Forty Years Later

Soiree?

I can already tell that I'm going to love being single.  I already love being single actually. Long before my divorce I daydreamed about being single.  Over the past five or six years...maybe more...I have dreamed off and on of what it would be like to be alone.  Never having been alone, even in my twenties it was a titillating daydream, though I felt a smidge guilty about those fantasies. Not so much though, because I figured it was a natural progression of thought for plenty of women in their 50's.  Especially if they had been married the majority of that time. And especially if they'd never been alone in their whole damned lives!

I occasionally fantasized about it in great detail, almost planning it:  where I would live (maybe the Oregon coast), what my house would look like (a cottage with a small garden and a porch dripping with clematis), what my decorating style would be (color, more color, whimsy and a little bit of funk), how my art studio would open to the garden, what clothes I would wear (that was the Frye boots/gypsy skirt vision). I imagined I would hold little soirees in the cottage with a small rotating group of friends who would vary in age and sex, and certainly I'd want a nice homosexual friend (style adviser).  It wouldn't be a high brow soiree 'cause I'm not a high brow kind of girl.  Rock and roll and wine is more my style.  But we'd talk about all kinds of things, and sometimes we'd roll back the rug and dance, and sometimes we'd have little dinners. I'm still holding on to the bulk of this day dream.  Ok, forget Oregon except for summer visits.  And I don't know, are gypsy skirts and boots out of style? 

I'm just putting this vision on hold until I move and get a new house and make still another new life for myself. I'm in my first "new life" right now.  The single woman in the wilderness life. Luckily there's no limit on the number of new lives a person can have.

 In all those years of indulging, however, I never saw myself as divorced.  I always imagined I was a widow (and I had all the money).That seemed reasonable since FH was five years older than me and in general women outlive men.  Don't misunderstand that...I didn't want him dead. Heavens no!  It's just that for most of those years I wouldn't have dreamed that anything less than death would split us apart. I just figured I'd eventually join that big pool of old widows like so many women do only I'd make sure to have some fun.  Fun is highly under rated among people my age.  Well that makes me sound ancient and I'm not. But I see so many people who are just a few years older than me and I can tell by the look on their faces and the slope of their shoulders that they aren't having enough fun. No light in the eyes.

Hmmm.  I do love sweet dreams.  But until the dream can materialize I'll just hang out up here in the mountains, wearing jeans and boots, three friends to my name, admiring the deer rather than a garden.  But you know, right now that's enough.  Gotta change what we call our girls night in, though.  I'm thinking of the Thursday Soiree.  Not quite what I had in mind, but it works for now.

My Daily Gratitudes

I'm thankful for good neighbors.

When I was married, for some reason when my eyes opened in the morning, I would jump out of bed like I'd been shocked by the pillow, and believe me, for the past four or five years that wasn't because I was eager to seize the day. It was a habit I suppose, and perhaps then my shared bed wasn't a sheltering nest and peaceful haven as much as it was an uneasy resting place, prickly with the vibrations of anxiety and sadness. There is nothing sadder than a marriage bed empty of love and affection. Ah! But no more that bed of unrest.  No, as a single woman sharing my bed with no one (except for my stuffed dog, Sandy, who I really must tell you about sometime), even when the alarm rudely rouses me on a school morning, I linger luxuriously in my soft cotton sheets, head nestled in my down pillow, and pull the feather comforter tightly under my chin. I gaze out my windows at my amazing surroundings and I do a little gratitude litany.  I say it aloud, of course, since I'm a great one for talking out loud to empty rooms.  I try to do this every day even if I wake up feeling less than cheerful.  Honestly it does help.  But on a day when I awaken perky and hopeful it increases the richness of the day a hundred fold.

Ghostly winter clothed aspen out my bedroom window.

I always say thank you for the obvious: my people, Katy, my son, my sister and my best girl friends; and my very good health.  And I'm quite grateful for my safe surroundings: my home and my car to take me safely where I want to go.  Now days, I never fail to mention my blog and the friends, support, comfort and fun I am finding through it.  Then I list personal behaviors and accomplishments for which I'm extremely thankful.  Lately I am thanking the Universe for my  feeling strong and capable, and for letting me get over him (former husband) much easier than I would have dreamed I could considering the time and love invested. Thanks are in order for helping me get off my butt and drive downtown to workout. And hey, I think I'm getting much more open and outgoing with strangers and acquaintances, and seeing benefits from it.  I'm grateful for that! Then I throw in a few frivolities I'm especially happy about on that particular morning, discovering chai tea this week, finding Artful Blogging when I was in town rather than having to pay postage on it.  The little things.

Beloved Katy...self portrait in car

I'm talking to the Universe. I imagine it sitting in the chair across from me, legs crossed, nodding while offering encouraging little murmurs as I talk. Sometimes, on the weekend when I have more time, there are many asides, polite requests for more help and time spent actually working out a needling problem before my feet touch the floor.  Oh, some people might say Sounds like she's talking to god to me, but since my spirituality doesn't run along those lines, I believe I'm talking to the Universe and really, I don't think it matters who you're talking to, as long as you are offering your gratitude to it and deeply appreciating what you have, what you've done, what you can do.  I got this idea from "The Secret" and "Romancing the Everyday" and everyone else in the world who is talking about gratitude these days.  Once I actually put the idea into action however, I realized the pure power of the idea and it is enriching my life daily.  Even on a bad day, the gratitudes (I don't believe that is a word, but I'm coining it now if not) spoken aloud in the morning softly come to me later and bolster me.  Help dry tears.  Remind my heart that this bad thing is just one thing. Not everything.  Nothing is everything.  Everything is just one thing.

Sigh....As Martha might say, This gratitude business is a good thing!

A new cup of tea....thanks!

Country Girls

OK.  So maybe winter isn't going to go so well.  I haven't had the slightest bit of trepidation about it, I don't think.  I've got a great new car that can go anywhere in any kind of terrain, loads of wood, automatic fill on the propane, a generator that automatically comes on if the electricity goes out (which it often does), and snow shoes.  Yeah, I'm set.

But it snowed today, and it was the first decent snow, five or six inches by the time I had to pick Katy up at the bus stop, and it was very cold.  That meant of course that lurking under the snow just waiting to make my life a pain for the day was a half inch of ice.

