Happy happy all the day
Today is the birthday is one of my favorite people ever… my sister-in-law, Stacy. I am blessed beyond reason to have the opportunity to live this life alongside her.
I was lucky enough to celebrate with Stacy, her mom, and her sister last weekend with a super spa day. It was such fun to join in as family really gathered together to focus on Stacy, a woman whose life deserves a bit of joyous celebration.
So, for today and all sorts of days to come, I wish you many happies, Stacy. love you…
Tagged with: birthday • Stacy
a place for everything…
Last Saturday was my niece’s first birthday. I flew to Arkansas last year and spent the weekend with my brother and his family a few weeks after she was born to meet her, but I haven’t been back since. And Mike and my kids haven’t been to Arkansas since right before we moved to Florida nearly four years ago.
Mike and I began talking with my brother a few months ago about us making the trip for London’s birthday, and we agreed not to tell the rest of the family. Now, anyone who knows me knows I’m not a very good surprise keeper, so it was a big deal that I managed not to tell, but I did.
Eliza got to make her first flight, and when we arrived in Arkansas Friday night, my kids got their first look at snow. Saturday morning, I took a photo of all four kids (my two and my brother’s two) and emailed it to my parents. That’s how they found out we were in town. Then, my brother, Griff and I paid a visit to my grandmother. She hadn’t seen Griff since he was eight. It’s a wonder she recognized him at all.
Her reaction was worth every penny of the plane ticket.
While we were hanging out at my parents house, I wandered through at one point and noticed how everything was perfectly in place, even though they had no idea anyone was coming to visit. I mean, Perfectly In Place. Seriously. And initially, I felt a little envious. But then, in the quiet of that back room, in the stillness and the perfection, I thought about how that room is always still and perfect… and quiet.
And I thought about how my house - every single room of it - is never still or perfect or quiet. At any given point, there will be crayons on the floor, dirty clothes draped on top of the crayons, open books on the sofa, dolls on the tables, dirty dishes in the sink, unmade beds, towels in the dryer. Try as I might to go green, a light somewhere will be on unnecessarily, and someone will probably be yelling at someone else. Moments late, however, both of those someones will probably be laughing and playing.
And I think that when my house is quiet, I will sorely miss the chaos. And I will hate having everything in its place.
Filed under Most Everything | Permalink | Comment (1)is the room spinning… or is it just me?
Turns out, it’s just me.
I’ve been dizzy on and off for … well, for about three years now. It’s gotten worse … well, significantly worse, in the last month or so. I made a deal with Mike that I’d go to the doctor for it if he would go to the doctor about his funky mole (got the letter in the mail yesterday that it wasn’t cancerous). I’m terribly bad about not being willing to go see a doctor… I worry that I’m making my symptoms up or that they aren’t as bad as I think or whatever.
As it turns out, I wasn’t making them up and they aren’t a passing thing. My doctor had me do several balance and coordination tests, and I didn’t do very well on them. He had me go in the next day for bloodwork (extensive, if the amount of blood drawn is any indication), and I am scheduled for an MRI this Wednesday. The doctor said there are some pretty bad things that he wants to rule out before determining that I have inner ear problems with migraines. Thankfully, he left those possible ‘bad things’ unnamed. I don’t need specifics to worry about until I meet with him again. I’ll worry enough about the generalities, unfortunately.
But at least the doctor is moving quickly, and we’ll know something soon. I’m hoping he’ll be able to start me on something that will ease the dizzies. My casual lean against whatever wall I’m near at the moment is beginning to look a little less casual than I would like.
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wah, wah, wah
I am tired and crabby, and I sit amongst people who are cranky and angry and discouraged. One of my personal flaws is that I have a tendency to be a sponge and soak up the feelings of those around me. I’m getting better at not doing that quite as much, but still, I find myself influenced by the negativity around me.
Back in the early summer, I got promoted at work… something I honestly thought would never happen. People talk about this new division as being the promised land at this company, and this job is better than the last. But I now see that the idea of a promised land in this division is laughable. What we do is stressful. There is no way around it.
But I’m finding lately that the stress is really hard for me to negotiate. I am not given to enjoying middle ground. I’m a bit of an all or nothing girl. And I’m probably a bit of a bit of a perfectionist, though I hate to admit it. And this job is all about numbers. How did you perform today or yesterday? How did you compare to everyone else, regardless of whatever your personal situation was at the moment?
I don’t mind that the company has expectations of us, even if they may at times seem unreasonable. That’s the company’s right as my employer. What I mind is not being able to navigate the workload and the expectations successfully. Admittedly, this is my problem, not the company’s.
But all of this focus on the numbers just feeds into my own OCD obsession with numbers… the number on the scale, the number of years, the number of days I blog, the number of … on and on. This job encourages an obsession in me that I clearly see is unhealthy. In this life of mine, I need to focus on quality and not those numbers. But five days a week, I sit and am judged based upon the numbers.
My New Year’s Resolution was balance, and I’m trying really hard to take that to heart and to focus on the important and not the numbers floating in my head. It’s not easy because I want to be really good at what I do. But I also want to be a sane (reasonably) woman and a kind, compassionate, not stressed out wife and mama.
Now, I’m going to end my way too short lunch break and go back to the land of numbers. And try not to worry about mine.
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griff time…
Mike’s dad and his wife are in the state for their annual holiday visit, and I’m sick. Typical, huh? Steroids and antibiotics are making me less sick as the days pass, thankfully. We were all supposed to go to Chuck and Stacy’s for a fun day, but instead I stayed home to rest. Mike had Griff stay home with me to make sure that I rested.
And it turned into a really lovely day. I’ve rested and taken my meds. And Griff and I have sat on the sofa and watched a marathon of one of my favorite shows (Buffy). Griff and I spent tons of time alone together when he was little before Eliza was born. Mike was gone a lot working on his doctorate, and it was just me and Griff most of the time. Now that he’s older, we don’t do much together just us. And this day of Cokes and jammies and vampire slayers has been really super.
I know that as he gets older, time alone with him will get more and more rare. And so, for this moment, I am grateful for a day in which he and I got to hang out and just be.
Despite the meds and the cough, I think today has been a really super introduction to twenty-ten.
Filed under Most Everything | Permalink | Comments (2)Tagged with: 2010 • Griff
