Doodledash

A week ago I was struggling fiercely with a multitude of issues and drowning. Today the issues are still there but I am not struggling. I know what they are. I can feel them. I decided that I can't take responsibility for them and so I don't have to be overwhelmed by them. I am very thankful that I have pushed through them. My daughter got engaged a few days ago. I was surprised by it and it is not real easy for me. I love her with all my heart but I don't support the choices that she has made. I have and I continue to learn to walk in love and to not condemn those who believe differently than myself. It is a challenge for me and I am a work in progress. I do very much love you honey and I will always be there for you no matter what. I am proud of you for the woman that you are and I have great respect for you. My ultimate wish is for you to be happy. I do love Mackenzie. I love you Kate.

One of the definitions of wallow is To luxuriate; revel: as in wallow in self righteousness. I have not been wallowing in self righteousness at the moment but I have been a wallower of the first order. I have been wallowing in self pity, pain, anger, frustration, helplessness, discouragement, fear, and a host of other shades of dark. It has been one of the most miserable times of my life. I have felt like I was walking on the edge of darkness and felt like the ground was going to give way and I would collapse into its toxic hold. I did a lot of praying and crying. I had a lot of prayers from family and friends that helped push me through it. It is because of the grace of God and his protection that I got through the Valley of Shadows. I felt the sunshine on my face this morning as I climbed out of it and it was raining but what a beautiful rain. God in his mercy and love, though I do not understand it, allowed me to make this dark journey and walked along side of me the whole way....

My beloved has now joined the ranks of the student world. He is going to school to become a paralegal which is very cool but it is an extremely intense day. 3 hour lectures twice a day, 4 days a week. I am very proud of him and admire his discipline. He has hunkered down and diligently studying. What a fantabulous example of dedication and shows his wife and daughter how to do it! My life has been on a three month weird. It just felt so out of balance with my beloved home. I enjoyed his company but just wasn't used to having so much togetherness. Now that he is in school, there is a more balanced feel. I am not ready for retirement yet. Anyway, I have not really been in a routine for a while and decided I need to have some regularity in my life so I am starting to blog again. Sky is blue, muggy weather, shine, rain, summer is here. So I was always really interested in watching NCIS. I-we finally watched it one day in Jan/Feb. We were seriously hooked and set up the dvr to r...

I want to thank all those who have served in the armed services of our country. Thank you for your courage. Thank you for your sacrifice. Thank you for giving it all and laying it on the line. Thank you for living what you believe. Thank you for loving your country. Thank you for dignity and your grace. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to live in the greatest country on earth. Thank you families for your sacrifice and your sharing. Thank you for all you give every day of your life. Thank you for all you have done, do now and will do in the future. I salute you. I pray for you. I honor you. May God Bless You.

My friend titled her recent blog entry the same and I have to echo the thought. I don't where the time went. It was the end of March and suddenly I find myself at April 39 with little memory of the time in between save Easter. Major brainfarts I guess! Lots of stuff has been on my mind lately. Not sure where it will all end up but it is definitely some deep thinking. I know that makes no sense. I am tired and sad. I am happy and energetic. I am quiet and calm. I am up and down. I am most of all rambling. I went to a Twins game at Target Field last week with my hubby and we had a great time. Game sucked but the company was terrific and the locale stupendous. What a beautiful place it is and we took a bus to the game so no parking and traffic issues. Definitely the way to travel. The end of the school year is approaching and I feel it. Amy is itching for it to end. I want it to end. I am feeling freaky though because she has one more year of school and then what? Scares me. Ter...

I have had a very bad case of extended tunnel vision. It has slowly come to my attention how bad it has been. We played poker with friends. We went to a house that I have not visited before and it was a nice place. It was a nice place and told a lot about the owners. I felt like I was paying more attention to the surroundings than to the game. I still won anyway. I carefully examined the walls and decorations absorbing it all. I realized just how much I wasn't in my home. I determined at that time to make some changes. I came  home and looked around. I don't recognize myself in my home. I live here but who I am is not here. There are things that I have had for a long time but they are not necessarily who I am now. I have been a sideline observer not a participant here. I haven't known what I wanted so I gave up. Time to get off the rear and shift into gear. I am not sure what that all entails but time will tell. Another step forward after so many steps back. I have ...

