I had a fantastic time when Jill was here. It was almost like a drug for me - and by that I mean having someone to spend time with for an entire week was a high that I just can't explain and the detox of getting back to normal life is not easy. However - while she was here we saw a LOT of stuff! We played at Garden of the Gods, saw the Coors Brewery tour, the Celestial Seasonings tour, putzed in Golden, had tea at the Boulder Tea House, putzed in Boulder, cooked, had Wahoo's Fish Tacos, had an impromptu St. Patrick's Day party complete with Shepherd's Pie and discovering your leprechaun name. We played Yahtzee and Battleship and Hit the Deck, sat in the hot tub, watched American Idol and I slept while Jill enjoyed Lost. I'm sure this is not all, and yet it's enough to show that we had a rockin good time. And that I put a lot of miles on my car.
In the coming down and getting back to real life I was struck again with a realization that I was beginning to come to before she came and shelved while she was here. I am lost. I know where I've come from, and I have no idea where I'm going. You know how people have dreams and plans and hopes. I have almost none of this. I live each day with little regard for the next. I was taught for a long time that this was great. That worrying about the future is not trusting. I've realized in the past month or so however that there's a difference between worrying and dreaming and planning. I'm in the process of claiming some hopes and dreams - and building a plan from there with the understanding that things will probably not go exactly as I think they will.
I've been playing with a couple analogies and both of them are equally true so I'll try to explain what I've been feeling this way. I feel like my life has been a hike in the woods. I had a map and food and water and somewhere I took a wrong turn. I didn't realize it for a while though, and I'm not quite sure where that turn was. Instead of consulting my map, or trying to get help I started hugging a tree and hoped someone would eventually find me. The other analogy is a boating analogy and it's quite similar. In this story I started off on an oceanic voyage in a small sailboat. I lose my way again, and instead of calling the coast guard or searching for ships nearby I put in anchor so I don't drift any longer and hope that another boat crosses my path.
Well, I'm done waiting. I'm trying to make choices that put me back on the journey. I still don't believe life is about any sort of destination, but if I'm not going anywhere, seeing anything, I'm still missing the point. And that sucks.
Why do people insist on doing "service projects" at the crack of dawn? This morning there are people working at the homeless coffee shop and they have been making ungodly amounts of noise beginning at 7:00 am! I get that you want to help. Please think bigger than the homeless coffee shop - there are normal, law abiding condo dwellers in all the buildings around you who just want to sleep on a Saturday morning. Be considerate.
I made an appointment yesterday to see a dietitian. I've put on 20 pounds in the last 3 1/2 months which is completely bull and I have no idea what's going on. I know I've been stressed and a little on the depressed side which leads to more couch potato type behavior. Not enough to put me in the blow up like a gigantic balloon category though - which is where I feel like I am.
My clothes don't fit well, I don't have any energy and I'm just generally feeling run down. My hope is that with some eating advice, a new exercise plan and some commitment I'll be able to lose some of this by bathing suit season. And before I need to start buying a new wardrobe. That would be bad on oh so many levels!
My own house. Someone in the condo above ours is having what sounds like some fantastic sex. I would like to sleep and it is entirely impossible with all the moaning, and yes, Yes, YES and the rhythmic squeaking of the bed springs. I may have to sleep on the couch if they keep it up.
Patio season is my favorite season! We've had a string of gorgeous days here in Denver. Friday night Vivian and I drank Sangria on her patio after I had sat there for the afternoon soaking up the sun. Sunday Vivian and I walked around downtown and ended up on the roof at LoDo's. Sheralee met us there and we ended up going to the Chipotle by our house because we were tired of waiting for a table. It was amazing. Today was beautiful yet again - I'm sure it was at least 70 degrees out. Vivian and I grabbed some burgers on the way home from work and we grilled out. On March 12! I heart patio season so much - it's for sure my favorite season.
It hurts too. I love the people in my life - the peeps I get to share every day with. There's one less person on that list these days, and I miss him like crazy. I want so much to be sharing this thing that I love so much with him. Yet I can't bring myself to do anything about it - I'm afraid that the hurt will only grow, and I don't think I'd be able to handle that. I'm barely handling this.
