pink hair, which is wonderfully interesting. As you guys may know, I currently have blue hair with some red/pink and teal/green mixed in at the ends. It was fun to encounter a kindred spirit.

On the way home, I saw a man standing at a bus stop. He was holding up a phone and yelling, and there were three police officers surrounding him. The police officers weren’t doing anything. They didn’t seem aggressive or even overly perturbed. They were just standing there with their hands on their belts. Perhaps this, in and of itself, is aggressive? They do have guns on their belts, after all. But I don’t know. I was driving, and the scene went by quickly. I hope everything turned out okay for everyone involved.

A little ways up the road, I was in the left lane approaching a traffic circle. The left lane and the middle lane (the one immediately to my right) both go straight through. The farthest right lane curves around into the circle. My light was green, as was the light for the lane next to me. So I picked up speed in order to continue through the light. The truck in the lane next to me did the same. Just as we were approaching our intersection, an 18-wheeler started to run the red light from the circle. The cab of that truck darted out into our lanes of traffic, and we all had to slam on our brakes to avoid a collision. It was a near miss. You could hear the squeal of tires on pavement and smell the burning rubber. It was nerve-wracking for me, but, I’m sure, not as much as it was for the driver next to me. The truck cab was blocking his lane completely. It was fortunate he had good brakes on his vehicle.

I don’t mind admitting my heart was beating a little faster after that incident. But I continued on my way. I went through that intersection, then a couple more intersections. On the third or fourth one, a car suddenly stopped and put their emergency blinkers on in the lane to my right. A couple of cars started to swerve into my lane, right where I was, but they ended up going around into the right turn lane. Another lucky miss!

My normal route home takes me through a small and quiet neighborhood. Usually, the streets in there are deserted in the middle of the day to early afternoon. I don’t mind telling you I turned into that neighborhood breathing a sigh of relief after all of my unexpected adventures on the road. I was home free, I thought.

Not so! I stopped at the first stop sign. I saw no one coming, so I started on my way. Just as I turned the corner, another vehicle came out of nowhere. It raced around the corner in front of me, going so fast that its momentum carried it out into the middle of the street — right in the path of my car! Luckily, there was no one around, and I was able to swerve out of the way. But it was a close call.

I’m home now, safely ensconced in my comfortable office chair in front of my computer. I love to hear the click-clacking of my keyboard. It is soothing away the surprises and near-misses of the afternoon. I would like to say I refuse to go back out into the world, but I don’t have that luxury. In about ten minutes, I have to pick up my daughter from school. Surely, I have had my share of “interesting” for the day. Right?

The Grumps

I’ve got me a case of The Mean Grumps. I would say I just woke up in a bad mood, but I’ve been in a bad mood for the last several days. So I’m not sure I can write it off to something as simple as waking up with the grumps. I mean, I did wake up that way. But several days in a row? Ugh.

The most annoying thing about it is that I can’t put my finger on any exact cause. I think it’s a case of a lot of little things piling up to feel like big things. I feel unsettled and frustrated and annoyed. But not with any one thing. With everything.

It’s not really that things are going so wrong. It feels more like nothing is going right at all. My life seems to be flying away at the seams, leaving me to chase down thread after thread. It feels I will never be able to catch them all. I try to step back, take a deep breath, and remind myself that I don’t have to catch them all — not all at once. I can start with one thread. And then move on to another and another. And yet, when I think about doing that, I feel itchy and impatient all over. I don’t want to go thread by thread. I want it all different NOW. I want it all fixed NOW.

And yet, I know thread by thread is the only way to go. The problem is that the thought of it makes me so tired. I feel exhausted by it. There are so many tasks, both physical and emotional, facing me. And, honestly, I don’t want to do them. When I think about going step by step and putting in the work and hours and mental and physical effort needed … Ugh. It makes me want to curl up in a ball and let the world pass me by. It all feels like Too Much.