My favorite song from Phantom of the Opera is The Point of No Return. The music sweeps me into the moment as Phantom and Christine come to the point where he is about to declare his love and she rips off his mask. From that point on everything has changed and there is no going back.  My brother recently told me about his moment when he made a choice and it was not the right one. He said it was several years ago but he can pinpoint it exactly as the starting point of when things changed. It was a point of no return. He looks back on it now with sadness and regret.  His story brought to mind a few of my moments which I have regrets about it. I can remember them both very clearly as if they were yesterday. It really confirms to me how important it is to maintain a vigil and stand strong with the things that are important to you. I have been so conscious of the choices I make and the result of the choice for the past several months. I may have written about it, but I can'...

I am bored with stuff. I am bored watching tv. I am bored on the computer. I am bored on facebook. I am bored reading. I am bored and want a new challenge. I am not sure what that will be. Husband now laid off for a week. He is keeping busy but bored at times too. We are adjusting to more togetherness. It is something new for all of us. It is like being on an endless vacation with lots of time on our hands. He spends a lot of time online looking for and applying for jobs. Tuesday was a hard day for me. It was the one year anniversary of my friend's death. I look back and appreciate the person she was and the friendship we had. I made changes in my life as a result of her departure. I am proud of myself for these changes and know that she would have been too. You know what is hard is really hard for me is being proud of myself. I share how much weight I have lost with people and they congratulate me. I can smile and not feel embarrassed but part of me is still shunning the att...

I am currently helping Amy with a study guide for the Crucible. I am in agony doing it. She is not enjoying the experience either. It is 17 pages long with a zillion questions. It is groanningly awful. I don't care about the book and Amy currently has been falling asleep. She has mush brain syndrome right now. UGH.

i was cold and decided after i had been standing in front of the open oven door and having longing thoughts of a hot shower that i might be sick. i took my temp and voila i had a fever. that was almost two weeks ago. it was a most unpleasant experience especially when amy was home sick too. we both missed a week of work/school. last saturday i was driving by my clinic and looked longing at it. i decided maybe i needed to go to urgent care. i had a sinus infection and got some antibiotics and sudafed. my sinus sludge had just gotten to be too awful and a few days of the magic pills gave me a clear head and body free of aches. it was wonderful. i am now human again. it truly is a most amazing gift from God to be healthy and i rejoice in it. health is a wonderful gift. one great result of my illness was i lost 6 pounds and have now passed the 30 poundage milestone!!!!! huzzah. hurrah. hallelujah and praise the lord. today at work someone who asked if i had lost weight and i sm...

It has actually been a hard year. A year ago I was clueless as to what was going to happen. Clueless can be nice at times. Enough negative. Focus on the positive. I have lost 25 pounds. I am proud of that. I need to focus on the weight loss more seriously. Since the holidays I have been distracted. I have reached a plateau and need to shake it up somehow. I went to Joann Fabric today and bought some yarn and knitting needles. I am going to give it another go at knitting. I have been reading a series of murder mysteries that are centered around a yarn shop. Hero has learned to knit and is progressing. It has inspired me. I am going to make a dishcloth. I have started doing things that I like to do. I am trying to make time for me. Allow myself some fun. It is hard but I am slowly progressing. I have read several books which makes me very happy. I am trying to stop playing so many games on Facebook. I waste a lot of time doing it and I have to clamp down on it. I am really ...

Today it was announced that Walgreens bought Snyders and Dane will no longer have a job. We had some warning about it so it wasn't a shock as it was for so many others. It doesn't make it any easier though. Once it was real, it was hard to not have that fear want to knock me down. I would appreciate prayers for all of us and especially for Dane. This is the only job he has had and he has been a loyal employee for 30+ years. It is exhilarating, exciting and scary for him and me. I have my job and will be able to still have insurance for our family. It is just hard when change is forced on you. I needed a shakeup and so did Dane. Now we have an opportunity for a new adventure. Onward ho!

I needed a change. So I now have a sleek cleaned up simplified version of my blog. I love the fish. I saw that under gadgets and couldn't resist. You can feed them if you run your mouse over them! Yesterday my family went out to one of my favorite restaurants, Maggiano's, to celebrate my birthday. We had a very fun time but Mackenzie felt it necessary to blow out the candle when I was examining it because she thought I would play with it. I do admit that I enjoy playing with candles and fire holds a certain fascination for me. She really did not need to do that though. But c'est la vie. It has been extremely cold in the frozen north for the past few days. I went to work this morning and it was -15 degrees. Good way to slap you awake when that cold hits your face. It was a long day but went well. I was very glad to get home. I warmed the car up for 10 minutes before I left this morning and was warm on the way to work. I left work and finally started to warm up with heat ...