If there's one thing that I dislike more than people complaining about how long it took them to get to work it's meetings called at the last minute. When I got in to work this morning my boss told me we were to have a sales and marketing meeting in a half an hour. Which is in the end not a huge inconvenience for me. However - since we've been asked to be out of the office as much as possible my boss and I are the only ones in the department who have reported to the office for work this morning. Seriously people - if you want us at a meeting then ask. Ask more that 15 minutes before you want the meeting to start. I won't get into my theories of what I think my coworkers were doing when my boss called, but let's just say I don't think they were at appointments.
My sister is making the ultimate sacrifice and riding to Denver with "the smelly people" as they've been so lovingly dubbed by my family. I will do everything within my power to get them all to shower at my house on the way home - that's the bad part apparently.
I had no idea how much emotion I had tied up in the fact that she still didn't have a way to get out here. It's not as though everything is "solved" now or that I'm feeling suddenly perfect, and yet at the same time knowing I can safely look forward to having her in town for a week has been comforting in a way I can't explain.
Also comforting - warm weather and a lovely night of sangria and porch sitting.
Happy Birthday Dad! Here's to many more. Today is also International Women's Day. So - the one day of the year that should belong to my Dad - who has four daughters and no sons - is International Women's Day. Take that Alanis.
Am I the only person who thinks that raising your voice at a coworker in a meeting or at all is inappropriate and unacceptable behavior? This is my second job where raising your voice in a meeting is an almost every day occurrence. Seriously, can we just have a conversation without someone going on the damn defensive? I know I'm a woman with fairly thin skin and yet I just don't think it's acceptable to raise your voice at me or anyone for that matter. Let's have an adult conversation where we point out different sides of a solution and come to a conclusion together. If we can't do that I'd rather you just give me a list of things you want me to do and I'll be robotic in doing it. Gah I am so angry!
It is so nice out today. I'd say upper 50s if not 60 and the sun is shining - it is so exciting! Especially since I saw another car that had spun off into some snow last night on my way home from Divide, CO. Which is near Santa's Workshop. I can't make this up people.
The nice weather makes me so wish I could do some summer slacking today. I say this mostly because it's true, but also because the line summer slacking is from the song "The Way" by Fastball which takes me back to my freshman year of college. On Friday night Vivian and Sheralee and I were having dinner when another song that reminds me of the same year came on. I desperately wanted to remember "The Way" and spent at least 20 minutes trying to think of it. Sheralee finally helped and not 5 minutes later that song started playing at the restaurant. Also a true story.
I've hit a sad stage in the past couple of weeks. It started with an unexpected phone call from Arizona and, as is usual with me, it triggered me into bunches of other sadness that was there, right under the surface waiting to be let out. I hope that I can use this round to grieve better than I have in the past and to find energy to affect change. It's amazing to me how when I feel like this there is no place that feels safe, the littlest thing can get me in touch with that sadness and it is so easy to lose the energy to hold it together. I can't stop hearing the new Luda and Mary J. Blige song on the radio - Runaway Love. It's pretty. And for the last couple of days I've been thinking that maybe I'll runaway - because Mary J says she'll run away with me. And how cool would that be?
I saw two bad accidents today where the cars were no longer resting on their tires. And a coworker was in a pretty bad head on collision. I'm done with winter!
In my life as I know it I've been a fairly easy going, upbeat, positive thinker. It's come pretty easily. Then I moved to Colorado. While the positive thought about maybe someday, down the road, long from now still seems accessible, the short term seems pointless. I change this, I change that, this happens, that happens and yet I don't seem to be going anywhere. Is working day in, day out, paying the bills and trying to do the best you can all there is? Because seriously, if this is it then I'm moving to Hawaii, working at the front desk of a hotel for minimum wage and live in a tiny apartment. Cause then I'd get to go to the beach every day.
I don't know how to explain to you where this is coming from. Part of it is that there are a couple of things I want(ed) so bad that have not and are not turning out anything like I thought they would. There's part of me that's dying to those things, realizing that I had put some sort of false hope about those situations bring happiness. I'm tired of waiting. I'm tired of watching all these parts of me die - some for good reason, some I can't figure out - and so many times nothing is there to replace it. How long do things have to die? Where's the bottom? There was a time when I felt myself coming back to life, and now just a few months later I'm falling back again.