As I was lying in bed this morning, it hit me: The Grumps. I turned up my ceiling fan to make the room cooler and cuddled up under my blankets and thought about how I didn’t want to get up at all. Wouldn’t it be much better to stay there, in bed? Yes, it would be. And that’s exactly why I had to get up and start on my day. Even though I knew I would make little progress on all the things I needed to do. Even though I had me a case the The Mean Grumps.

They Say It’s Your Birthday

Today is the anniversary of the day of my birth, better known as my birthday. I sat down to write this post in order to reflect on my thoughts and feelings about the turning of another year in my life. But … I dunno. As soon as I started typing, I realized I don’t really know how I feel about today. Or about the year that has just passed.

I don’t feel bad about it. Not really. At the same time, I don’t feel fantastic about it, either. Like many things in my life right now, I feel kind of “meh” about the whole thing. It’s sweet to be remembered by my dearest friends and my beloved family. That part is always great. I love feeling loved. Dessert is good, too. I don’t let myself have dessert very often, but I splurged a little bit today. There was also my favorite dinner at my favorite restaurant. This was good.

But how do I feel about life? About my life? That is the tough question, isn’t it? I think that’s the question that has kept me up for the last two nights, tossing and turning while my family sleeps.

If I’m being honest with myself … And, really, I should be honest with myself at least once a year, right? So, if I’m being honest with myself, I have to admit I’m not where I would like to be in my life. There. I said it.

I am not where I would like to be with regard to my weight and weight loss. At this time last year, I felt pretty good about my weight. Well, that’s not true. At this time last year, I was stuck in the midst of trying to help my husband recover from his heart attack and surgery. So I have to go back a few months before this time last year — to November or December. At that time, I felt pretty good about my weight and weight loss goals. I had lost quite a bit of weight (almost 50 pounds!), and I felt optimistic about things. I wasn’t where I wanted to be, but, for the first time in a long time, I felt like I could at least see that goal and a clear path toward it.

And then, the heart attack happened. My life has been in a constant state of stress ever since then. We went from panic and stress and anxiety over the heart attack and surgery to panic and stress and anxiety over my husband’s work situation, as well as panic and stress and anxiety over my daughter’s school situation. I am ashamed to say this, but I gained back a lot of the weight I previously lost. Not quite all of it, but enough to make me feel as if I am starting over again, from Square One. It’s … frustrating. And disheartening.

It doesn’t help that I’m stuck in this darn boot. It hurts my back, and I can’t exercise. This contributes to my frustration. Even with the high pollen counts wreaking havoc on my allergies, I want to be outside walking for an hour a day. I am mentally ready to try and get back to normal, to the extent I can. I am mentally ready to throw myself back into exercise as a stress relief. But it seems my body and mind aren’t quite in synch at the moment.

And then, there is the other horrible sink-hole in my life: my writing. Or, should I say “lack thereof”? I am nowhere near my writing goals. I’m so far away from them that it sometimes feels as if I am going backward. I can’t see a light at the end of this tunnel. I can’t even see the tunnel.

My creativity is … stuck, for lack of a better word. Or, maybe that’s the perfect word. It’s what it feels like most of the time. I have all these ideas and thoughts and THINGS inside my head, wanting to get out. Begging and screaming to get out. But when I sit down to let them out, nothing happens. It’s uncomfortable and horrible and scary — a constipation of the creative part of my brain. The ideas are there, but they are mired down in a flood of anger and frustration and guilt. Plus, there’s all this emotional baggage from my childhood, and there are all these secrets. Secrets I’ve kept my entire life in order to protect others. But it seems like, the harder I have to hold on to these things, the less room I have in my head for creative stuff.

I’m sure the constant state of stress in my life isn’t helping. I keep waiting for things to settle down, but I am beginning to think this isn’t going to happen. My husband is mad at me over the writing thing. I am mad at me over the writing thing. It’s just not a good situation. I’m not sure how else to explain it.

