guess i'm feeling irritable

because i'm thinking about how tired i am of summer...

it's just so damned hot...

and there's no structure...it's all so willy-nilly...the kids are always asking me if they can do everything? can we buy some candy? can we have ice cream? can i go outside? can i get a kleenex? can i sit on the toilet seat?... ugh... i like i better when we have a routine and they all just know what to do without asking... and all that asking means so much talking and how is a mama supposed to think with all that talking going on?....

and did i mention how freaking hot it is? like, if it's outside and you don't do it before ten or after seven, you'll probably get a heat stroke...

and we're going camping...what was i thinking? there have been so many errands to run and so much stuff to buy...camping gets expensive when you only do it every year or two and lend out your stuff or lose it and then don't have what you need.

ok, this is getting whiny instead of irritable. it's probably the heat getting to me...

we've been busy since we got up and we're just taking a small break before we get busy for the rest of the day....it's actually going quite well. i think we'll be ready when it's time to go. (although my bil wants me to leave here at three in the morning and you tell me who the hell's ready at three in the morning...) but we're making good progress. if we can get the things on the list done for today, i think we'll be pretty smooth from here out... wish us luck!
peace

ps--julie walker did great. i am told she is looking great and her first words out of anaesthesia were about whether or not her son had fed their dogs and whether her daughter had written thank you notes...or something like that. i hope if i am ever coming out of anaesthesia with someone in the room to hear me, well, that i just don't say anything. but thank you for the prayers and positive thoughts and energy...it worked.

pps--ok, i'll be quiet. after whining about the heat and summer and such, i read this story. i mean geez, the whole olympics coming, you're trying to clean up stuff, deal with civil protests, what not and then bam...more trouble... makes me laugh because i feel like i can relate... (i'm sure china deeply appreciates my understanding...snort)

tired

so my oldest has strep throat. and everyone just seems kind of grumpy and every once in awhile someone mentions a headache, which in turn, gives me a headache...

but i did pull out our hiking packs today and check out some books from the library on the grand canyon, bryce national park, and zion national park...also one on hiking essentials that has some fun exercises i might show the kids.

between the headaches of the day and deciding today would be the day i'd begin my coffee free mornings, i'm just too tired to blog more.
peace

weekend recap

a friend of mine came up thursday to stay for a few days. and then my sister came up friday night. it was a busy, fun, gentle, wonderful weekend... (yes, sister...i know you had nothing to do with the gentle stuff...whatever)

i already blogged on friday. i think all that's left to say there is that the bread came out really good, the mozzarella? notsomuch. but, like everything, it was a learning experience. some family also joined us friday evening, and while i was completely exhausted by the time i went to bed, i also had a really great day.

saturday, dh and my sis and i got up and took two cars to get tires done on them, ran dh by the hospital to check in a patient, then we went back and picked up the cars that i couldn't believe were ready. that is, by far, the fastest i've ever seen tires done on a car. it was, well, obviously remarkable...

then we went on a hike for awhile...that was fun. my only regret? i didn't take my camera. but the eight of us had a really good time and saw some really beautiful things...caves, springs, small waterfalls...also some indiana jones-ish ants in the springs, somehow gathering and eating whatever small things they could find even though they seemed to be transported by moving water that they had no control over...and what were they eating? bugs, leaves, fingers, i don't know. they were a little creepy.

then we went to a lake and swam for awhile. the lake was choppy, we all got too much sun, and the fruit was gritty...we had a blast. we never did put the kayaks in, but we did find a great spot to try next time. and we can take the dogs next time, too.

so this morning, it was my sister and i and the kids, on our own. dh was on call. we had a good time. made homemade cinnamon rolls. bought a video game. went to the pet store. bought a friend for amy...named her annie. she's sooooo cute. bought my oldest a few fish for his tank, too. and listened to the "specialty" dog food woman talk so we could get the free sample. (woo!) fun times, fun times.

so everyone is gone now. dh isn't home yet. i'm trying to enjoy the quiet and also let the let-down of the party being over pass through me, too. it was sure fun while it lasted, though...

i still had my morbidly intense moments this weekend, but the weekend wasn't defined by them. i also ate some crappy junk food this weekend...but i'm not defined by that either. i've practiced letting emotions be and go without holding on to them all weekend. and it's felt good...felt right. but it does make who i feel like i "am" a little more fluid, a little more dynamic. and i kind of like that, too...