and I finally have acknowledged the fact that though I want to do a Christmas letter in thought. In reality, I don't want to do it. I thought I did but every time I sit down to do it, I clearly don't want to do it. So I am not going to do it. Enough said. We celebrated Christmas with my mother in law on Sunday and she gave me an absolutely fabulous gift, a box of 40 individual flavors of jelly belly. I love it because I can eat a few and have the pleasure of the taste. Nummy. My favorite flavor is juicy pear which I had two of and a yellow one and to my horror a licorice one. I had to spit the whole thing out. Ruined my taste buds for a long time. I hate licorice. We are supposed to get a lot of snow on Christmas Eve and Christmas. I hope we don't have to postpone our celebration. That would be a first and a big disappointment to my family. I finally tasted a cappuchino right now jelly belly that is. I don't drink coffee and tasted it out of curiosity. Not my favo...

hindsight ( ) n. Perception of the significance and nature of events after they have occurred.  I still have not written my Christmas letter because I needed to review and decide what to write. I just finished reading my blog entries for this year. I figured that I would have written about the highlights and wanted to make sure that I didn't miss anything. I titled this hindsight because it has quickly become apparent to me what the significant events of the year have pushed me to do. My friend Jone's death was the key event of the year. I promised myself that I would make some changes and no longer put off important things anymore. I can see the effect that decision has had on my life.  I joined Weight Watchers which changed me in ways I never imagined.  I have lost 22 pounds so far, I have learned to change the way I think about  myself. I like who I am. I am proud of myself for changing.  I have learned that I can make mistakes and not be a failu...

for the first time in my life I am going to write a Christmas letter. I read an article on how not to write a Christmas letter and loved it. It inspired me to do one because her suggestions were right up my alley. I read one of the most boring ones ever this year and I decided that mine will never stoop to that level of snooziness. I kept thinking of the monotone that Ben Stein uses in Ferris Bueller's Day Off...Bueller, Bueller...no way does this chickadee do that to anyone. Well off to the composition and may it come off well. Later gator.

The weather outside is quiet at the moment. It is cold and crispy out though. It snowed and it is now a winter wonderland outside my door. Tomorrow morning I will have to face it for the first time in two days. I have been home with Amy for past two days since she didn't feel well. Good time to be missing school at least with snow and cold and wind. I have had ginormous struggles the past few days. I want to just crawl into a hole and hibernate for the winter. I am facing things a step at a time but it is taking everything I got plus more to deal with it. I am not even sure what it entails but I will discover it. I have been definitely avoiding thinking about by having a song/songs play continuously in my brain so I can't think about it. It doesn't work. When the song stops, the thoughts keep right on going. I know it is vague but right now I am vague. I intend to do some serious thinking when I finish this. So off to bed and may you have a good day tomorrow.

I had really good intentions to write every day but did not accomplish it. I will do better in December. Thanksgiving was a nice time. I had a turkey issue that made me tense. I have never a turkey that was not finished cooking early. I put in the meat thermometer after 4 hours and it said it was done. I took out the bird, took it out of the bag, placed it on the platter and Dane started carving. He kept saying how hard it was to carve and I looked at it. The meat was not done and everything else is. He finished carving and I nuked the white meat, put the dark meat in foil and stuck it in the oven. It was good and worked out well. I bought a digital meat thermometer to use from now on. Not gonna do that one again. Raw turkey is so unappealing! My mother-in-law(who was fairly well behaved), my parents, my brothers Bill and Greg, and Amy were here for the day. It was pleasant and I really appreciated my mom and everyone's help with the meal. After the meal was done and clean up w...

this has been a really shitty day. arguments and tense. stress. yuck. all of us have been wound up and walking on eggshells. i warned amy this morning that i was walking on eggshells with myself and to beware. there was just a lot of things that came up and bit all in the ass. it was not fun. nothing productive about any of it. kate and mackenzie came over for dinner and that was nice. it was the highlight of the day. i love crockpots. thank goodness it is time for bed and time for putting the past behind me. good night and good riddance to sunday.

I have 45 minutes of me time right now until I have to leave for work.  For the moment I have chosen to use some of them for writing this. I had a disturbing revelation this morning that will be my topic of pondering for quite a while. I realized that all my life I have tried to be a lot of different people. I have tried to be my mom, my dad, my aunts, an uncle or two,  my husband, my neighbors, my friends, my respected people, my aquaintances, my coworkers, my kids, and others. It was a matter of I thought I would be better if I acted like (insert name here) .   Now there was one very important name missing in the list. It was mine. I was trying to be everyone else but Debbie.  So now all these thoughts are flooding through my head...I don't have to be a (insert word here) . I don't have to be a math whiz like ( insert name here) , I don't have to be like (insert name here) , etc. It is very scary, very liberating, very exciting, very life changing.  ...