And there you have it. The state of my union, or something like that. I feel like my life is topsy-turvy and constantly whirling out of control. I feel confused about this a lot of the time. I can’t figure out how or when this happened. It seems like, one day, I had everything figured out and under control. And then, the next day, it all went to heck. Maybe my husband’s heart attack was the downturn. Or maybe everything was a mess even before that, but I didn’t realize it. It’s funny how fragile life can be, how one thing can turn everything on its head.

Here’s what I know. I can’t control the things around me. I can’t control my daughter’s annoyingly inconsistent teachers. I can’t control the stress and worry around my husband’s job and our living situation. I can’t go back in time and make the heart attack never happen. But I can control myself. I can make a plan, and I can do my best to get my own mind back on track.

Hopefully, I will be out of the boot and into a brace this Thursday. If so, then it’s time to get moving again. I will have to be patient with it, but I am determined to work my way back to a good exercise routine. I am researching different strength-training exercises, and I plan to incorporate those into my routine, too. I know from experience that this won’t be easy. It is hard to stay motivated and in motion when sitting still is easier. Well, it’s physically easier. I need to remind myself that it’s not mentally easier.

And I’ve decided to start journaling again. I need a quiet space where I can let go of thoughts and feelings and secrets I’ve kept inside myself for far too long. When I started this blog, I intended to talk about them in here. I quickly realized that was not going to be possible. Maybe it will be one day, but it’s not possible for me right now. I’m too afraid of offending people I love. Not that any of them pay a bit of attention to my blog. But it would be just my luck they would stumble into one of the posts where I talked about my childhood and my feelings and emotions surrounding it. But I still need to let these things go. I need to release them into the ether so I can make room for newer, better things.

It’s time to make a move and see what the coming year will bring.

The Saga of My Ankle

I have my first broken bone. I am firmly ensconced in the latter part of my second twenties, and I have my first broken bone. When you’re a kid, you expect to break a bone here and there. The world expects this, too. It’s a badge of honor, in a way. When I was a kid, I kind of wanted to break something. I realize now how macabre this sounds. And how stupid. But I was a kid. I was the definition of stupid innocence, as we all are when we’re kids. I was a quiet kid, and I tended to be invisible most of the time. You know … out of sight, out of mind. There was a part of me that thought the attention would be kind of great. I wanted a cast everyone could sign. Maybe they would write messages on there or draw cute little pictures. It would almost seem like I had real friends. It would almost seem like I was a real person, just for a little while.

But let me tell you this: Having your first broken bone in your second twenties is not any of those things. It’s not expected. Or neat. Or cool. It is attention-grabbing, but, as an adult, you are pretty much past wanting this kind of attention. Or any attention, unless you are a reality TV star or internet celebrity. There’s something that feels slightly sad and a little bit pitiful about having one’s first broken bone in the twilight of one’s middle age. This is probably just me. I feel there is something poetic about having my first broken bone a scant two years before I’m eligible for AARP membership. And by poetic, I mean slightly terrifying, a little bit confusing, and, yes … also kinda funny.

Is there anything that can make us feel our own mortality faster than breaking something on our bodies? I’m not sure, because that’s how I’m feeling right now: old. And mortal. And old. And fragile. And mortal. And old. Did I mention mortal and old?

The other really bad thing about breaking a bone in one’s youngish “old age” is that people always want to hear your story. They see a cast or, in my case, a boot, and they want to know what happened. And how it happened. They want all the gritty details.

When you’re ten or twelve or some other “kid” sort of age, there is usually a good story. It is a story of adventure and excitement and good intentions gone bad. It is a story of trying new things, and, maybe, failing at it. But the point is in the trying. That’s hero territory. It is a story of epic proportions and, most importantly, fun.

I feel this is generally not the case once you pass a certain point in adulthood. Once you’ve passed a certain age, any broken bone story is going to be boring at best. Mostly, it’s going to be ridiculous. Maybe I’m just speaking for myself here. Because my broken bone story is just that. If you looked up “ridiculous” in the dictionary, I’m pretty certain my broken bone story is in there, somewhere. Looking ridiculous. But, of course, I’m going to tell it to you. I realize you are likely dreading it, but I’ve typed this much of an entry already. You have to know you’re not going to get away without having to hear it. Because it might be ridiculous. But it is my story.