ok, i'm off to handle my mice for awhile...and anything else i can remember i've been "meaning to do..."
peace

ramble on

so the blogger at triangle nose posted the simon and garfunkel video to slip sliding away. she's so cool, because below the video, she posted the line, "you know the nearer your destination, the more you slip sliding away." and that has stuck with me since i read it yesterday. kind of a challenging of that sense of control...the more you think you have it, the more the universe will pull you back to the reality that you don't have it. i mean, i think that's a strange statement in the sense that yes, there are things you are in control of. like...you. and only you. and really, only certain aspects of you, at that. and then there are those times we think we're controlling our lives, but actually, it is someone else and their impact on our lives we are trying to control which is, you guessed it, someone else and not a small aspect of you that you actually have control over. i have been turning that line around in my mind off and on for awhile.

then...i am attending a book club tonight. i've been invited for a number of months, but am finally going to remember to go and make the effort to be there tonight. the book we're reading is the secret life of bees, by sue monk kidd. i think i have lent my copy of it out, so i haven't actually read it...this month...or even this year. i read it a few years ago. and i am not remembering it very well. i vaguely remember the story line...online synopses have helped jog my memory a bit this morning...yes, i am cheating for my book club. i am already a book club failure...ha but i found this little passage today....

"You know, some things don't matter that much, Lily. Like the color of a house. How big is that in the overall scheme of life? But lifting a person's heart--now, that matters. The whole problem with people is--"

"They don't know what matters and what doesn't," I said, filling in her sentence and feeling proud of myself for doing so.

"I was gonna say, The problem is they know what matters, but they don't choose it. You know how hard that is, Lily? I love May, but it was still so hard to choose Caribbean Pink. The hardest thing on earth is choosing what matters" (147).

i had a post i never posted the other day that started with talking about the hiking i did when my kids had their outdoor climbing trip last week. how i had forgotten how you can follow a path when you're hiking, be trucking along, and then all of a sudden, that path stops. and i'm usually pretty focused on helping a little one on the path, so it's always kind of disorienting to me to lose the path or find that a path has ended. like, "huh? where the hell did the path go?" then i have to look around...usually behind me ("yeah, there's the path i was following, i'm not making this shit up"), then around me ("yeah, there were others on the path and they seem a little confused, too...except for that guy over there...why doesn't he look confused?..."), and then start picking out a "do-able" route to the next path i can find. (yes, i am almost always this conscious of things...it annoys me too, so get over it.)

and that's been kind of how life has been lately. i was trucking along at a good pace, feeling confident in the path and my ability to make it, and then all of a freaking sudden, that path disappeared. whoa. (i know, i know...it was hardly even noticeable, right?) well, it was hardly tolerable at times, but i think i've found another path. i have no clue where it goes, but i have faith in a greater power, an infinite good, an ancient wisdom...a collective consciousness...yeah, it's God...feminine and masculine, understood, beyond understanding. i was talking to a friend who studies a lot of buddhism the other day. i was telling him how the masculine pronouns in the bible irked me. you know...the whole perpetuation of patriarchy in christianity. so he started telling me how for something to be, there must first be a space for it to exist in. we were comparing it to breathing...how your lungs expand (or the diaphragm expands them...this isn't biology), creating a vacuum that draws in the air. so he was saying that if God was masculine, the space God came into, fills, exists in was feminine. to which i responded that the universe is the feminine uterus God exists in?!? and he said right!!! i don't know. it was a fun discussion...even if it was the blind leading the blind. :)

so anyway...doubt and misery and anger and resentment have come in and cleared out a path, i suppose. although i don't really want to be on a path created by those things.... maybe they came in and cleared out all those silly notions that i am the most important or that i am in control. and now i can hear the things i need to hear. now i can feel the pull toward what i call my true north. it's always been a very strong pull....in a direction i do not always understand because i am not always consciously choosing it...other than i am choosing to follow the pull. i don't know. hard to explain in words. but so much more natural than the last month...although i suppose that was natural, too. in a painful, uncomfortable way. there are still things i need to do. and i am sure i will get them done when i am ready. i'm on a path again, see...so i can see a little ways ahead of me. ;)

ramble off
peace