sueeeus

Be

“Be” was the defining word I chose for 2011. I didn’t do such a great job of living up to that word.  I think that now, in 2014, I am much better suited to fulfill the aspiration.

On a whim, I ducked out for a couple of hours after work yesterday to look for a daybook to use for the new year.  Nothing like last minute plans and resolutions for a brand new year.  I journal and I blog, but I haven’t been faithful to a daily log of much of anything.  Ever.  I may take my vitamins and supplements religiously for a few weeks at a time, or I may check my blood sugar faithfully for a few months at a time, and I may log my calories and nutrition for a few days at a time, but anything?  for a year?  It has yet to happen.

The open bookstore that I happened upon had a scant selection of journals and daybooks, but I found one that I think will work.  It’s an engagement calendar, really, and I’m going to give it a go.  Whilst there, I found this little heart trinket which reminded me of the defining word I’d chosen to herald the new year some time ago, and I thought, why not go for a do over.

If at first you don’t succeed, try, try again.

And so I shall.

To quote myself, “Maybe this is the year to focus on loving myself the way I want to be loved, or treating myself the way I want to be treated.”

Maybe I will find a way to… …just live, just be.

Be.

Hello 2014.  I am ready for you.

With open arms I greet you.

NOTE TO SELF

Should you ever decide to delete posts in future:

1. Reconsider, and change visibility to Private
2. If you decide against (1.), BACKUP your database
3. If you follow (2.) and need to recover and merge the deleted files, here are some helpful instructions that work a treat.
4. Or, if you’re not feeling particularly lazy, you might consider finding and installing an undelete widget of sorts.  I’m pretty sure there are options out there now.

SIGH

I barely blogged in 2012.  I was kind of busy.  Prior to the blogging hiatus, I deleted a bunch of posts.  Now that the hiatus is over, I sort of miss those posts.  Regardless of the chapter I’m in NOW, those posts comprise my history.  My last backup was from 31 Dec 2010.  Sad, because the major scrub took place at the end of 2011.  So I’m missing whatever posts I deleted from 2011.  Thankfully, I was able to restore whatever I deleted prior to 2011.

Lessons learned.

Onward.

I miss writing.

I’m back.

I hope.

capturing a new year

I’ve noticed some of my blogging friends have chosen a theme word to help focus the year.  Simplify.  Breathe.  Listen. Words like that.  What word would best encapsulate my aspirations for 2011?  I can think of many words that describe how I feel at this moment.

Drained.  Deflated.  Depleted.

Relieved.  Relieved to have my boys home, asleep in their beds, and to have a little alone time to regroup, try to figure out where I am, how I am, and let tears stream down my face as I try to sort these things out.

I’ve had a week off from work, but it doesn’t seem as though I’ve had a vacation, even though I did get two full nights of sleep in during that week, and even though I had two fine grown-up days that bathed the senses with visual, aural, and gastronomic goodness.

Maybe this is the year to focus on loving myself the way I want to be loved, or treating myself the way I want to be treated.  Or to put the golden rule into action and love others the way I want to be loved and treat others the way I want to be treated.  In general, I think I do these things (for others).  For me,  I can give myself time.  I can carve out more time with which to do things that edify me.  That I can do.  But what of intimacy?  Why is it that I have such a deep and persistent ache for physical touch, for embracing, for intimacy?  I don’t know how to assuage this ache alone, and I can’t make it an expectation for another.  So I’m stuck, like a spoiled and whining child who wants something she can’t have.  The difference being that that which I want to receive is also that which I want to give.  That said, I like to think that I don’t come across as spoiled and whiny.  I hope that I come across as loving, giving, and nurturing.

Stuck.  Stuck is not the word that I want to use to define my year.

Maybe I will find a way to overcome the ache, and just live, just be.

Be.  That can be my word.

Be.

I’ve moved servers again.  Blah.  So.  Some things don’t behave quite the same.  My pretty permalinks don’t work on the new server.  Apache vs IIS yada yada.  Or something.  My character encoding is finicky, but seems to be stable at the present setting.  Funny, it uses UTF-8, but sometimes wants to be told explicitly and sometimes wants NOT to be told.  This time it wants to be explicit.  Last server it didn’t.  Nice.  Nothing like consistency.

Comments are supposed to reach me : sueeeus at sueeeus dot com.

