Black Oak's Daughter

It’s funny how fast time passes. I keep thinking that I should write this or that, and by the time I sit down to write, I have no idea what all of those ideas were.

In the past couple of weeks, I’ve been to a birthday party, and a renaissance faire both in Wisconsin, a college trip with my best friend and her daughter, and my daughter’s house both in Iowa, a couple of doctors, had a birthday, watched about one and a half seasons of True Blood (i’m hooked!), met with my cousin to work on a project that I’m doing for them in my spare time, and somehow kept the house going, Roomie fed, and the cats alive. Most of that was done on weekends, I only took 2 days off from work that whole time and one of them was for my birthday where the only place I went was out for dinner.  It’s been a little busy.  It’s still busy, so this is probably going to be less than 200 words.

I’ll be back over the holiday weekend to actually write something.

Namaste.

PS for you geeks that would actually count, wordpress says 199 words including this PS.

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I was reading last week and I came across a couple of profound thoughts.  This one stuck with me though. 

Home isn’t a place, it’s a time.

We all have a time when we felt at home.  For me it was as a young child at my parents house.  As I grew up, that would change, but around age 4 or 5, that place was a beautiful haven, filled with love. It was what my idea of “home” comes from.   For Roomie, he moved around a lot as a kid, but the time that he keeps going back to, talking about, and the vast majority of memories that make him smile were 18 months that he spent in a particular school overseas, living there with his parents as they served the country. He came of age there in many ways, and remembers it very fondly.  Everyone has a time in their life that they remember that feeling from. The feeling that “I belong here” and the longing to go back to that place.

The thing is, you can’t go back to that place. It no longer exists. 

The people that bought my parents house have radically modified it, so much so that I have no interest in even seeing it anymore much less owning it like I used to dream of.   That place had an amazing charm that has been stripped away, probably because charm = maintenance in homeownership, and that place took an extreme amount of work to keep up. They’ve made it very low maintenance and dull now. The features, the gardens, the old trees that gave it it’s charm are gone now.  It doesn’t fit the memory.  They’ve ruined My Home. But have they?

That place hasn’t been my home for more than 18 years.  My memories there don’t require that the place still exist, and no one can take my memories.  I’m a little sad about what they’ve done to the place but that comes from an archetectural perspective, they’ve taken an early 20th century house that flaunted it’s charm and individuality, and stripped it of it’s dignity. It’s now a big bare box, with a big bare yard.  What a waste.

But that leaves me with the question, what is home? What makes a Home? What is this feeling of Home.

There’s something to be said for Home is where you are.  I can be at home at any number of my close friends houses. I’m going to a party tomorrow where I’ll feel very much at home because of the people there.  Even my best friend’s house, where the people are in the midst of several different versions of turmoil right now, feels like home because when I’m there, she’s there, and we are each other’s home. With nearly three decades of history, wherever we are is home, and even people around us respond to that. 

My house, that I’ve lived in for 16 years now, has had periods of feeling like home, but for the amount of time that I’ve been here I’d expect that I’d feel more like I belong in this place. The thing is that I never liked this house. It’s a box. Literally. A prefab, raised ranch, box. It has no character. There are a hundred just like it within 2 blocks.  It’s passable as a dwelling, but it’s not a place that I’d ever think would be capable of making me feel Home like my parents place did.  It was our starter home, we were going to be here a few years and then upgrade. Sixteen years later, it’s all mine now. Well, mine and the bank’s. Mostly the bank’s.  The marriage is over, the daughter is grown.  It still isn’t the house that I want, but due to the economy, and my own precarious financial position, I’m going to be here for a few more years unless something drastically changes. On one hand I’m grateful that I have a roof over my head in a time when so many people don’t, but  on the other,  if my circumstances were different, I’d have a really nice house, not much bigger than this one, but certainly more functional, and definitely something that reflects my style a little more than this box. I am to the point of being at peace in my current dwelling, but still playing the lottery too. A girl can dream, right? 

The thing is that I can’t hate this place. Through all of the stages of my life that I’ve lived here, it has served me decently enough.  When my girl was growing up, it had a yard, and the basketball net, and places to store bikes and pools and all sorts of that kind of paraphanalia. We had room to entertain, and entertain we did.  That stage of my life is mostly over. I still have a couple of holidays a year here with my family, but now it’s mostly it’s just Roomie and me at dinner every evening.  I love our dinners, and the time that we spend talking about where we’ve been and where we’re going. It’s really grounded me in a way that I haven’t felt since I was that small girl. 

Also, this house is now the place that is allowing both Roomie and I rebuild our lives after some pretty personal financial devastations. He’s got a place to work, and he’s made progress in his own life, and I’m slowly rebuilding and shaping my life into what I want it to be, not just financially, but also emotionally and physically.

We are here together, building whatever relationship this is that we have with each other at the same time we are fixing our own lives.  I care about him quite deeply. If you’d told me that I’d feel this way about someone that is so different from anyone that I’ve ever known, I’d have said that’s impossible.  He’s been here for me though, through some very ugly times in my life. He’s been rock solid, noble, and so kind.  He has shown me who he is consistently for the years that he’s lived here now. I’ve tried to be here for him too, although he totally outclasses me when it comes to that.  As different as we are though, whatever this is that we have works.  It feels like Home with him.