My driveway is quite long very, very steep and much narrower than I wish it was because on one side of it is a big drop off, a little medium sized cliff actually, and on the other side a deep, rugged, rocky ditch. Neither the kind of place you'd want to drive your new car over or into, or yourself for that matter. Going down I crept and it went ok.  After I picked up Katy we headed home and back up the hill.  At the steepest point, the car wouldn't go forward anymore. It just balked.  If I pressed the gas a little it slid.  I tried to go forward until I realized it was too dangerous what with all that sliding around and the cliff. When I realized I'd have to back down the entire driveway, anxiety hit.  Fear might be a better word. We buckled up and  I began but the sliding was worse going backwards with me twisted around in my seat trying to see where I was going.  Oh man.  It slid from the cliff edge to the ditch edge with every foot. I am an awful backer even on flat, dry ground. I was just totally freaked by that time, though I was trying not to show it, but Katy wasn't buying that facade.  She had her head down and she was scared and wailing a little. I quietly told her to shape up and not be a wienie.  We're country girls. But inside I was feeling like the biggest wienie of all.

Finally, I put the car in drive and pressed the brake firmly while I deftly reached over to the glovebox and pulled out the manual.  I must not be in the right gear or something, I was thinking. While we were suspended there at a steep angle, me looking for answers in the manual, Katy asked if she could get out of the car. A great idea I should have thought of because by that time, going off that cliff was a distinct possibility. I could just imagine us hanging there upside down in our seat belts.  So she got out and walked down to the barn to worriedly watch and wait.  The manual didn't provide answers, so I just began to go down in tiny, tiny increments sliding from one side to another with each increment.  I finally did get down and just parked the car in the barn.  Katy and I hiked up the hill, came in and collapsed by the fire, happy to be in one piece.  In the morning at 6:45, we'll have to hike back down the hill to the barn and the car so she can get to school. It's a long hill.

I'm worried.  If I were here alone I'd just hole up till the ice melted, but I can't do that with Katy having to get to school each day. After I got home I had a tearful breakdown.  I felt so angry. At everything. At FH, at being forced to be here this winter, at having no immediate options.  I can't, or won't rent my house to someone for the winter. It's too much of my nest egg.  I couldn't risk that. But I called Max and he suggested I buy new tires. More "aggressive" ones. I'll do that and I'll have my road guy put some straight gravel over my expensive road bed for more traction.  Money, money, money!!! If it helps at all, it'll be worth it, I suppose.

 When FH was here and it snowed he ran all the errands.  As a kid he and his buddies went to frozen lakes and spun their cars in circles for fun, and learned to drive on and be comfortable on ice.  When it is icy, I've always just not driven, but how much school can a kid miss?  We can hike that hill, of course, until the snow gets too deep.

Guess we'll have to drag out the snowshoes then, though neither of us knows how to walk on them! Suddenly, winter isn't looking quite so friendly.

The Strangest Thing

I had a blog dream last night.  It was a dream born of the blog, and included women and dogs from other blogs.  It vividly pointed out to me how important my blog and my blog friends have become to me. This little odyssey began two days ago when I posted "The Perfect Man" about how I (on a big whim with little thought and no idea what I intended by it) joined an on line dating site.  I tried to add a little humor to it, liked it and posted it not thinking much about any responses I might get. 

The next morning I had some fun comments.  Later in the day I checked again and two comments stood out from the rest because they were from my longest running blog friends, including my very longest running blog friend, Susan. If I ever had any doubts that I have an overly sensitive streak in me, my feelings upon reading their comments were telling.  Anxiety immediately filled my belly with butterflies because I thought they were chiding me a little bit, and I feared they had read more into my intentions in joining the dating thing than I actually intended when I joined.  I especially didn't want Susan to misunderstand because her singleness and my singleness are a bond.

I flew to the computer and banged out an extremely long post entitled "Why You Needn't Worry".  It was one of those writing episodes where you don't come up for air till it's done.  I was in the writing zone.  I proofed it and posted it and immediately felt those butterflies whipping it up in there.  Maybe I over reacted a little.  A simpler shorter post would have made my point.  They may think I'm protesting too much. Blah, blah, blah. You see why I complain about my inner voice? I don't know what it was but something about the post was making me uneasy.  Throughout the rest of the evening, I visited my own blog several times to read it again and I'd think, No, no. It sounds fine.  It's just right. (Are you starting to think I don't have enough to do?) Eventually, I went to bed because I couldn't see any reason why it was troubling me.

At three in the morning, my eyes popped open.  I lay there in the dark trying to figure out why I was awake. Do I have to pee? No, I didn't.  Then my memory flooded my mind with the dream.  And who was in there but two women, Susan and Vee , whom I've never met in person. Just from photos, though, my unconscious produced walking, talking realistic versions of them, including cagily surrounding Susan by dogs just so my sleeping brain would really believe it was happening. And they were a little disapproving, worried that I'd hook up with weirdos and sacrifice my treasured solitariness for some creep.  And I realized, in the dream and upon awakening that it really matters how they feel. Then my post popped into my head, and I grudgingly gave in to my uneasiness. I crept down the stairs (Katy's got ears like a dog.) and sat down at the computer, trying to keep my eyes slit and my mind empty so I wouldn't really wake up and zapped the post.  Erased it.

Honest to goodness, I still don't know what it was in the post that bothered me.  On my email this morning I saw that Vee had actually read the post after I quit looking at it and before I erased it!  I could tell by the comment that the "Why You Needn't Worry" post was just fine, though long (like most of mine).

That post is one I printed and will keep, however.  I realized today that is kind of a personal affirmation stating my position on several topics: singleness, men, dating, Katy.  That is why I was in the writing zone; it was coming from deep within. 

The unconcious is so awesome. And so is the power of the blogosphere. 

Enough said! 

The Perfect Man

Hello dear readers and friends.  At least I hope I can find my readers and friends after having been so negligent this past....what? ten days!  Totally rude of me. You know my son was here and that was part of it; I was preoccupied, and my writing brain seemed to be napping. I don't know if that was a result of preoccupation or just a momentary brain pause. 

I wasn't completely fallow however.  When I tell you this goofy thing I've done, you are going to laugh and then be shocked. So. Thursday before last only Lavonne and Linda were here for "Knitting".  We were sitting around my round table after downing an enormous pizza and got to talking about men.  Specifically about me and men and relationships.  Future ones.  I said at some point,

"Well! I am certainly going to have another relationship in my life!"

I told them I had even begun writing a list: My Perfect Man.  I got the idea for this list from one of the law of attraction books.  Maybe "The Secret"; I don't recall, but in the book several women said they had made a list, a very detailed written description of their perfect mate,  and eventually that exact person, down to the last detail, appeared in their lives. Well. How easy is that?  Do I believe that could happen?  I don't know, but I figure, what have I got to lose?  Naturally, they both wanted me to read the list to them, and I immediately dashed up the stairs and snatched it out of my underwear drawer where I keep it hidden (like people are roaming my house looking for this list).  I was kind of excited at putting the list out there even more, vocalizing the list. Needless to say, we had a lot of laughs over it. It covers a lot of ground.  Perhaps it is a little anal, and possibly my bar is set a little high, but if I'm going to do it at all, I'm just going to go for broke. (Am I beginning to sound like I'm in high school yet?)