And, like most of the slightly ridiculous incidents in my life, this one started with my dogs. Oh, how I love my dogs. They always make life a little more interesting, don’t you think? My life would be a lot more boring and a lot less muddy without these fuzzy goofballs.

My Springer Spaniel was the key player this time. He likes to charge the door when he’s excited. He has developed a particularly bad habit of trying to do this when we leave our house through the garage. I have worked with him on this. And I continue to work with him. We are making slow progress.  So, a few weeks ago, our neighborhood’s lawn care people were outside our house, on the front lawn. My boy, always excitable, was even more interested in getting outside to say hello to all these strangers. I was backing out of the house, telling him to stay, and I tripped over the step down from our house into our garage. And then, I tripped over our vacuum cleaner, too. Because we are silly humans, and we store our vacuum cleaner right next to the step into the garage. In retrospect, this is probably not a great idea. I came down, hard, with my right ankle twisted under me. All of my weight on one spindly, twisted ankle.

It all happened so fast. That’s the funny thing about it. In a moment or two, I managed to pull ligaments and put a hairline fracture into my ankle. I earned myself a few weeks in a lovely boot for my trouble. All of this, of course, after I walked around on it for a couple of weeks, trying to pretend everything was fine. I come from (fool)hardy people, what can I say?

But that’s it. The long, the short, and the painful truth of it all. I’m 48 years old. I tripped over a step and a vacuum. And I broke myself. I have to go now. I think I hear old age calling, and she wants to have a chat with me about my careless habits.

Hello, Spring!

Spring is officially here. I don’t know what date WordPress will put on this post, but I am sitting here typing it at 8:55 PM on March 21. Which means it is the second day of Spring. I generally don’t enjoy Spring. I am allergic to dust and trees and grasses and weeds and mold and all kinds of flowers and … Well, probably a lot more things than I can remember to list in here. Basically, I am allergic to every single thing Spring brings. Instead of being able to enjoy the warm breezes and the soft sun on my face, I am forced to double and triple up on my allergy medication and drive around with my car windows closed and the a/c blasting full force. On any normal year, I do not greet Spring with open arms or joy in my heart.

But this has not been a normal year. It has been a year of stress and disappointment and worry and more stress. Winter was supposed to bring us mounds and mounds of fluffy, beautiful snow, according to our seasonal forecasts. Instead, it brought us warmer than average days and rain. Lots and lots of rain. Which, in turn, meant all the things I am allergic to bloomed in the Winter, too. There was no relief for this hacking and sneezing allergy sufferer.

I don’t dislike rain, by the way. I am from a place where it doesn’t rain nearly enough, so rain holds a bit of a special place in my heart. There is something kind of magical and mysterious and fun about a gray and rainy day. But … we have had months of these types of days. If I’m being honest, I have to admit I am more than a little sick of rain. I am also sick of my muddy yard and the dog foot prints that are all over my floors.

So I was ready for Spring this year. The idea that it was quickly on its way, coupled with the unseasonably warm temperatures we have had for most of the winter, had me thinking of pastel colors, flowers, and buzzing bees. I was ready for the smell of fresh earth and green grass, even if I had to enjoy these things in extremely short bursts. And I thought it was beyond time for some bright colors in a world that seems to have gone all too gray.

Today, Spring looks like a fluffy white, slushy mess outside my window. I got so excited about Spring’s arrival that it seems I forgot about our annual March dumping of snow. And it arrived, right on schedule, today — just in time to celebrate Spring. It’s cold. It’s wet. Everything is frozen. In short, things are unexpectedly unpleasant.