Home really is a time.  It’s my 4 year old self playing in my parent’s backyard.  It’s my time with Roomie,  my Best Friend,  Minime, or whatever other family is around. Wherever that is isn’t important, what is important is that we have that time.  This house is a place that holds our stuff, and keeps us sheltered. Home is wherever love lives, past, present, and future.

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The summer is always a bit of a ride, this one is no different.  Except for this weekend, I can’t say that I’ve been exceptionally busy, but I’ve been on a bit of an internal trip that I needed to take a break and listen to.

It’s 8 weeks now since the surgery. I’m about 90% back to normal.  The rest of the recovery is going to take a bit of effort. In order to get stamina back, I have to push myself, get back to doing some exercise, get the endorphans back up and get back to the trend toward health that I had going for the first half of the year.  That’s the big push from within now.  There have been a couple of mornings this week where I woke up and really CRAVED some exercise.  One of those days I had time to get sweaty, the other had to wait until later in the day, but I know I’m getting back to normal when I wake up with enough energy to even consider working out.

The post surgical depression hit a couple of weeks ago too. It felt like going through the emotional aftermath of a very personal hurricane. That’s most of the reason I haven’t been writing. I had to open myself to learning the lessons that the depression needed to teach me.  In the last few days, along with the urge to exercise, have come some insights that I didn’t have before. I think I’m coming out of it now. I don’t know if I’ve learned all that I need to, but I’m still open to whatever it is that the universe is trying to teach me. I’m still working at making peace with my body which is very scarred, and my life which really isn’t bad at all.

The biggest part of what I’m feeling is anger. I have a lot of good reason to be angry.  I don’t need to go into all the deep seeded neurotic stuff that I’ve been dealing with, but in this conversation that I’ve been having with myself, I also remind myself quite a bit that I have so much good in my life now too. It’s not all anger. The anger won’t eat me alive.  Anger can be dealt with.

So once again I find myself in a place where forgiveness is a choice.  I forgave my ex a long time ago and he did some pretty haneous things.  I’ve forgiven others too. Forgiveness is a funny thing.  You don’t even need to tell the person that you don’t hate them for whatever it was they did, but you can let go of it, be free of the anger, and live in peace with yourself. 

The hard part about forgiveness is that occasionally you have to forgive yourself.  I’m not good at that.  I’ve done some really dumb things in my life. I’ve called most of them learning experiences and moved on.  There are a few things though that I’m having a hard time figuring out how to let go.  I’ll get it done, it might take some time, but I’ll figure it out.  It’s all part of the process.

In the mean time, this weekend was outstanding. Minime and Hewhostilldoesn’thaveablogname celebrated their first anniversary with a BBQ for the families and friends. They did a really good job, I got to spend 8 hours in the car with my best friend and her nearly grown daughter and we got some quality singing time in. It’s been SO long since we’ve done that. The biggest suprise of the party was that our very good friend from Virginia flew out especially to spend a couple of hours there.  Jim is the best hugger I know, and he’s always had a bond with Minime.  When he walked through the door, both of our jaws dropped.  We got all caught up with him, took a few pics, and he had to go meet his sister.   I left soon after for the 4 hour drive home. It was a very long day but very fun. I needed that.  There is light at the end of this tunnel. I can even see it sometimes.

Namaste

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Welcome to summer in Chicago.  It’s not supposed to cool off for a week.  My AC bill was $300 last month, I bet it’s $400 plus this month. I’m SO broke. I absolutely need the AC though. The only thing that I can really do to keep the bill down is keep the shades down on the front window, but then the house is like a cave. Neither of us likes it, but that room heats up significantly when the sun hits that window in the afternoon, even with the shade tree in front, and the schmancy argon insulated bay window.  

I went out in the heat today and ran three errands. Walking from the car to a store in this heat hits me like a ton of bricks. I had 5 stores on the list, I made it to 2.  Tomorrow’s another day, and I have plans to go shopping earlier in the day with BFF.  I’ll finish getting what we need and get back in somewhere that’s cool so we can talk.

It’s days like today when I miss my pool.  We’d spend all day in and out of the water between chores and things. All of the neighbors would stop by and get wet too. Our pool was unheated, so on uberhot days it felt so good to jump into 70 degree water and you stayed cool for a while after getting out.  Breakfast was cereal, lunch was sandwiches, and dinner was grilled outside.  There was no indoor cooking on days like today because the house didn’t have AC. We didn’t really have a one hour rule after eating either because the pool was only four and a half feet deep. No one ever got cramps anyway, so we figured that was a myth.

We always took a nice long dip to cool down before bed too and if it didn’t cool down at night, we weren’t above a midnight dip. There was no sleeping when the house was 90 degrees.  That pool was such an integral part of our lives. I’m still a water baby. It soothes me like nothing else can because I grew up with that pool.

