Again I say

There are not enough hours in the day. There are not enough days in the year. Gratitude is playing with my psyche today. I am grateful for my son, daughter-in-law(daughter), and 2 of the cutest grandkids in the world.

Today was a beautiful day in this part of planet Earth. I have gotten to swing on the front porch without suffering a melt down. I have read some good books. I'm making some pretty jewelry for the first time in a long time. Boy, it doesn't take much to make me happy.

Autumn is one of my favorite times of year. I always connect it with the start of school, though today's schools often start at the beginning of August. Anyway I was the dweeb of the world because I loved school. Of course the social opportunities (namely boys) were part of the program. I went back to my hometown the other day and was able to shop in the cutest shop with some wonderful decorative things. The shop is at 110 East Tennessee Ave. I lived in part of the shop when I was 8 years old. I even got to set foot in my old bedroom. Wow! Life surely does change. And when I was 8 was 53 years ago. I loved seeing the things that had been done with the building. I was with a friend I had met when I was 9. She is a treasure and I only recently was able to reconnect with her. It has been a treat. I am so much more able to appreciate things now. It is always better to go ahead and say so I think. Waiting for a perfect time to tell a person they are appreciated may result in a loss of opportunity.

I have been thinking about the old days, or at least as much as my memory will let me. The friday night football games for instance. I was in the band and of course I wanted to go on the boy search but the band members had to sit in the stands and play and set a good example. Of what I don't know. The smells and sounds and sights at a High School football game are the same all over. The popcorn, the coolness of the night, the fizz that goes up the nose from a really fresh coke. Yelling till hoarse, jumping for joy at a touchdown, and making plans for after the game were one of the most fun things about High School. Should you have a boyfriend, there is always the shared fun of being seen being doted on by the most wonderful guy in the world. But anyway, after the game I usually managed to find some friends to ride with to the local fun spot, the Wildcat Den. (Now a Senior Center) There was a band or DJ and we all had a great time dancing and pretending to be adults. Back then I didn't know that being an adult was not so much fun as I had thought. I loved dancing so much it surprises me that I have not danced since college except on a very few occasions. And I also didn't realize that a lot of guys don't particularly like to dance. Oh well!

I also loved the excitement of getting back to seeing friends that had been unavailable over the summer. There were always a few friends that lived close enough to see once in a while but the school year offered so much more to see and sometimes to gossip about. Yes, I did. It was"Did you see who so and so took to the Den Friday?" and "Oh, I just heard so and so is now wearing such-and such's ring. I didn't even know they were dating. Did you?" The latest of the things that happened over the summer took till about Thanksgiving to discuss, understand, predict the future of, and embrace or dismiss as false. I really don't know how anyone gets out of High School with the ego intact and the self esteem healthy. Or do they?

Fall is one time of year that has, therefore, seemed to be a beginning, not an ending as some would have it. Spring is the historic time of beginnings and Summer is the time for growth. Well, because I loved school so much and spent so much of Summer bored when I was young, I now associate Fall with a time of growth and Winter is the time to think over the things I have learned and how they fit me. Just think, 2 growth periods per year. Yippee!

Weathering the weather

People talk about the weather when they can't come up with a better topic of conversation. People complain about it when it isn't doing what they want it to. People get their juices flowing in the Spring when the warm days begin. People agonize over it if it is getting too destructive. It can be too hot, too cold, too windy, too humid, too dry, too rainy, too snowy, too sunny, too dark, and just too too. But on those days like I have seen in the last 2 weeks where I live, the weather has just been too beautiful for words!

To add to the day's joy

I miss having a schedule to keep. If you are reading my blogs, you can tell.

I am going to go to an art gallery tomorrow. I am always inspired by beautiful things, workmanship, color, artistry, etc. There are so many beautiful things in nature that I am also adding a trip to the woods to my list of things to do. A running brook usually has lovely colored rocks and silvery fish and ripples of color running right through it. There are always gorgeous colors in the bark of different trees, the leaves, the flowers on the roadside, and even on the strata of the rocks of the hillsides. The clouds and sky colors inspire a huge AHHHHHHH! My honey calls me a tree hugger and I guess I must be cause I have actually hugged a tree. I am impressed with the different shapes and sounds of the forest and with the calm that lives there. When my life is not calm enough, the woods are a comfort. So too is an art gallery to me. Therefore I must say there are two kinds of galleries, indoor ones and outdoor ones. Hurray for both.

Staying home

Staying home is sort of tough for a non-self-starter. I love it. But in order to get anything done I have to make myself focus. Without a child to follow around focus goes out the window. Now I must make a list. It's the only way.