Then one of the girls asked where I expected to meet this man, or any man for that matter. Considering my current lifestyle, the only answer I could come up with was in the vegetable aisle at the supermarket. I said I was sure this has happened to someone,  and Linda promptly told a horror story about a friend of hers who had met a man in the vegetable aisle at the supermarket.  Then, to make a long story short, they convinced me I should try the on line dating thing, e-harmony and match.com to be specific.

Honest to god, my doing that had never, ever entered my mind, and I put up a lot of resistance to the idea. No way!!!  I want to meet someone organically. But once they planted that little seed, it sprouted like an over fertilized pumpkin plant filling my head with the idea.  When they left at eleven...I slinked over to the computer feeling a little silly, a little embarrassed and very daring, and I joined them both! For three days, every time Max and Katy left the house I hit the computer.  You have to write a profile and your personal headline plus add photos that will reel in those guys.  Apparently I have not hit upon the magic formula yet as I am not inundated with possible suitors, though two very nice men have written, one an author which is kind of cool because I am sort of an author groupie, or I could be.

I can not imagine into what adventures this activity will lead me. And to be honest, I haven't really decided that I would ever actually meet someone in person. After being with one man for 40 years, the idea seems frighteningly radical at this moment.  (I'd have to buy new clothes and everything!) I may not even be ready to think about men yet, though I don't think I'm suffering much heart ache for FH personally....still some for the loss of my marriage of course, but not so much that I can't go to the movie or out to dinner with a man. 

Whatever happens, it's kind of fun. Another pleasant time wasting activity on the computer when I should be slaving in my garage!  I'll keep you posted about this new past time and if anything interesting happens, you'll be the first to know.

I can't wait to go to the mailbox tomorrow.  The author has sent me an autographed copy of his book.

Tickled Pink in Hog Heaven!

 

Katy and her Dad

Katy and I are in hog heaven today....ha ha. I started to erase that stupid phrase.  Just something we said in the south.  But looking at it again carefully I have to wonder where in the world did a saying like that come from?  Surely if the hogs were in heaven their journey there couldn't have been very pleasurable!  Oh well...I'll leave it!  To rephrase...Katy and are are tickled pink (that one I understand) that my son, her dad is coming tomorrow for an entire week.  He'll be here for some fun everyday Life things like soccer practice, homework, and two soccer games, plus best of all, Halloween!

Halloween is a lot of fun here.  Perhaps I should say Halloween here with a ten year old girl is fun.  I am working the school party on Thursday after which we'll go eat pizza. Those lovely Amish women I mentioned in my post about Western Days are preparing  four dozen of their indescribable raised, fried, glazed doughnuts as my contribution to the party food.  Then Friday on Halloween the county's entire population of children will swoop into downtown in their costumes to trick or treat the stores on main street and the small surrounding neighborhood. The houses are so far flung up here in the mountains that people don't get little ghosts and goblins at their doors.  So the merchants provide a safe (paved, level!) haven for all the spooky happenings.  Some of them really get into it, setting up scary displays and acting silly.  It's lots of fun.  And somewhere in there we'll squeeze in the haunted house at the fire station and the Halloween Fair in the gym, put on by the high school band.  Like Western Days, Halloween here is small town America at its very best.  We are just so happy Max will be here to enjoy it with us.

I am looking forward to his visit with more pleasure than I have in years.  He and his dad have been at odds with each other for a long while.  (FH has been so careless with those who love him.) And for the last several years I looked forward to any visit, including Christmas with more dread than cheerful anticipation, and every visit was marred by anxiety and stress.  But oh what a difference now!  He met Katy and I up in Northern Colorado this summer and we had such a fun time.  Max can be fun and he can make me laugh like no one else can when he turns on the antics.  Big, big laughing. And could I use some of that!  It feels so good just to look forward to a visit from my son.  So natural, like a cold, clear drink of water.

He and I have lots of plans to talk about, and I have a list of computer issues I hope he can clear up for me.  He is going to help me do some things around here including moving things out of the garage down to the barn for my sale in the spring, but mostly we'll just have a good time.  He and Katy are going off on a Dad/Daughter field trip on Monday and need I say, her anticipation is also running high.

We will see him every month for the next few months.  I am going up to Northern Colorado to stay at my sister's for Thanksgiving and Max is coming.  Hopefully Katy will be there but the custody agreement does give her mother access here in Colorado for Thanksgiving if she wants it and arranges something.  I don't know what will happen there and in fact I won't know until the last minute, I am sure, though it is most likely that Katy will be with me.  So Katy doesn't know her Dad is coming for Thanksgiving just yet.  If she was unable to be with him in Colorado for that holiday, she wouldn't be happy.  He will return for Christmas here in the mountains, and then in January he is meeting us in Denver for a long city weekend.   I had been dreading the holidays.  Much like I dreaded my birthday in September.  But I am feeling that dread drain out of me; it is being replaced by a much more upbeat and positive emotion.  Actually, this holiday season, much of the negative factor...oh, ok! Let me be honest: THE Negative Factor is no longer in my life. That's a plus.  In fact, all around, most of the time (no, not every minute, but a whole lot of the time)  I'm starting to look at my divorce as a gain, not a loss.

From there, it's forward all the way! (Yes, yes, with the exception, I'm sure, of the occasional set back.) Geeze!! There is this yappy little person living in my head always trying to quantify my happy statements with an insistence on mentioning any possible negative influences that might likely impact my happiness.  Does everyone have one of these crabby, negative women living in their heads? I'm clearly getting the upper hand in this twosome, at least at the moment, but she can drive a NORMAL woman nuts!  I say, just let me enjoy the moment, bitch!

Ahhhh. Silence. That's better.

Ciao, friends!

p.s.  can you tell, I always add my heading last? ha ha. 

Vampire Nights!

I'm writing tonight to say I'm not writing tonight!  I'm headed for bed with two Dove Dark Chocolate Promises, six almonds (three per chocolate),  and a book.  I've gone and gotten myself hooked on a series of vampire books. I've always had a soft spot for vampires and witches.   I don't like overly dramatic stories full of blood and gore.  I like my spooks to read like they could be the innocuous neighbors down the street with an underlying sense of menace.  Almost believable.  Actually, I do believe in witches, but vampires are a different story.  Still, they make for great reading.

I'm reading Stephenie Meyer's "Twilight Saga", four books, each the size of a small dictionary.  Unless the one I'm currently engrossed in, book two, "New Moon" takes a turn for the worse, I'm doomed.  These are actually supposed to be teen books, but I believe they are getting quite a lot of adult reading also.  And here's the amazing thing, Katy's now reading the first book, "Twilight".  When she saw me reading "Twilight", she told me a friend in her class was reading the same book so I said, casually, Oh, so do you want to read this when I'm finished? and she said yes.  I'm delighted.  There isn't anything in it she shouldn't read.  No sex, no blood and gore.  Just a more adult level of reading.  And really, the vampires are quite civilized!  Good practice for her.  I remember sneaking books from Mother's book shelf early on and most were probably not G rated.  I read Tropic of Cancer at 12.  She didn't know it though.