RSS feeds probably have to be updated.  I had a slightly different folder structure two servers ago, and I think my feed has been broken since then.  I’d reuse the old folder structure, but it doesn’t work properly, and I can’t be bothered to dig through my settings code or fiddle inside my database.  Well, I did actually do all of that, but only enough to get it up and running, and not enough to put it back to the previous structure.

Yep.  A whole lotta words about nothing much at all.  Mostly I’m just testing.

I do have things to write about…

…one of these days.

Okay. New server, compliments of new uber geek friends. No more crashes! I think I have it all sorted out. Blogging may resume.

Awesome.

I’m a happy camper.

Stupid stupid stupidy server that keeps choking, how am I supposed to blog with you being so fickle?

Gadget’s MO is to play his passive aggressive games and not give me the courtesy of any advance notice with regard to when he will take the boys. While it appears there may be a light at the end of this tunnel, since he’s expressed interest in synchronizing the visitation with his new woman’s visitation schedule such that all children can be together for the same weekend, there is no guarantee that he will follow through with any level of consistency.

Anyhow. He called at 8 a.m. Saturday morning and said he’d take the kids, and to meet him at 9 a.m. Nice. Does this give me time to make any sort of weekend plans?

I prefer to be able to make plans. I still sort of fall apart when the boys aren’t here. As much as I yearn for some down time or me time, I still haven’t learned how not to fall apart when they’re not here. A cloud of anguish descends — the grief that we aren’t a family, and I so, so, so want to be a family. Not with Gadget. That ship has sailed. It’s just grief that we aren’t a family, or rather, I’m not a family when my boys are gone. So I fall apart. Because, truly, that’s all I want. Family. Sigh. Therefore, knowing this is how things tend to go, I like to be able to book up my alone time so that I don’t have much time to fall under the spell of that cloud that so deftly and swiftly descends upon me.

Luckily, I’ve been able to schedule very short notice massage appointments each time I’ve come upon a free weekend. If nothing else, this indulgence does much to improve my overall well being. Man hands on me, this time for two full hours, working deep, deep, deep into the bound up muscles of my body. Wow, that almost sounds saucy. I could put a little more effort into that prose and come up with something racy! Massage doesn’t have to be man-hands. I’ve been trying different practitioners, but lately am pleased with this particular therapist. He’s got a little familiarity now with what I need, and because we went for two hours yesterday, he really made some progress and was able to loosen up the upper back and shoulders. I’ve been having chronic headaches, so this is a step in the right direction. And besides, I’ll take two hours of man hands on me any day, even if I have to pay for it!

So this free time can become very expensive. Shopping is one thing that gets me out of the house and that can be done on the spur of the moment. And what struck my fancy this weekend? I stumbled upon this iPod speaker contraption called an iHome, that claims to produce excellent sound. It’s kind of odd looking, and more expensive than the other options, but I figured, what the heck. I can return it if I don’t like it. Oh, I love Costco. Love. Costco is my crack. There, I said it.

Of course I can rationalize any mad spending. See, a speaker solution for the iPod allows me to listen to music without having to wear headphones and carry the iPod around. I seldom have pockets, so have to stuff the thing in my bra. And if I’m dancing around, well, it gets sweaty. Gross! Not to mention potentially limiting the lifespan of my iPod. Electronics and moisture don’t play well together. That’s just plain irresponsible, and we can’t have that!  And singing and dancing to music, reliving memories and experiences that the music evokes, is very therapeutic. Therefore it’s good for my soul. Good for my well being. And something that is good for my well being is worth spending mad money on. Yes? Yes!

I’m good. What can I say.

I tried to wrangle together a date or two within my minuscule window, but it’s just as well that I wasn’t successful. I could get myself into trouble if I acted on spontaneity like that! Instead, I stayed in, drank some wine, bombarded everyone’s FaceBook walls, and cyber flirted. So entertaining. This week I’ve had a sugar daddy offer, a few boy toy prospects, a heap of not-at-all-my-type-please-leave-me-alone pursuers, messages from a small handful of actually nice sounding men, including one or two I might agree to actually meet in person. Maybe. Or maybe not.