 

But … school was canceled. And it will be canceled again for tomorrow. My sweet girl and husband were both home today, and we nested inside our house. We laughed and joked. My daughter and I played a video game together. We had home made tortilla soup. I watched the dogs playing in the snow. We were all warm. And safe. And together. In short, things were unexpectedly awesome. I can’t think of a better way to welcome Spring.

Christmas Is Over

I know what you’re thinking. You just read my post title and thought, “Well, duh! It’s been over for months, Crazy Lady.” Perhaps you also gave your computer screen the stinky fish-eye, just for a moment. It’s okay if you did. We all do it, from time to time. Only our pets know, but they won’t tell anyone. Probably. Well, I’m confident the dogs won’t, because of the whole loyalty thing. And I’m pretty sure the cats can be bribed into silence.

Remember how I posted, sometime in January, about keeping my Christmas tree up for the duration of that long and dreary month? I did exactly that. I kept the tree up for the whole month. I even turned it on every single day in January. I hate January. But that’s not the point.

It is now mid-March. And my Christmas tree is still standing proud in my living room. I still turn it on, too. I know this seems crazy, but it is more of a joke between my husband and me at this point. The tree has served its purpose. It celebrated a joyful Christmas with us. It got me through my January doldrums with its cheerful ornaments and colorful lights. In a month of gloom and doom and gray, rainy days, the Christmas tree gave me a glimmer of hope and happiness. If it was up to me, I think the tree would stay put all year long. I have a problem, guys. And yet, I don’t see it as a problem. Which probably makes it more of a problem than I realize. Or something like that.

But here’s the thing. All good things must come to an end. The Christmas tree is special. Putting it up each year is an occasion of joy and celebration. If it stayed up all year long, it would stop being a special thing. I know this in my head, even if I don’t know it in my heart. The truth is this: I’m not strong enough to put the tree away. Because I like it too much. And I want to continue liking it for always. But too much of a good thing is still too much.

Luckily for me, my sweet husband understands this in his head and his heart. He is sweet enough to humor me through January by leaving the tree up and lit. But today, he decided to draw his line in the sand, daring my insanity to step over it. He got the ornament boxes out of the garage. And he is downstairs right now, stripping ornaments and lights from the tree.

I, of course, am up here in my office like the coward I am. Christmas is over. But I don’t have to show it to the door. Thankfully, there are stronger people in my house for that task. Good-bye, Christmas Tree. For now. I shall eagerly await your arrival next year.

Hello, Monday

Mondays, in general, aren’t great days. I don’t know of anyone who looks forward to Monday. I’ve never met anyone who feels excited at the prospect of returning to the drudgery of work or school or whatever else the week may hold in store. The worst Monday of the year is the Monday after the start of Daylight Savings Time. That Monday right after you “spring forward” is a killer. I don’t have any hard scientific evidence to back this up. But I feel it in my heart. There are some things you just know, on a gut level. And this is one of them.

In general, I don’t hate on Mondays. I don’t love them. I don’t enjoy knowing I have to get back into a productive routine and get stuff done after a weekend of family time and relaxation. At the same time, I’ve never particularly dreaded them, either. I guess I didn’t feel one way or another about them. They were just there, like a flu shot or a trip to the doctor: a necessary evil, or something like that. Oddly enough, I’ve always harbored a big hate for Wednesday. I’m not sure why. Maybe it’s something about being in the middle. Today was almost enough to make me change my mind about Mondays. Because today was a banner day. And I don’t mean that in a good way. It pretty much sucked, all around.

I started off with the not-quite-put-together feeling that happens every year when we spring forward. It doesn’t matter what time I go to bed or how much sleep I get, it’s never going to be enough to overcome the uneasy feeling in my brain that tells me time has gone completely off the rails. I spent the whole day feeling tired, run-down, and generally annoyed with life. The Monday after Daylight Savings Time always makes me feel like I’m stuck in a world that has suddenly grown too small. Or maybe that I’m just out of whack. Or something. I don’t know how to explain it, other than to say nothing fits together the way it should.