So, I'd better run.  I turn into a pumpkin with no energy if I'm not asleep by10:30 so I've only got a little over an hour to read. 

Scary dreams guaranteed tonight!

Glee In The Midst of Chaos

 

You start off with one thing, end up with
another, and nothing's like it used to be,
not even the future.
                                       -Rita Dove

Certainly my  future is nothing like it used to be.  And, no, I'm not complaining.  Really, I'm not.  In fact, I'd have to say this has been a stellar ten days or so.   That's an amazing thing for me to say considering the meltdown going on with my hard earned money and the potential for stress and anxiety that warrants.

Sure, I've been worried all along about the awful financial news.  But it was a stealthy, kind of unformed, push it out of my mind kind of worry that was quietly gnawing away at my stomach and my peace of mind at the same time,   I don't watch the stock market rise and fall, or fall and fall throughout the day; that's surely the path to craziness. Instead I check in once at the end of the day to see how much it plummets.  I don't worry about it too much because I do  believe it'll come back and I'm not about to sell stocks when they are low.  I have other investments and I have this house which is a fat part of my nest egg when it sells. But I do have a bit of a problem.

What I worry about is good old CASH and having enough of it till something changes.  I don't want to sell my security at a fire sale price.  I am always aware that whatever I've got may be all I'll ever have.  That's how you think when you are my age and you don't work anymore.  In the past there was the comforting knowledge that all I had might grow a little, but that feeble ray of sun has been obliterated by the black cloud of others incompetent stewardship of our fine financial balance in this country.  I took a deep breath and decided to examine and get intimate with every area of my personal financial situation refusing to shy away from the fear. Afterwards I coined a new phrase:  I have to hoard my liquidity. (Suzy Orman would be proud.)  And somehow, once I began using that phrase to myself, I've felt just as chipper as a little chipmunk storing acorns away for the winter.  It made everything so crystal clear in my mind. Whatever choice I'm facing:  this faucet or that one for the bunk house? I just say to myself, I have to hoard my liquidity,  and I choose the one I don't like as much which, of course, costs less.  The bunk house at the barn is a liquidity munching project I must continue in order to put the house on the market; there are several of those.

So I cut things out and cut things down, but the most important thing I decided was to sell my stuff on ebay,  amazon, antique shops and craig's list with a big barn sale in May.  I have so much stuff I can practically start my own store. And FH left most of his stuff (just sell it  he said throw it away, I don't care. The man wanted to leave that badly!).  Lots of the stuff resides up there in the  garage with the rat. And tons more stuff lives down in the barn.  I have decided that I will go to work.  Selling my stuff will be my work.  In addition to all the other stuff, I have enough books to establish a pretty good on-line bookstore at Amazon.  I have hundreds of gardening and decorating books alone, not to mention cooking, the Civil War, World War II, arts and crafts and a very large horse library.  I have so much STUFF.  But, now perhaps that stuff will become a blessing rather than a curse.

I'm busy making plans, researching prices on the net, writing descriptions and all that; just figuring out how to do it all.  And it seems that I'm gliding through the days quite happily occupied.  Today, I paused to express gratitude to the Universe for this way I am feeling, the feeling that I've crested the hill.  And when I thought about that...cresting the hill, so to speak...I realized that Wow! He's wearing off.   FH (former husband) is wearing off me and I'm beginning to truly feel free. Physically free.  Emotionally free. Mentally free.

Halleluja!  

A Favorite Book

...moving on isn't as much about taking a few steps forward as being willing to untangle and then ruthlessly uproot whatever's holding us back.

                      Sarah Ban Breathnach  

Oh yes. I believe this. 

 

It's unbelievable the primitive feelings that are aroused by rapid change.

                       Sheila Balantyne
                  

I can certainly attest to the truth of that quotation too!

Both of these nuggets of wisdom are found in Sarah Ban Breathnach's book, Moving On, now one of my favorites of all the books she has written.  When I first got the book in 2006 I read a little of it then put it down and didn't finish.  I actually thought the book wasn't relevant to my life and my marriage at the time.  Considering that was only two years ago, I understand now that I was not acknowledging  the fact that it was entirely relevant to both my life and my marriage, and reading the book was causing feelings and fears to rise to the surface that I didn't want to examine.  I picked the book up again this past spring, and have read it, highlighted quotations and entire paragraphs, and now have it looking quite dog eared.  A comfortable, loved book. As are all of her books it's filled with not only her brand of wisdom, but wonderful quotations from dozens and dozens of sources and a bibliography in the back of the book rich with new reading.

It is a brave book for her to have written because most people prefer maintaining their images, particularly if the images are their golden eggs, to telling the world of their failures and disappointments. If Simple Abundance the book, and her entire Simple Abundance empire is all you know of her, you may assume that her life thereafter was gilded in happiness. A well lived life of enviable riches. But as good old Life has a way of doing, it threw her a massive string of shocking surprises, and every area of her life and everything she knew and believed changed.  She lost money (huge amounts), her home, her husband, and her happiness. She endured a terrible and terrifying head injury and months and months of depressing recovery that stole her confidence and almost got away with her talent as well.  She freely admits to many faulty decisions.

It is the story of how she was finally able to move on.  How she consciously and with intent moved on and created a new home and a new life for herself.  And by sharing how she did it, she has inspired me greatly as I forge my new path into the future. 

Now don't think you have to be divorced to get a lot out of this book. It isn't just about moving on from a divorce...it is about wanting or having to shed your current life or a portion of it and going forward to embrace something new, fresh, interesting, satisfying.  A life and a home that speaks to your soul.

Sarah talks about the place we women hold sacred...our homes...and ties purposeful domestic enrichment to creating happiness.  The crux of this book is really about decluttering our lives, both physically and emotionally, and creating our "house of belonging" whether it is the physical house of our dreams or not!  As we do that we are also creating a life of belonging.

Yes...I love this book.  I picked it up this morning to read some passages again and when I sat down to write my post I just decided to share the book with you.  This isn't at all the post I planned to write, but I'll write that one tomorrow.  I believe this book must be out of print because Amazon only offers it through their third party sellers.  Best of all, it is priced at just a dollar fifty.

How can such a treasure chest of inspiration and ideas cost so little?

  Katy this morning enjoying the first fire of the year.

Autumn fully arrived in the aspen grove behind the house.

Messages

Message in a chocolate wrapper.

