sick

just a quick update...i have been sick since saturday night. and it sucks. started in my throat, then took over my head and face and neck, then just kind of hung out all over there for a day, now my throat is all phlegmy and hurts and i sound like a boy going through puberty. i'm also pretty tired, but i am getting some energy back today, i think. spent all of sunday in bed, though. can't remember the last time i did that.

so life goes on and there's lots everyone's going through, but it's funny how being sick can just kind of push all of that to the proverbial backburner. i mean, you've still got to deal with it in the moment, but process it too? nah. save it for a rainy day, right?

peace

prayers on a busy day

today's been kind of...busy....eventful...something like that.

i woke up and got to chat with a friend online. that was good stuff. she's going camping, but i'm not so jealous i don't still like her lots. (i will camp this summer, i will camp this summer...)

once i picked up teen at his dual enrollment class, i decided that i was going to get some stuff accomplished. but my sister called first to tell me that my aunt is in the icu...with meningitis. my cousins are my kids ages...well, her older daughter is ten months older than my oldest and her younger daughter is a week older than my second born. and their mama's in the icu...and can barely remember who she is or where she is. so some prayers for her, please...my aunt lori.

then we ran our errands. teen was not too happy once we finished because he's decided he doesn't need to eat breakfast. which i don't agree with...but i don't get to agree with everything he chooses and i'm alright with that. but when i decide to run an hour's worth of errands...ok, maybe an hour and a half...and he's starving and grouchy as hell by the end, well, then i feel his choice is inconvenient. much in the way he felt mine was inconvenient. it's so hard when you aren't the one driving the car. and i empathize with that. but i also know he'll have much time to be the one driving in his future, so i've let it go. plus, once he ate, he was back to normal.

but get this...i load everyone in the car, thinking we're running late to piano, so i've got that extra edge to my voice...we need to hurry kind of thing. we back down the driveway and something in the universe shifts and i ask teenager, "isn't piano at 2?" he says, "yeah, i think so." so i ask, "then why are you letting me run everyone out the door and load us up as though it's at 1?" he thought i'd gotten a call or something. children are so trusting. even when they know we're nutso. so i drove back up the driveway and my youngest shouts, "well, that was a short trip!"

oy...i'm going to skip the part about talking to my mother and the way things are going with her and my stepfather...it was a two hour conversation, but i just don't have the energy to even summarize it. we DID, however, pick up teenager's glasses. and the wonderful woman at the glasses place even fixed his spare pair that we didn't even buy there. i was and still am very, very grateful.

oh, and speaking of gratitude...my bil and sil sponsored my oldest for his robotics trip. once i let go of some of my fear, things work out amazingly well. once i know longer try to be the only one in control, it seems others find room to step in...and then it is so much better.

so prayers for aunt lori...and my little niece is still in the nicu...getting better, but still there. maybe the week after easter she'll get to come home.

peace

weekend edition--short version

so...no one puked at my house. i think the odds of being exposed by two different folks to two different puking viruses in the same house and NONE OF US getting the virus are slim. which makes me feel like we have immune systems of steel. and maybe that's not what it means, but it is how i feel, and that is what matters....

my nephews came and spent the night last night. seven young men/boys...ages 16 (almost 17), 15 (just turned...yesterday was his birthday), 14 (that one's mine), 13, 10 (almost 11...mine also), 9, and 5...it was a blast. it really, really was. i am so glad we did it and we all had such a good time...almost burned the house down with my less than brilliant candle placement on my nephew's cake, but otherwise...all great.

i do notice, as i keep going forward with this life, how some things change...many things change. but many don't. but i can always change how i react to things. if i choose to. and i imagine that as i change how i act in those types of situations, it will change my whole perception of them. i don't know. i just have to slow down a little...pay attention somewhat...relax the rest of the somewhat. something like that.

lately, i have this feeling like there's more to say, but then i just can't frame any of it in words. there are many things and many people i pray for right now...but most of them involve situations i am fairly certain i do not know the right course in. i am fairly certain i cannot even sit and lay out five distinct courses for any one situation, which tells me i am limited in conceiving a solution. so, all i can do is offer my sincerest wishes for peace in and for all of them. and that's where i'll end this...
peace

cleaning up and resting

so my sister came to visit me. she brought my niece, punkin (aka pk), and we had a really nice evening. well, except for that part where she saw my gmail inbox and was appalled at the over 10,000 messages in my inbox. so she set out to clean out my gmail account, creating folders, labels, color-coordinating...she's all "computer science" like that... and i ran across this post on a yahoo group that dissolved a long time ago that made me smile. i was reading anne lamott's fiction book, joe jones, at the time and this passage had caught my attention...

"Left to its own devices, her mind is a fat hummingbird flitting
through leafy trees of anxiety, apology, sorrow, excuses, and dreams
of grandeur, dreams of humiliation. Sometimes she watches it run
off, and it makes her laugh and shake her head. It's like a video
game. Bright fast blips of worry and anger come at her, and after
fending them off, she's attacked by the huge lumbering
Czechoslovakian blobs of tiredness and broken-spiritedness which
break into smaller, faster missiles of regret when she fires at
them. What a half-baked species we are, she thinks, and does what
she can to make her insides more habitable."

it still makes me laugh. and i still believe annie wrote that whole book to put that hilarious and brilliant paragraph in...

also, i think we are all getting strep throat in my house. headaches, fever, sore throats, and eventually spots in throats. i'm amazed how everyone in my family, except my spouse, seems to be in some phase of this. ibuprofen, the new white meat...

cooperative efforts seem to be attracting cooperative folks...this boosters my confidence in the universe. as well as soothes some of my anxieties. because i've been taking some hits in the hsing front these days. marriage shifts and life shifts and hsing shifts have all converged for a huge upheaval this past week. i so appreciate the hands that kept me on my feet and the words that helped light up corners where the flame was getting a little weak. i am amazed by the wisdom that finds me and deems me worthy to share with, but then i have to remind myself that there is a certain wisdom in me to respect and embrace others, too. such a bunch of wise guys are we, eh?

ok, back to the resting part...
peace