My daughter has been fighting a sinus infection. I took her to the pediatrician last week, and they told us to use over the counter allergy meds to make it go away instead of prescribing antibiotics. I’m all for using as few antibiotics as possible. Unfortunately, it didn’t work in this instance. She woke up this morning feeling worse than ever, with even more sinus pain and pressure, a fever, and a sore throat. It seemed a visit to the pediatrician was in order. We managed to get an appointment for noon. I made the mistake of getting there early — silly me.

Long story short: We ended up waiting for over an hour. We were slightly early, but the doctor took us back over 40 minutes after our scheduled appointment. This is bad enough, but the waiting room turned into a horror show of annoyance and frustration. Our pediatrician’s office is divided into two waiting rooms: a sick side and a well side. We were on the sick side (of course). There were a lot of other kids on the sick side, too. After we had been waiting for a few minutes, this boy — probably around 10 or 11 years old — came jumping down the hallway from the well side, looking for the bathroom. The floor is mostly white tile, but there are red and blue tiles spaced evenly along it, and he was entertaining himself by jumping from colored square to colored square. He ran into the sick waiting room. He made all kinds of noise. He jumped from square to square in there. He banged all the toys. I think every parent in the sick waiting room breathed a sigh of relief when he and his sister finally got called back for their appointment.

Sadly, our relief was short-lived. Once their appointment was done, the entire family came into the sick waiting room, which was already full. I have no idea what they were waiting for, but the two kids continued to make noise and rattle and bang on toys and jump from square to square on the tile floor. Their parents busied themselves on their phones. I thought about telling them they were sitting in a room stuffed full of sick kids. But then I decided to keep it to myself. If anyone ever deserved to get sick … Well, I’m not proud of the thought. But there you go.

Finally, after our hour wait, we got to see the doctor. As expected, he said my daughter has a sinus infection, and he prescribed antibiotics. We went on our merry way, ate lunch, and then went to the drug store to get this medication. There was no prescription ready for my daughter. There was no prescription in the system for my daughter. I realized, with a sinking feeling of dread, that this meant I would have to call the doctor’s office to find out what had happened.

I hate calling the doctor’s office. The doctor’s office phone system is the third circle of hell. I am sure of this. Again, I have no scientific proof, but I feel it. I feel it right in my gut. It feels a lot like acid reflux, but it just keeps going and going and going. It is impossible to find a live person on the other end of the phone. You have to sit and listen to a recorded message that is, I swear, five minutes long. And then, you have to try and figure out which option will give you what you need. But here’s the thing: none of the options fit. Ever. And Heaven help you if you push the wrong option, because you can’t back out and try again. No. You have to start all over. I know this because I did it three times today. And I still never got a live person.

After the drugstore, where we weren’t able to get my daughter’s prescription, I decided to drop her off at our house while I ran a couple of errands. I had a coupon, and I had to go inside to get it. My dogs, of course, went absolutely nuts. After all, I had been gone for three hours by this time. Clearly, they thought I was never coming back. I grabbed my coupon and headed back out the door.

Unfortunately, Monday is also lawn day for our neighborhood. The lawn guys were out there, next to our house, with their leaf blowers and rakes and mulching things. My Springer has a habit of trying to dart out of the door before you can get it closed. The urge is particularly strong when there are strange people in our front yard. As I backed out of the house, all the while pushing the dog away from the door, I tripped. There is a step down into our garage from the house, and I managed to trip over this and come down with all of my weight on my bent/twisted ankle. It hurt like a … Well, something that hurts a lot.

But I’m a tough person. At least, this is what I tell myself. So I sucked it up, limped to the car, and decided I would run my errands, anyhow. I had a coupon! It needed to be used! And off I went. At this point, I still had no news regarding my daughter’s prescription. What else could go wrong?