Spotting the messages that you're longing for from the Universe is often a lot like finding your first agates on the beach.  You have to look very carefully to find them. You have to use all your powers of observance.  But once you figure that out and get the hang of how to look, you start seeing them everywhere; and you think to yourself Oh, I didn't realize they would be so subtle.

Many messages are so subtle that if we aren't looking, or opened to them, we may not even recognize them as messages. A message might look like a coincidence, or a happenstance meeting with a stranger, or a synergistic occurrence.  Or if we are even slightly mystically inclined, an event like spotting a lion or an eagle, or finding a crow's feather on the back door step, or spotting a rainbow on a particularly low day can make us tingle with the portent of the message, even if we aren't quite sure what  the message actually means. We still feel better somehow for having received it!

Three years ago, FH was squatting at the edge of the pasture examining the grass when a great undulation filled the air. With a half fearful glance above him, he was shocked to see an enormous, bald eagle landing in the pasture just 5 or 6 feet from where he squatted.  He and the eagle faced one another at eye level.  Mesmerized and paralyzed, FH felt his skin tingle as the eagle gazed at him, occasionally twisting his great neck to look around, but always swiveling  back to fix FH with his stare, shielding it occasionally with a languorous, heavy lidded blink. They stood and squatted there in a frozen moment of time for 3 or 4 minutes before the eagle's wide span of wings lifted him off the ground filling the air once again with their powerful noise.  Now, anyone...even the most spiritually challenged person...would have to agree that that was a sign.  Particularly in light of the fact that the golden eagle, not the bald is our regular neighbor here on this mountain.   The event drove me nuts because though FH was opened to the idea that it was a message, he could not imagine an interpretation of the message and so shortly he just dropped it.  I knew the eagle was telling him something, but WHAT?  Hmmmmm, well,  looking back now I can think of a possible interpretation, but one FH may not have acknowledged at the time.  My point is that that  is the sort of message that hits you over the head screaming This is a message! Listen up!  Most are much more subtle.

Ready made commercial messages can be personally interpreted as well, like the message on the Dove paper in the photo above.  Most of those messages are silly, but occasionally I open a tasty chocolate and there is a little message just for me: There is a time for compromise...it's called later. That was my message all right, because I'm not compromising to please someone else for a long time to come, thank you.

My favorite daily source of messages is Tut.  You subscribe, answer a couple of questions about your dreams and goals. Then, each morning when you check your email, there is a "message from the Universe".  Four days out of five I feel that the message is sent directly to me straight from the mailbox of the Universe, when I know everyone receives the same message each day. Somehow, it feels quite personal.  You might try it. It's a great way to begin the day. You can always unsubscribe and if you are religious and have qualms about communing with the "Universe", well call it God.  I'm sure it will work just as well.

If we are opened to them, if we need them, we receive messages every day.  We each interpret them within the framework or our own lives, experiences, feelings, dilemmas and challenges; and then we continue on our personal journeys a little lighter on our feet, a bit more resolved or sure of ourselves, or enlightened. Are these kinds of messages real? Or are they just our own minds grasping at something...anything to help us understand ourselves or help us have clarity about an issue we are facing? Does it even matter?

Sad Goodbyes - New Ideas

 

My next door neighbors Jack and Lucky.  How can I leave

good neighbors like these? 

I said good bye to my friend Paula today.  I went over this afternoon to watch her finish packing.    We talked some about my desire to move, but my needing to sell the house first.  She asked me if waiting to sell before moving is something I actually need to do or is it something I just think I need to do.  Hmmmm. Good question.  She suggested I not lock myself into that idea because if my son moves this summer and I want to move also, I could just rent a little house in Northern Colorado until this house sells.  I might could swing that.  I'd leave this house decorated and furnished of course and I could come here on some weekends and holidays.  I'll have to think about the finances and logistics of that idea.  I'm not sure I want to leave my main investment, but I could hire a caretaker neighbor to look in often and I don't think that would cost much.

In the midst of that conversation, a realtor called and wanted to show her little house in forty five minutes. Panic! We jumped up and began sprucing the place up, stuffing clutter in drawers, and turning on lamps (always turn on the lamps when showing a house!).  While I was washing up a few dishes in the sink, I had a strong feeling that this prospect is going to be the one that buys her house.  Later after I was home, she called me saying the realtor had called and said the man loves it and wants to bring his wife back next week to see it.  Paula has said all along that when the house is meant to sell it'll sell.  I hope this is it for her.

 As for me, it isn't that I am dying to rush out of here exactly.  I mean just look at Jack and Lucky, the lions and the longhorns, all the horses and the herds of deer and elk, the coyotes and the eagles.  I love all these guys and my close encounters with them will end when I move to a bustling town. It is gloriously beautiful and remote here. On the other hand though, I am kind of longing for the stimulation and excitement of something new.  I have this feeling that if I stay up here in the mountains, fairly isolated as I am and with my "hermit" tendencies,  nothing will ever happen to me again.  And I want something to happen to me. Or for me.  I wonder if that sounds crazy...I want something to happen but I've no idea what I mean by that.  

I pledged to Paula that when she comes back for Thanksgiving I'll have my garage cleaned and the stuff at least sorted.  I know that if I don't set goals with deadlines I'll never get anything done.  I'm excited. I'm going to do it.  I'm starting this week.  Unfortunately the first thing I have to figure out is how to get rid of this very large pack rat that keeps building a nest in there and running all along the shelves knocking off valuable treasures and breaking them.  Katy and I scared him yesterday and he ran straight up the garage wall.  ICK.  I can't shoot him in a building and there is no way I'm going to even think about bashing him with a stick or something.  He's way too big for that.  I mentioned in my last post that I'm terrified of mouse traps.  Well the giant traps for rats are really scary.  I'll try poison tomorrow.  I only hope it doesn't take too long. That's one of mother nature's creations I won't miss when I leave, although that's the one creature I just might also find in town.

I'm off to bed now.  It's a little early so I'll lie in the dark and think about all this.  I do some of my best planning in bed at night before falling asleep.  At night, snuggled in my cozy bed, anything seems possible.

Water Off A Duck's Back

favorite spot for deep thinking or day dreaming

My newly divorced self has been forced to learn many new skills.  Like running the air compressor and airing up the tires on my car; setting mouse traps; unfreezing the ice maker; making investment decisions (ha); remembering to pay bills on time.  Dozens of little day to day chores that were the province of FH.  Those day to day accomplishments make me feel smug with the knowledge that I'm going to do just fine by myself, although I am still terrified of mouse traps.  However, there is another skill, not so tangible, but just as necessary that I'm still working on.  That would be the skill of becoming inured to people's thoughtless comments.   When I say "thoughtless" I mean blurting without thinking. I'm not talking about people making thoughtless comments with an intention to hurt or annoy. I'm mastering the ability to let those comments just slide by me.  Like water off a duck's back.