It’s fun, but wearying. I don’t really want to look around, troll about, or anything like that. I just want Mister Right-For-Me to show up in front of me, and I want to recognize him, say, “Hello there cutie pie, how are you, where have you been all my life?”, to which he says, “Looking for you, Sweetheart”, and that’s that. We live happily ever after. We don’t have to figure out if we’re ready to meet or even be with someone. We don’t have to figure out if we’re compatible. We don’t have to figure out if we’ll get along until we’re a hundred and one. We don’t have to wonder if the love and honor and respect and compassion and communication and understanding and interest and attraction and affection and everything or anything else will ever fade. We don’t have to wonder if the other will help raise our kids the way we want them to be raised. We don’t have to wonder if they’ll be true and honest. We don’t have to wonder if they’ll always have our back.  We don’t have to wonder if they’ll be responsible and trustworthy. We just jump into forever together.

I know. I’m bat crazy.

hello cutie pie, it's me, bat-girl

I don’t want that sugar daddy, though. That much I do know.

Oh, and that iHome thingy?  Sounds pretty darn good.  Whodathunkit?

It’s not just the end of a year, but the end of a decade.

A decade!

Many momentous happenings.

• The birth of a nephew, and with it, an epiphany that changed my life;  saved my life, even
• The death of a brother
• The birth, life, and death of a marriage; my marriage
• The realization of motherhood; the birth of my two sons
• First teeth, first words, first steps
• Travels in far off places — Italy!  France!  Australia!
• New friends in faraway places; friends in the blogosphere
• Professional growth
• A new car
• A home of my own
• The end of my parents’ marriage
• New love and marriage for my mother
• The beginning and end of a marriage for my brother
• A new nephew; the realized dream of motherhood for my sister
• Two other brothers married
• A new niece on the way; the realized dream of fatherhood for my brother

Much love, sorrow, and joy, these past ten years, but overall, much, much joy.

Adieu, 2009.

Adieu.

I’m starting to come to the realization that if only is no solution to anything at all.

The easiest trap I allow myself to fall into is the ‘if only I were thin’ trap.  If only I were thin, I would be happy.  If only I were thin, I would look good, and if I looked good, I’d feel good, because I wouldn’t have any reason not to like myself, so, I’d be happy. And besides that, if I were thin, others (say, significant others) would love me more.  Because nobody likes fat people.

I conveniently forget that there was a time when I was smokin’ hot (never thin, but I was a cutie), and even then, I still found fault with my looks and wished I could be thin.  I’ve always had something to hang ‘if only’ on.  If only I could get through school.  If only I had a reliable car.  If only I had my own house.  If only I were out of debt.  If only I had somebody who loved me.  If only I had kids.

If only.

It’s nothing but a trap.  An excuse.  A crook that distracts me from the beauty of this moment that I will never get back.  Robbing me of my very life.  Tricking me, disarming me, incapacitating me, making me not like myself, making me think I’m not worth liking.  What’s not to like?  I’m nice.  I’m caring.  I’m friendly.  I’m even half-smart about some things, and can hold a reasonable conversation (depending on the subject, that is).  So I’m not thin.  WHO CARES?  Seriously.  Who?  And if anyone besides me, then why?  Why would anyone care what I look like?  Do I care if someone is tall or short or large or small?  No.  NO!  Well, I do have a little trouble with over-cologned people in close proximity, but I have chemical sensitivity and it’s nothing personal.  I’d love it if I could wear cologne myself.  And I don’t particularly like to be around loud people, because I have noise issues.  Loud pleasant people are okay.  I just don’t stand too close so that my head doesn’t ring.

It may be time to break out the zoloft.  But first I will try some more small changes, and give them a chance.  I’ve been going to the gym four days a week.  I need to make that a part of my day, so that there’s no questioning whether or not it will happen.  It just needs to be part of my life.  And I plan to revamp the menu towards more whole foods, and less cheese and meat.  Definitely less cookies.  I’m a cookie fanatic.  And somehow, more sleep.  I put the kids to bed an hour ago, and struggled between grabbing a little bit of me time, or just joining them.

I wish I had a little more time to blog.  It’s so good to take time to collect some thoughts.  But now I hear the baby crying, so off I go.

*~*~*~*

Being the stellar mother that I am, I took just long enough to reread my post that the baby soothed himself back to sleep.  So I have a little more time.

*~*~*~*

Part of me struggles with taking any time to blog because of Gadget’s accusation that I spend all my time on the computer.  When we argue, it invariably comes up.  To which I say, I WAS PUMPING.  Because I did spend 4 hours a day strapped to the breast pump (and hence, on the computer), back when the dairy was in operation.  Since weaning, I’ve spent very little time on the computer.  (Or so I claim.)  I shouldn’t allow false accusations to make me feel guilty.  So here I am, blogging.  (He’s not here, though, otherwise, I’d have stopped at ‘If only I had kids’.)

