Last Day

We have finally reached that very last day of the year.  It's the time for reflection of the past and hopes for the future.  The day when all those firm resolutions to do better, become stronger, and accomplish more are written down.  It's the time we mull over all the possibilities and put our hopes into plans.  I know about this because I've done it year after year.

It can work.  Giving some thought to the things you want to do is a very good step in getting them done.  Planning the ways you think you can achieve them brings you even closer.  Of course, you then need to do those things.  I've done many.

This year I found I didn't need to wait for the first day on the new calendar to do all this.  I broke though the traditional conventions of starting my resolutions and plans by waiting for the very first day of the year or the very first day of the week or whatever mind trip I thought I needed to get started.  I got going somewhere (I don't even know the exact day/time) in mid-December.  I hadn't even plotted out, written down, or organized what I thought needed doing.  Somehow, this year, I already knew.  I skipped the first steps and went right to getting started without looking to the calendar to see when I would begin.  I just got started.  It clicked into place and instead of rubbing my temples and scowling at my list of things to do, trying to figure out how I would be able to do it, I started doing things.  All my normal fretting, analyzing, and figuring went by the wayside.  I lifted a one shoulder shrug at my doubts that would have normally plagued my plans.  And then I grinned at my own audacity and thought how that particular attitude had always been there in me, but I have managed to suppress it so well in the past.  And how it's held me back - but not this time, so I smiled to myself.

What a better way to go into the new year.  It widens my scope of what I can do because I am not counting off things I didn't get done but already moved on to the new possibilities.  Maybe, that is something that comes with age?  I mean, I did turn a year older today.  Because today, besides all the resolutions, plans, and New Years Celebrations, you see, it is also my birthday.

I have a feeling it's going to be a great year.
TT

Two thoughts

I made the mistake of taking a look at the calendar.  I can see this month - no this year - barreling to an end.  There are only a few days left and normally at about this time I would be taking measure of all the things I had done and should probably do in the future.  It would be about that time to tally up the scores because that is what you do at the end of a year and the beginning of a new.
 
Not so much this year.  At least, I am not feeling an overwhelming need to go over each and every thing I did or didn't accomplish.  I did a bunch of stuff whether I want to go through the list or not.  I'll do even more and I'm not exactly waiting for this new year to start to, well, get started.  I have a certain amount of momentum already growing that, I can tell, I am going to be able to build on.  It's a good feeling.

What I have learned this past year, if I must do any type of reflection, are two things.  They might not mean anything to anybody else, but it's what I have figured out for myself.
1)  I don't need an audience and
2)  I have nothing to prove

I don't even know how these two things must sound to anyone else but it doesn't matter.  That's the point.  I don't have to explain or figure out what is right or wrong for anybody else.  It's not arrogance, but a simple freedom to do what is important to me without carrying the weight of how it will look or feel or appear to anyone else.  The fact is nobody cares about what I do more than me.  Others might seem to care but they don't really.  I might learn from listening to others but they don't carry the same depth of feeling I do about the things I care about.  That's only a natural thing.  I don't need to put so much stock in others because I CAN rely on myself to care and do a good job on what I want to do.  I've done more research and self-education on all the things I spend most of my time doing.  It isn't as if I haven't built the knowledge on my own.

So with these freeing ideas of two simple thoughts, I can get all those things on the list for next year done.  Whatever they might be.  I have the capability and now the mental freedom to do them.  As I decide.  It isn't as if I have an audience to please.  I mean, really.  I've got nothing to prove.  Just a lot I care about doing.
TT  
  

Whole other way

I'm trying to get my head on straight about what day it is.  I've been off the past two days and it's felt like a Saturday or weekend and it isn't, which is especially nice and great and wonderful.  Now, today, it's Saturday; not that it makes a difference.  I'm still off from work and I don't have to return for another week!  What amazing grace of planning on my part was that!  Awesome.  Say it again, awesome.
I'm really good at this 'making my own schedule.'  I could do this for an unlimited amount of time.  Come to think of it, this is definitely going to be my next big goal.  It might take me some years and planning but I am going to make this happen.  I will get myself maneuvered into my much coveted position of not having to show up somewhere...like a job working for a paycheck.  How about that for a new year's resolution.  How about it?
The best part about this, is the whole formulation of a plan, no matter how sketchy, to accomplish something I now have in my head.  It will need some determination, a bit by bit forward motion, and probably some changes to the plan along the way.
Today is Saturday.  A normal day to be off and yet it's a whole 'nother day with a whole other meaning.  It's the start of a entirely new way to get up and look forward.
TT