I went to see our one doctor in town yesterday.  Nothing serious, just some little stomach troubles.  I told him I suspected that the troubles are the result of more than two years of high anxiety and stress.  Then I said quietly, FH left. We're divorced now.  He leaned back in his chair nodding and replied, Oh, yes...I heard he flew the coop.  He still in town? Geez, Doc, how about a little  sensitivity.  Then, for some odd reason I replied with a fact I never discuss with anyone around here except my best friends and you, my cyberspace friends, He's left town. He's with a woman.  I can't imagine why I said that....playing the sympathy card?  Looking for empathy?  Nodding again like he knew every damn thing in the world, he said, Yes, I see this all the time. Mainly with men. They get in their 50's or 60's and they panic and then they start  acting crazy.  I nodded back and told him in the spunkiest voice I could muster that I'm doing just fine, thank you, in fact Katy and I are MUCH better off without him. be calm, Anya, it's just water.

Driving down Main street my friend flags me down and insists I stop and have lunch with her and another friend.  In my past life, I would have wiggled out of it.  I've got so much to do. etc.  But in my present life I'm following some advice I read in a divorce self-help book: Accept all invitations. So I parked and joined them.  Paula's off to Florida for the winter: knitting retreat, beach combing, jewelery making. My other friend's headed to Africa on safari for three weeks. (don't even ask me what kind of safari)  They went on about other upcoming plans.  I quietly sat there munching on my tuna sandwich without the bread. When Paula urges me again to visit her in Florida, I remind her I can't. I have Katy. My other friend laughingly tells me Oh, yes that's right, you can't play with the old girls!  This is only a "thoughtless" comment because it goes straight to a place deep in my heart that remembers being free.  A place where longing and guilt about the longing duke it out occasionally.  just water.

Final stop, the hair salon for a trim.  The owner of the salon is my age. I haven't been since the divorce because I wanted to avoid her scrutiny and questions. Are you selling the house?  Are you leaving town?  When I told her Katy and I are moving to Northern Colorado, and her father  is moving there also, and it will be wonderful because we will have a partnership in raising Katy she says, Maybe you can find a place with a little mother-in-law apartment or a house large enough for all of you!  I'm sure I gave her an annoyed glare.  Marlene, I'm not eighty!  For christ's sake I'm not living with my son!  Look, I'm going to have another whole life here! I'm just divorced I'm not throwing in the damn towel!!!! She leaned away from the passion in my voice. Oh. Well.  Good for you, she said.   water just water.

Driving home in the soft yellow autumn light I felt pretty good that I felt pretty good despite a handful of irritating encounters. At home (a quiet empty home with Katy out for the night) I switched on the music, and perused my little wine rack. Putting my hand on a bottle on the bottom shelf...the expensive wine FH and I bought on a trip to Napa four years earlier...I drew it back and redirected myself to the cheaper wines.  But then I stopped...What in the world am I saving it for? I'm drinking this wine tonight!  Moments later I poured a ruby red glassful, nestled into my favorite chair, sipped, and settled in.  quack

Alone But Not Lonely

       "What a lovely surprise to discover
         how unlonely being alone is."
                                        Ellen Burstyn

#1 in the bathroom series

Clearly this was an up day.  At two in the afternoon, I found myself in the bathroom with my camera.  I was putting away an armful of folded towels on my way to the deck to photograph the aspen on the back hill.  This mirror, this room, this lighting is the kindest in the house.  I love this setting because the soft warm lighting takes a few years away, so whenever I want to look myself in the eye and have a serious talk with myself I come to this bathroom and peer into this mirror.

For some reason, I held up the camera and snapped.  And I  continued snapping,  posing,  laughing out loud at myself and having a heck of a good time.  I believe I'll use one of these photos to replace the "about me" photo where I'm standing in front of the shoe tree on the "Loneliest Highway In America". (I'm going to write a post on that fascinating highway one of these days.) I'll edit out the toilet of course.   I was in the best company today... my own company and we had a blast.

#2 in the bathroom series

I am pretty sure I'm either "healing" as they say or going crazy.  I've finally got that working man in and out doing my bidding and I've got the land looking fabulous due to the unpleasantly expensive work of another working man.  Those two things alone have empowered me somewhat and I'm feeling more in control. But I still haven't actually done anything myself with my own two little hands. Haven't done a thing to get this house ready to sell. No, the days continue to drift by with few, if any personal accomplishments, but there is a big difference in the mood of the days.  I think I am actually feeling...dare I say it?...a little happy.  Oh I know the usual drill has been two steps forward and three steps back, but this might be different.  It feels different.  And I know it is somehow related to my birthday because I woke up that morning knowing I felt differently.

So I play music all day at top volume, dance around and sing when the lyrics are especially meaningful (Gloria Gaynor's I Will Survive! for example); spend too much time blog cruising; spend way too much time sampling and buying on iTunes; talk to my fish, Duke, for ten minutes at a time; stand on the deck and gaze; put on lipstick eight times a day;  try on clothes; organize my studio (that isn't work, that's fun); groom house plants. Today I saw an add for Classmates, the site where you can register and look up old high school classmates.  Yes. I joined and then spent a pleasurable hour looking up old boyfriends (just looking of course, no contacting). The list of meaningless but pleasant, time wasting activities goes on and on. From 7:15 to 4:15 when Katy arrives home. At least I am making it to my workouts downtown and I'm actually loving that. I can't wait to get really strong. 

Surely this kind of silly phase will pass and I'll head up to that dastardly garage and start sorting stuff out.  Till then, I'll just go along for the ride.  It's a rather enjoyable one for a change.

 

I did get some aspen photos. Color's coming along.

Yoo Hoo!

This is not a real post, actually.  I'm just reaching out.  

Lorri...are you still out there? What happened to you?

Marvels of the Net

my sweet computer...small but powerful

Older people often speak of the progress and the changes in society and technology they've seen in their lifetimes: cell phones, fax machines, satellite television, vaccines that save millions, artificial hearts, tapes, videos, cd's, COMPUTERS, Tivo.  Hmmmm....Wait a minute.  This is interesting. My plans were to begin this post on technology with a mention of these "older people" remembering advances, to set the theme you know; then segue to today and my experience.  However, all those developments do reflect my experience.  How strange to think about that.  You'd think I was born in the dark ages. 

 Regarding communications I suppose I was.

A Day In The Life Of...

When I woke up this morning I brewed a cup of tea (always Twinings Irish Breakfast tea with lemon added) and flipped open my laptop computer to check the news on the internet.  Ever since 9/11 I peek at the top headlines each morning to make sure we're ok.  I read hurricane Kyle was going to hit Nova Scotia where my blog friend Susan  lives. I click over to her blog right away to see what she's thinking about the storm.  She's posted a link to a map of the hurricane.  But I'm not sure where in Nova Scotia her little town is located, so I just google for a map of the place and I've got her location pinned.