Today I had the pleasure

Today I had the pleasure of talking to my daughter several times. Hurrah for cell phones. I can reach my kids at the drop of a hat. That is if they answer. I remember that it used to cost so much for a long distance call that I rarely made them. How much nicer it would have been to call MOM and say HI and not have to cram a month's worth of stuff into 10 minutes. I can now consult on the haircut my daughter will get and Mom just had to comment on pictures when I could afford to get them printed and mailed. What a wonderful change for families. Especially now when many families must move across the country for jobs or retirement or whatever, what a blessing it is to be able to just converse with loved ones. How wonderful!

Today is also a banner day. I didn't have to go to work. Darn I like that. I feel as if I have been let out of prison.

What's with the gas here? Where it is available, it is 50 cents per gallon more expensive than anywhere else in the Southeast. Think price gouging. Think go elsewhere for gas when I find out who started the trend.

The weather couldn't be better here. The days are balmy and the nights are cool. So super to walk outside and not have to take a shower when I come back in. Maybe that is partly responsible for the boost in energy I have felt also. Anything is more fun for me when I'm not sweating.

I would love to say something wise and deep today but --- oh well!

What's really important

My son. His car, that he has enjoyed and worked on and loved was damaged in a crash and what is important to me is not the car but the love he put into it and the fact that he is unhappy. Fortunately he was just banged up a bit. But I spoke with him and he sounds so darn sad. As a MOM I know that there are things I would really miss. And I know about cars that I missed when they went away. Old Rusty was the family car for so many years and boy did we put the memories into that ride. However, mourning for the car was my son't because he had known no other car but that one. It is truly important to have things to be interested in and the automobile certainly fills the bill for a lot of men. Then there are the Steelers. But that is another story.

Is anybody out there?

Just try staying home with only yourself for company for a few days and you can completely lose track of the world. Of course there is the TV. Now my world expands to cover the whole Gulf of Mexico, Most of Texas and wherever the new VP candidate is trying to sound intelligent. Whoopee! I am truly enlightened.

Of course there are other ways to see what is out there. There is always the discover channels, the green channels, the decorating channels, the cooking channels, and, of course, reruns of crime scene shows. So now I know that a lot of people are killers and they WILL get caught. Some stay home and cook and redecorate. Some are learning to save the planet and others want to know what is here to save.

Ok. There is a lot of room on the TV channels for really interesting and informative info. Like what a Gekko thinks about insurance, Glade candles are from France or at least lying to friends is OK. One poor guy on an insurance commercial is going to die when he gets home for forgetting to tell the missus about the boat, motorcycle and rv. It seems to be OK to throw stuff out of windows if you're mad, no matter what you hit. You can add two hours to your life by taking medicine. Some idiot is releasing baloons to celebrate birth control. And of course there are the paid ad shows which fix the body, the face, walking, cleaning and just about everything you want to cook.

So there are no reasons to go outside my house. The whole world is going to come to me through the power of the satellite. I feel so much better I just might stay home forever.

Just an example.

Last week I was fired from my job. I admit that I did rest my eyes sometimes when at work but I didn't sleep. After all, who could. I wouldn't let myself do it because I snore so loud. It would be too embarassing. Anyway, I no longer have to get up and go to work at a job I hate. Truly hate!
So what now? I grin a lot. Haven't needed nearly as much antidepressant. Maybe won't need any. I am looking forward to my days. I've been cleaning house and cooking and enjoying the things I never felt energy enough to do before. I am cleaning out the rooms of the house one at a time and amazingly enough the job doesn't seem as overwhelming as it did before.

I have learned a good lesson about life because of the loss of the job. I need money to pay bills. I don't have enough to stay home for good and retire right now. However there is something worth so much more and that is time. I have time to enjoy cooking, and cleaning, etc. I am 63. I would love to have 20 or 30 more good years to enjoy life. I wasn't enjoying even a moment of life while I was working at a job I hated. I was so miserable at the thought of working 3 more years until retirement that I was working myself up at the thought. But I thought I had no options. Ha! When the boss says you're fired, you start digging up options. Everyone has options all the time. We just can't always see them. Thank God for bosses who are idiots. His actions made it possible for me to see the options for happiness. I am just too easily lulled into status quo. The marriage ended and my life improved immediately. I learned nothing from it. So here I am again. The job ended and am I going to learn this time? You bet I am! Here's to the future!

Venom

Some days I just want to spew. I would love to have the power to change things I see that I don't agree with. For instance, if the person in the lane next to you on the interstate is going the same speed as you are, one of you is in the wrong lane. Move it.

If your boss is depending on some suck up for info on you, find out who it is. Stay away from them.

If anyone cares, Jessica Simpson has 2 poses. One on her back waiting to get laid and the other with her mouth wide open looking like an idiot catching flies.

Children who have tantrums have parents who need schooling in parenting.

I am getting old and I don't like it. There is no way to avoid it but I don't like that either. The death thing sucks.