Well, I’ll tell you. My ankle throbbed and ached the whole time. I went to two stores, and nearly got run over in the parking lot of each one because I couldn’t manage to hobble out of the way fast enough. The first store didn’t want to take my coupon, which led to an extended wait as the cashier tried to figure out how to key in the entire code. And I got all the way back home and into my driveway before I was able to call the pharmacy again about the stupid prescription that started this whole mess. It turned out the doctor actually “called in” the prescription by leaving a voice mail on the pharmacy phone, instead of sending it electronically. And, of course, no one had checked the message. I had to turn the car around and head out into the world once more, limping and cursing the whole way. But I managed to get the damn prescription. Finally. Victory!!

And so, here I am. Monday is over. It’s not official for another couple of hours, but I’m calling it done. My ankle hurts and has started to swell. Hauling one’s posterior up three flights of stairs on a throbbing ankle is no picnic. Neither is standing in the kitchen and cooking dinner. I learned both of these things the hard way this afternoon and evening. I still need to straighten my house before the cleaning ladies come tomorrow, but I really can’t handle any more trips up and down the stairs. I asked my family for help with it, but that hasn’t materialized. I have a sinus headache and have used up a box and a half of tissues, which tells me the allergy attack that started three weeks ago has probably morphed into a sinus infection for me, too. I’m just … done. I’m ready to climb into bed with a book for a couple of hours of quiet time.

Tomorrow is another day. For some reason, the thought of it makes me very afraid.

 

Rain Boots

Last weekend, I got new boots. These are my first rain boots. Ever. That’s right. I’m 48 years old, and I’ve never had rain boots before. I have waterproof hiking boots and waterproof walking shoes. I’ve trotted both of these out on walks through many a rainy day. But I’ve never had an actual, honest-to-goodness pair of rain boots. I never needed them growing up. I’m from S. Texas, and it doesn’t rain there very much or very often. Now, I live in Virginia. It rains a lot here. But, in the 15 years I’ve lived here, I still never bought a pair of rain boots. I guess it never occurred to me that I might need them.

Several months ago, when we were waiting for Winter to make its first chilly appearance, it seemed like all the almanacs and weather gurus were forecasting snow for us. Lots and lots of snow. I love snow, so I was pretty stoked about this possibility. Sadly, most of our lovely snow has come in the form of rain. Still precipitation, but not nearly as fluffy or pleasant. My yard is a mess. No, it’s beyond a mess. It’s a swamp, and the fact that I have two active dogs doesn’t help matters one bit.

I have a couple of pairs of rubber boots to use for yard work when necessary. These are not nice boots. They are yellow and cheap and coming apart at the seams. They are too big for me to wear with just my sock feet, but they are too small to wear with shoes inside of them. Every time I have to use them, my feet ache, both from the cold that seeps through the bottoms of the boots and because there is no support. Usually, this isn’t a big deal. We will get a little rainy weather, followed by enough sunny days to dry out the yard. Not this year. This year, there has been rain followed by rain and then some ice, which melts into water, and then a little more rain. It became obvious I needed better boots.

Enter my new rain boots! My husband found them on sale through REI’s website. This is the second pair we ordered. The first pair wasn’t comfortable or tall enough. But this pair fits like a glove. And look! They’re blue! Not just blue, but two colors of blue. What could be better? I mean, maybe if they also had flowers or something on them. I’m partial to daisies and roses, after all. That might be a good addition. Otherwise, I think they are pretty darn perfect.

The weekend my boots arrived, we had rain. (Of course!) And I wore my new boots out into the thick of it. Is there anything as magical, glorious, or just downright fun as a new pair of rain boots? I splished. I splashed. I jumped into puddles with joyful exuberance. I laughed. I can’t explain it, but there is something freaking amazing about jumping into a puddle. I felt like a kid again. Or, considering I never had a pair of rain boots before, maybe I felt like a kid for the first time.

I went home from my day out in the rain. I dried off my boots and put them away. And then, I told my husband the truth: These boots are much too nice and fun for my swampy, muddy yard. My husband laughed and shook his head. “I guess we’re back to square one, then. You need some boots to work in the  yard.”

Um. Yep. I guess that’s right.