Later, I get Katy set up at the computer.  She's  doing a big "self directed" poster project for school.  Her topic an animal we both love, the harbor seal.  Every bit of her research has been on the internet.  She did visit the school library looking for info on the seals, but didn't find much.  Ahh!  But at home, the whole world of information on harbor seals was opened to her.  She just clicked on Ask.com  and there were dozens of web sites for her perusal.  Once she wrote the copy, she typed it on the computer.  She's just ten!  I didn't lay my hands on a typewriter (forget any computers) until I was in the seventh grade, the earliest it was offered in school.  Katy began learning to type in the third grade.  She finished up her research and writing today and she was ready to search for photos of harbor seals.  Easy peasy, just click on google images and there on the screen are hundreds and hundreds of images of harbor seals doing everything you can even begin to imagine harbor seals doing.  So, as she makes selections, I show her how to save the picture to iPhotos. After that, Katy tells the computer to tell our printer to print her pictures (we're in the dining room and the printer is a mile away in the den) and voila! in no time there's a stack of  gorgeous, full color seal photos in various sizes for her to mount on her poster. WOW!

seal pup nursing mom...a favorite image from google

After that, I snatched the computer because I need some new music. I play my music so  much I need frequent replenishments.  Enter....what else but iTunes.  I turn on my stereo in the den and tell the computer to play my music through it and tell the stereo to play the music on the speakers up in the living room where I'm going to be.  Then I go music shopping on the internet. I think of artists, do a search then listen to samples of their songs. I click, I buy.  But after buying a few new songs, I can't think of any more artists to look at.  I need to find some new artists I might like so I go to Pandora .  Pandora is sooooo cool.  You make up your own personal, commercial free radio station.  You begin by putting in some songs you love and giving a title to your station. Say, "Girl Tunes". Then Pandora adds more songs that have similar characteristics to your original songs and therefore may be songs you will also like.  As each song plays, you can reject it if you don't like it. Also, there is a list of similar songs by other artists listed under each song as it plays. Plug your computer into a little speaker set up and let her play all day if you like.  Pandora keeps pumping out the music.   All that from just a few original songs!  Pandora continues to enrich your station indefinitely.  And...you can create all the different formats and different stations that you wish. They even have a fast click button for both iTunes and Amazon if you want to buy something that's playing.  

Anyway, I get quite a few great new songs. They're on one of my iTune play lists but I want to get these new songs on my iPod (a divorce fling purchase). No problem. I just plug the iPod into the computer and they cozy up a minute or two, and when they finally part, I've got the new music in both places. Heavenly.

It's getting dark and I decide to write a post for my blog while I'm listening to my new tunes  so friends as far flung as Nova Scotia can read it in the morning.  I took a photo I want to use and it's still on my digital camera so I need to get it to the computer.  Another cord.  A chat between the camera and the computer, and I've got the picture on my iPhotos.  Perfect.  So I write my post, transferring that same photo to my page.  In the morning you'll pour a cup of coffee or brew up a cup of tea and read my post, look at my photos and maybe leave me a comment.  Lovely, isn't it?

Yikes! It's 10:15 and I need to do a little shopping on the internet before I go to bed.  This morning on my email I got a notice that Boden is offering free shipping so it's a good time to buy that cute sweater I've been coveting. After that I have to order a few supplies from the art web site Dick Blick for an art class I'm taking on the internet.  My goodness.

Do you ever just stop and think how miraculous and wonderful it all is? 

I have no idea how it works but I love it. 

Thursday Night

Making jewelry around my dining table

I love Thursdays.  Since I moved here four and a half years ago, I've spent Thursday nights with "the girls", my sweet group of friends here in the neighborhood.  We call it "knitting night", though we don't always knit.  Sometimes we just drink good wine, eat, talk and laugh. Since most of us have been bitten by the bead and jewelry bug, for the last several months we have spent the time making jewelry. And sometimes we knit. Whatever we do it's a good time.

It's an insular little group of seven, though everyone doesn't come every time but there is an inner group of four of us that seldom miss.  We joke around and say we have three rules for "members"....you can't wear a bra and you have to be able to say the word "fuck" or at least hear it without getting squeamish and what ever is said here stays here. I know. Sounds like a bunch of grade school girls. All we need is to put a pin to the finger tips and do a blood oath. But, hey! girls just wanna have fun, and we do!  Never let the age a woman looks fool you about the age the woman feels.

We have always gone to Lavonne's house because her husband goes out on Thursdays to play poker with some guys.  Since I had a husband for the last four years, that was great with me because FH  kept Katy, so it was my night to get away.  Once he left, however, I was presented with a little dilemma. Kids weren't the norm on Thursday night.  But, everyone agreed they wanted Kendall to come so I could,  saying she could play video games or watch TV upstairs.  Rather than not go, I thankfully agreed. There is a four day school week up here, so late night Thursdays aren't a problem. But, much better, we began to have it over here more and more since there is no man in my house now.  You can't have "knitting" with a man in the house. Katy and I both love this because she can close herself in the den with her toys, movies and music, and go to bed at a reasonable hour.  The door to the den is so thick, she could set dynamite off in there and we wouldn't hear it.  Better, she can't hear us either!

We sit around my dining room table to eat and frequently just stay right there through the night, especially if we're making jewelry. The weekend before FH left he kept Katy, and my friend Paula and I went to Denver and stayed for three nights for my "divorce fling". We ate and drank like pigs, and we shopped.  The first place I visited: Anthropologie. God, I love that store. I wanted to go home and put out all this Anthropologie stuff the day he left.  Sort of the feminization of my living room. I bought a new funky/girly lamp, two funky/girly pillows for the sofa, and a funky/girly table cloth to leave permanently on my dining room table.  Something about that table cloth is magical to me and it transformed a cold dining room table into a colorful hub of creativity. I feel good just looking at it. I think that's why we girls love to sit around that table for hours at a time.  It's the table cloth.  I keep a jewelry project on it always  because I can do things like that now.

Dining room table with a fall backdrop.



Detail of the magical table cloth.

 We throw a birthday party for each one of us every year, and tonight's mine! Woo Hoo!  Tonight, I'm told, we'll have lasagna, salad, cake, and lots of great wine and bread. Gifts too! All I have to do is set the table.

It's a good guess there will be no crafting tonight.

A Good Birthday After All!

Here I am on the day I've dreaded for a month and been downright depressed about for a week and...it was a darned nice day!  I guess I got all the pity-poo stuff out of my system because when I awoke this morning, I felt positive and energetic.  I knew right away this last bad spell is over! 