*~*~*~*

Well hell.  I might as well come out with it.  I mustered the courage to tell Gadget that even though he was back, I realized that I wasn’t happy with ‘us’, whatever ‘we’ are, and don’t want to try to patch things together any more, because all we’ve ever done is sweep things under the carpet and not one thing between us has ever, ever been resolved.  We’re more like oil and vinegar than yin and yang.

So, he left immediately, a week ago Saturday.  And I’ve not seen or heard from him since.

I’m not letting myself manufacture any assumptions about what he’s thinking or feeling.  How can I have any real idea what’s in his head?

I will just feel more peaceful when all the turmoil is a thing of the past and we’ve settled into whatever our new lives will be.  If only this were all behind us…

*~*~*~*

A coworker’s son was died yesterday.  He was killed by a hit-and-run drunk driver.  He, the son, had been in a coma for the last few weeks, and there was much hope and things were looking promising, but when he finally came out of the coma, there was no neural response.  He drifted away yesterday.  He was 29.  It rips me up, that my friend and her family have lost a child who could have had so much life ahead of him.  It’s so, so wrong.  The order of the universe is all messed up when we lose our children.  We are supposed to go first.

*~*~*~*

It’s tragic that someone with so much potential for a beautiful life has no choice; his life was taken from him, and here I am, alive, and wasting precious moments making excuses for myself.  I’m making changes, and change is hard.  Oh GOD, change is hard.  But I owe it to myself, and it would be criminal for me not to.  It’s time to wake up and do what I can to love each and every moment that I get the privilege of living.

I am well aware that my blog is very boring, in general. I don’t have any advertisements. I don’t post YouTube snippets. I very seldom change the look. I don’t try to entertain anybody. I don’t try to be clever. I don’t try to make anybody see things my way. I don’t try to garner visitors or a following. I do go on and on at times about various issues that arise in my life. Probably in too much detail. Definitely in too much detail. Boring to the outsider, boring to myself, but necessary, in a way, to help me work through things. It’s very cheap therapy.

I thought I’d venture out recently, and troll some blogs to see if I could find some in my general area. Thinking I might actually make some friends in my neck of the woods. Real people. Maybe. Eventually. But I didn’t get very far. I kept finding blogs with ads and blogher this and blogher that and things seemed just too commercial for me. I got tired of looking.

I like that I’ve met some bloggers, in real life. I have a small circle. It’s pretentious to call it my circle, but there are a handful of blogs that I read, and even if they have little to say or show from post to post, I am always glad to see what they have to say. Because they’re real people with real faces and real lives, and it’s a warm and comforting thing to be privileged to glimpse into their every-day lives. Every-day struggles. Every-day triumphs. I love every-day life. It’s what real life is. It’s where the meat of the matter is. It’s not entertainment. It’s not glamour. It’s not sales or marketing. It’s not a popularity contest. It’s not business. It’s life. And that’s what I love.

I may not be practiced in this particular craft or that particular form of art, but I love that people share the things that they do.

If I happen to buy something, or make something, it’s a big deal to me. Because it’s above and beyond the basic confines of my normal life. So it’s exciting. To me. And that makes it noteworthy. Boring, yes. Part of my every-day life, yes. Beautiful, yes. To me. And I blog for me.

If I have a gross misunderstanding or miscommunication with someone (usually my husband, of course, because he’s the one I share my life with), it helps me to work through it. Or at least to vent. It doesn’t mean I’m looking for sympathy. Or that I’m looking for anything. Or that my life is falling apart. It’s just an ebb, and I need to get it out. To work it out. To work through it. So it goes on my blog. Because I blog for me.

*I drafted this ages ago, then never posted it.  I think I got my feathers all ruffled after reading someone else’s blog in which they commented about being bored with bloggers who seem like they constantly blog about the train wrecks that are their lives.  It’s part of that narcissistic nature in which I ridiculously think that everyone should be my friend and in which I think I want and need everyone’s approval, and of course I assumed she was referring to me (as one of the boring, thus dropped, bloggers).  Righteous indignation.  You should see the other drafts I have in limbo.  I’ve (thus far) spared the global public from some of my more lengthy rants!  Besides, I’ve put enough space between them that the issues of the moment are long past, and no longer on my mind.