Not minding

Cold, drippy rain and there is nothing like having the time off to sit inside and sip hot, black coffee as I watch.  My idea to take all this vacation time off from work was genius. I only stopped slightly when I made the decision to not return to work after Christmas until 1/6.  I'm having no trouble running down these last bits of this year and somehow, it seems to be turning out to be the best part of the entire length of time.  And I say that only after being off for one day.
I started yesterday early, but no too, too so.  Some bookkeeping was done, then I dressed to go out to the post office and the bank.  Then I stopped at the newly built gym, went inside, and signed up.  It seems like a small feat but I have not had a gym membership this entire year.  I was stubborn and pissed, it seems, all year.  It didn't do me well.  I'm not naturally a pissed person, but I have been.
Past tense.  Something clicked over during this month that changed within.  I can't pinpoint it exactly except to know it's gone.  Finally.  I'm so much happier now.
The gym - check.  I even went back yesterday afternoon and fudged through using the equipment.  I may check their schedule for a class today or just go back and have another run.  I mean, the weather outside is cold, drippy rain and what I would have done before was skip it completely.  Not so, anymore.  I even signed up for a few hours with a personal trainer.  Don't tell.  My first is on Monday at noon and I think it's all going to help.  Me.  To smile.  Again.  A lot.
I don't have to wait for a new year on the calendar to roll over to get started.  I'm doing it now.  Because I can and I don't even mind the weather.  
TT

Bliss

The phone rang just as I stepped out of the shower.  "Hurry," the voice said.  "The kiddos are waiting to open presents."
Christmas Day began a little earlier for me as I made coffee and tackled balancing Jay's receipts from the Shop.  I was all finished by the time I got the phone call and it was soon afterward we made our way to Sonny's house to start the day together.  It's what it's all about, isn't it?  It's bliss.
We managed to get the gifts wrapped and menu planned.  They were all quickly unwrapped with happy smiles and hours of playtime.  The food was superb. Nothing was rushed, nothing was forced, and all was well.   Smiles and hugs.

 Breakfast:
Eggs, Hash Browns, Bacon, Sausage, Croissants, Berries.
Dinner:
Stuffed Artichokes
Steak
Breaded Shrimp
Broiled Shrimp
Scalloped Potatoes
Steamed Broccoli
Creamed Spinach
Tiramisu 

We couldn't keep everyone from eating the breaded shrimp as fast as we took them out of the pan!  We had to post shrimp security to make them stop stealing shrimp!  How's that for smiles!  We need to do those shrimp again, soon.
Merry, merry!
TT

What happened?

What the heck happened?

I was limping into December without an ounce of resolve to keep at this blog.  It was time to stop, close down shop, and let it go.  There was no longer any reasonable purpose.  I had used the blog the way I intended from the beginning which was to build a discipline of words.  The idea was to be consistent with the daily putting together of sentences in order to try to improve.   I felt I had done that over the course of many posts (over 1400) and since they were not making any cohesive sense, I thought to stop.  Enough.  Leave it blank and let it go.

Then real preventative measures started happening.  I stopped writing here on Dec 4th. I was asked to take care of Mr. L half a day on the afternoon of Friday, Dec 13th. The poor two year old had strep throat and couldn't go to daycare.  I watched him that afternoon and the next, giving him his first doses of antibiotics.  On the following Tuesday, Dante had major knee surgery.  I was there all day as his surgery stretched to two hours and my throat started to get scratching and I could feel a fever coming on.  It was evening before Dante was settled into his overnight room and I has exhausted and sick.  I went straight home to bed.  The next morning I awoke to text's from Dante saying the doctor had seen him and was being released.  No chance of getting to the doctor for my own antibiotics yet.  We rushed and picked him up and brought him home.  My home.  He cannot bend his entire left leg.  He blew out his entire ACL, FCL and meniscus.  He will be on crutches for six weeks and this first day there was no way he could make it up to his second floor apartment.  With him settled for the moment, I went out to the emergency care and got my meds.  Then, I was asked to take care of Mr. L.  Why not?  I was already home with Dante even if I was miserably sick.  I mean, they were too.  One couldn't move and the other was all over the house until I propped the younger one into bed with the older one and told them to watch each other.
Before I knew it, everyone was cleared out of the house and I managed to sleep through the entire day of Saturday.  Then I woke up Monday morning and it's two days before Christmas with not all gifts bought and NO MENU.

Things have gotten too far away from me.  I'm feeling better but have minimum time.  Can I pull it together?  I will.  No one will go without, and no one will go hungry.

And the blog?  I don't have time to think about that now.  Besides, sometimes I think too much.
TT  

Blank

A funny thing happened when I came to write a new post.  I didn't have anything I wanted to say.  I couldn't find the words that led to anything I thought anyone would have any particular interest in hearing or reading.  I wrote a few things.  I reread them.  I deleted them.  I did it all again and then I repeated the process, several times.  In the end, I realized I was staring at exactly what I had when I started.  A blank page.
So I stared at it for a while longer, but nothing changed.  It was still blank.
I decided to give it a rest, so I saved it as a draft and left it for a few weeks.  When I came back and looked at it again, it hadn't changed.  It was still the same blank page.








No.  Still nothing.
TT