Katy began the day with a sweet hand made gift, a little blue heeler dog made of clay.  Then I got some nice phone calls, and an unexpected but very appreciated card.  And my son sent three books off my Amazon wish list.  Tonight we had dinner with my friend Lavonne and her husband and she made my very favorite cake.  Oh and FH called and he was quite nice too.

I think I'm going to make this my year.  To what?  I'm not sure... create the life I want to live now that I lost that last one I guess.  Not just let it happen any old way it turns out...but make it happen the way I want it to. I don't have all the details clear in my head.  I'll have to seriously consider what I actually want in order to head in the right direction.

But right now, I'm just headed for my soft snuggly bed to dream on it all.  So sweet dreams to me...and to you!

Looking for Cheer

I so much appreciate the sweet comments, and in Susan's case, informative comments.  I've been in a bit of a low spot again.  I did get that bad cold but thought it was finished. This week, however, every other day it has seemed I am carrying around a head of mush and  have a tendency to burst into tears at the drop of a hat...or no drop, really.  It is disconcerting  for a crying spell to hit as suddenly and spontaneously as a sneeze.  It makes me feel unstable, unsure of myself and pissed off too. Then my thinking goes round and round trying to know, is it depression or the left over of the cold making me feel like I'm walking around in deep water with ten pound weights tied around my ankles?  I woke up this morning after what seemed like hours of dreaming about FH in a surreal and painful story line. I lay there staring at the ceiling, tears streaming wondering my god, how long is this going to last. how can I get a little control? feel hope? be cheerful?  I miss feeling cheerful. I've always been a cheerful person.  Oh, I fake it for Katy and others. But I want to FEEL it.  It's only four months next week...should that be long enough? 

My birthday is tomorrow.  I'll admit, I've always been silly about my birthday.  For forty years it has  been a special day because FH made it that way.  Lovely dinner out, wonderful gift, cupcakes and candles...princess treatment all day.   I do belive this has been the underlying dread and sadness behind this current spell of depression.  Then I feel childish and self centered to care so much. 

I have had many conversations with myself today. I've got to get a grip. Make the life I want. Don't let another day drift by in a daze.  A birthday could be a catalyst for change I suppose, although I'll be surprised if I wake up tomorrow to a new Me On a Mission.  Anything could happen, though.  The only sure thing is I'll be one year older and in a radically different position than I was last year on the 22nd.  I am absolutely determined that by this time next year, my life  will be radically different once again.  Better.  No...really good.  By this time next year my life is going to be really good. 

Lemons and Dreams

Van Gogh  1887

OK! I'm getting back to normal.  I'm lucky this is a short run cold.  Katy brought home a killer cold last year that in my system lasted two weeks.  I don't know if this helped, but I've been drinking huge amounts of lemon juice in my tea since it began.  Sunday I was browsing the net looking for advice on pumping up ones immune system, because I figured if cold season is starting this early, I need to be proactive.  I found this site.  It offers a holistic approach, and it recommended copious amounts of lemon juice and raw veggies so I took said advice. I munched on raw baby red peppers stuffed with herbed goat cheese and salads, none of which tasted right, and drank the juice. For actual preventative suggestions, this site is pretty good.

List of Dreams Update

I'm actively working on this list of dreams that I mentioned in an earlier post.  It's kind of seductive, really.  Number 5 on my list is  I want to be strong with beautiful muscles.  When I was thinking of how to phrase this, I realized that I have to be careful with the wording on a dream list or it starts to sound like a "to do" list.  On a "to do" list, the same goal would be written as Start working out!  See the difference in mood in those two?  Of course to fulfill a dream, I probably would eventually have to make a "to do" list, but do that too early, and the dream just looks like work.  Lot of difference between dream language and work language.

I've had this dream drifting around in the back of my mind for at least a year, and kept it in the back of my mind with plenty of excuses: it's too far to drive to the club three times a week; I don't have any equipment at home to work with; if I went to the club I don't have any work out pants, etc. etc.  Some pretty silly, some valid enough.   Point is, I didn't take any steps to wipe out any objections.

So, segue to a couple of weeks ago after Katy decided she wants to play soccer.  I always sort of dreaded the day she might want to do soccer because (and yes, this is terribly selfish) of the huge commitment required of the adult in the partnership: pick up at 6 two nights a week, an hour round trip drive each day; games in the big town down the mountain every single Saturday, another 3 and 1/2 hours round trip.  Plus squeezing in homework, showers, etc. and the complaining that would ensue with such limited time on practice afternoons. And, big deal for us both, no two-night weekend sleepovers with her best friend till this is over.  Those heavenly weekends are my only solid stretch of alone time these days since there is no one here to fill in so I can get away.  But of course I acquiesced in only two days of negotiations. Once I asked myself why should she not lead a normal childhood just because she has a bunch of flaky and/or selfish adults in her life and she lives in the country?   That phrase right there makes the outcome of a lot of decisions clear to me, her grand mother.

Anyway, last week while parked under a tree at the soccer field, reading a book, it just came to me that HEY! I'm already coming to town two days a week. Why not work out while Katy's practicing rather than sitting around reading.  The next day I called and set up two sessions a week with a trainer there.  I told him that I also want to plan a small home workout for Saturdays so I won't have to drive to town yet another day. Perhaps just some weight work and aerobic dancing or something like that. I figure that by the time soccer is over in early November, I'll already be in the habit and will switch to mornings. Winter I'll worry about when it arrives.  Yesterday was  to be the first day...I got pants and everything...but my cold was too bad to take out in public and besides I felt awful.  Tomorrow it begins.  I have had  many periods in my life when I worked out faithfully and had wonderful results.  But I've let a lot of time pass since the last period like that and I know I'll have to work hard and hurt like hell to see any results. But the time seems just right.  Post divorce, new life, and all that...

I can't wait to see those beautiful muscles. Any muscles at all will be good, Universe, my expectations are reasonable.

Just A Little Note

I have the first darned cold of the season.  It seems awfully early this year.  I never had colds. If people were talking about getting colds, I'd say Oh I don't get colds. But that changed dramatically when Katy came.  For the past two years I've had terrible colds off and on.  She will come home with the tiniest little sniffle and that disappears after a couple of days.  Then it hits me, but wow! What a difference.  It is her young strong immune system I suppose and my not so young and strong one.  I do think that high anxiety which is my frequent buddy lends a hand to it also. 

I've sat down to write a few times, but my head feels a little mushy and upon reading my words they seemed to ramble a lot so I hit delete.  I just wanted to check in lest my dear readers think I've taken a leave of absence. (hmmmm...I'd love to take one of those).

I'll check in tomorrow.

Until then, sweet dreams or have a nice day, depending upon when you are reading this.