If you are still looking for a reason for this life, look for something nice to do for someone else. You might find it.

Love everyone close to you. Love them totally and completely. Tell them. What have you got to lose?

Rain is a wonderful thing. Especially during a drought.

Events

The weather is a real trip. First there might be a rain event. Or a snow event. These should be renamed. First should be, OBOY it might rain here. Then SNOW. If the weather people are correct it will snow all around us and we won't see any. But the grocery will make a killing on milk, bread, coffee, beer and cigarettes. Oh, and salt.

And, now the weather people have started talking about our days, as in, there is a 40 % chance of rain on our Thursday. Does he think that if Thursday belonged to someone else we would have sun instead?

And of course, there is always repitition. I assume that a certain amount of time must be filled so we have to see the forecast at least 3 times. Each time is from further out in space. Yup, that is definitely where I am going to check the weather. Space!

There is always a way

When I was younger (much, much younger) I often felt like the whole world was against me. I couldn't seem to do anything right. I never seemed to know the proper thing to do. I saw myself as being locked into one behavior pattern that was acceptable.

I am older now (much, much older), and thank goodness I have learned from experience that there are always options. Now sometimes the options are not what I would prefer. And sometimes they won't yield the result I would like. Take, for instance, this cookie in my hand. There are several options. I can eat the cookie. And maybe gain weight. And maybe feel guilty. And maybe not feel guilty. There are other options. I can put the cookie away. And maybe want a cookie. And maybe feel virtuous. And maybe go get a glass of milk. I can leave the cookie on the counter and walk away and forget about it till later. Yeah, right. Well, it is no longer a matter to worry about because I just ate the cookie and I am even now convincing myself that I am not going to feel guilty. It was a good cookie.

Seriously, I think the worst emotional times for me are those times when I don't think I have choices. I am frustrated, feeling caught in a trap of my own making. Because, I am only making the choice not to look for other options, and causing my own problems to escalate. There are always options. No one can take them away from me without my consent. And I don't consent!

Trying to change a rock.

Why would anyone in their right mind try to change a rock into something different? It seems that the events occurring in the Middle East are the same events that have occurred almost constantly since there has been a Middle East. There have been wars, male-dominated religions, fanaticism, refugees, and general unrest. It is clear that the different nations in the area can't even agree among themselves or with each other about much of anything. So why are we over there trying to insert a new (relatively) idea into their arsenal of things to argue about.

In the United States, we profess to value human life. And we march to save babies. Why are we not marching to save soldiers' lives? For some reason, a life which has had time to form doesn't seem to be as valuable as that of a fetus. So we send some of our best to be cannon fodder for people who did not attack us and who really don't want us there. In our rush to force those in the Middle East to conform to our value systems, we sometimes resemble them and their value systems. So much for our credibility.

Green

My body needs green things in large quantities. I am at the store buying them.

Rain

There is a new day here. It is really raining. In this part of the country, that means a lot. I never really knew what to think about the weather except how to dress for the day. Now I am finding that I am more aware of the ozone layer, global warming, acid rain, rainforest depletion, land fills, greenhouse gasses, and rain. I cannot make any changes in the well-being of mother Earth. I can't make rain or tell it to stop. I can't make the day hotter or colder. I can't make it sunny or cloudy. But I can change the setting on the air conditioner, use real bags instead of plastic, drive as little as possible, plant a tree where possible, use recycled items, recycle, and look for ways to leave less of a footprint on the Earth.

I used to want to leave a lot of things for my children to remember me by. Now I want to leave as little as possible of those things and to have my children remember me by how hard I worked to make the world better.

I'm worried!

There are so many things that worry me now. But here is the biggest one.... No one has come up with a weight loss product that works with no side effects. As I listed to the many drug advertisements on television and and see the ads in magazines, I wonder why anyone would take the products advertised. I have seen side effects listed as if they were to be watched out for but how does one watch out for heart attacks, strokes, death? Did you know that there are drugs which cause worse things than smoking and drinking put together? And these things are supposed to help us feel better. Ok! I feel better today. Tomorrow I might die but today I am definitely better.

Also I am told that the only real way to feel better and look better and live longer is to work hard at it. But what fun is that? I want to have the body of Giselle, the face of Helen of Troy, the money of Donald and the intelligence of just about anyone with a brain. I want that now and I don't want to work at it.

Ok! Now that is out of the way, New Year's resolutions rear their ugly heads. Lose weight. Pay bills on time. Clean and redo the house. Update my wardrobe. Do facials and other beauty enhancing activities daily. Keep my chin up and don't give up. That is pretty much what this blog spot is going to be about. I want to open my mind to anyone who cares to look, especially my children and grandchildren. I want them to know that above all, I believe in keepin' on keepin'on.