Those were awesome years. Pure, innocent, and beautiful. Filled with beach ball volleyball and frisbee tossing in the water. Playing tag while weaving through clothes lines filled with sheets and clothes. Playing on our swingset, monkey bars, and our trampoline, before trampolines were cool. My back yard was like a kids dream.  I rode my bike a lot when I was a kid too. I’d go out for hours. As long as I kept moving, even if it was 85 out I didn’t overheat. Summers were my favorite time of year.

Pardon me while I get up on my soapbox for a bit. I haven’t done so in a long time, so indulge me won’t you?

I think about that level of activity when I was a kid, and what is considered normal now, and it makes me sad.  Kids these days grow up with video games, and computers, and instant access to their friends. They play together, but not like we used to. I really don’t think we’ve done any justice by our children allowing so much of that and not enough real hard core, running around the yard, and learning how to be social in real life.  If I wanted to play with a friend, I went to their house and rang the doorbell. These days kids IM or text each other, and if one friend doesn’t answer immediately they’re tossed aside and the next friend is contacted in seconds. It’s more about immediate gratification and amusing themselves no matter what, than it is about being social and playing with this friend or that friend and just spending time together. 

I wonder what the world will be like as time goes on and more and more of the kids that grew up in this new way that come of age and matriculate into the power that runs this country. I’m not dissing them, there is some extraordinary talent out there, in every generation. I’m just wondering how things will change, and what will be important to them on a global basis. They’ll get along, in their own way.  My daughter is one of those talented kids, and my BFF’s oldest just turned 18, so she’s not far behind Minime.  They’re good kids, level headed for the most part. I hope the world works out for them.

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Another week has gone by. I’m still healing up.  The doctor gave me a little different advice to care for things on Friday and there’s a noticable improvement already just 2 days later. Yay! I go back next Friday, hopefully for the last time.

In the last week I’ve been consciously re-engaging with life.  I’ve spent the last couple of months doing nothing but planning for, having, and recovering from surgery. I’m very tired of all of that. I still have a couple of weeks to go as far as restrictions from exercise and lifting, but I’m taking on more and more as I can. It is wearing me out, I still have no stamina, but the only way to get that back is to continue to push myself into working more and more, without pushing myself too hard and causing more damage. It’s a delicate balance.  This morning, my bff and I resumed our Sunday morning walking at the arboretum.  This was the first real walking I’ve done in 5 weeks. The last time we went was the sunday before surgery. Today, we hiked 2 different half mile trails.  There was a short break between them, and I had to stop about 2/3 of the way through the second one, but there was a nice bench in the shade and a nice breeze over the meadow lake that we were next to, so we sat there and talked for a while. 

It’s funny how my body tells me that I need to sit down RIGHT NOW!  I told her not 30 yards before that bench that I’d be fine and make it the rest of the way back to the car. My body had other plans.  I keep reminding myself to have patience. They said 6-8 weeks before I felt back to normal. It’s been 4.5. I’m getting there, but I’m not there yet.  The last hike we took last month was 2+ miles on rougher terrain (we mostly stayed on pavement today) and at a much harder pace, but all things considered, I can live with a mile that took the better part of an hour with 2 decent breaks in the middle. It’s a start.

BFF is going through something awful that has a remarkable amount of things in common with what I went through a few years ago. It’s hard for her right now, and it completely sucks in general, but having been through it myself is at least useful for giving her feedback and different ideas on how to look at things.  She’s been there for me through so many things, it’s comforting for me to know that I can be there for her through this. 

Our Sunday morning’s are very closely guarded girl friend time. We went for years not seeing each other for months at a time. We talked on the phone, but that’s not the same. It feels so good to have a couple of hours every week to just get away from everything and talk, or not, and hike, or not. The Arboretum has become a sanctuary for that.  When I became a member there I just wanted to have a nice place to hike a couple of times a week.

We also usually do something responsible after our hikes like grocery shopping after a healthy brunch, or today, she helped me with a little housework.  I like when we go shopping. We’re both living healthy lives now, and we get more tips from each other just walking through a grocery store than I get from reading a good magazine or website.  We didn’t shop today, but she was helpful. I’m still restricted from things like vacuuming, so she hoovered the house while I swept and mopped the kitchen floor. I feel like a helpless, fragile little thang asking my friends for help with the housework, but this too shall pass, and for now, the place is clean enough. I’ve got 5 loads of laundry to do today, but I can mostly do it myself. I drag the full baskets down to the laundry room, so I’m not lifting anything, just dragging. Roomie will help me carry them back upstairs if I need it. I should be OK though, I just bring up a load at a time as it finishes, and they’re not huge loads, so the weight is within my carrying limit.

One of the cats is sick again. I just have to figure out which one.  I think it’s my old guy, but I’m not sure.  I have some high maintenance pets. One gets insulin twice a day, one gets a pill every evening, and the other has just been psycho for the last couple of days which isn’t so normal for him, so it really could be any of them that’s leaving me presents outside of the litterbox.  Hopefully I’ll catch one of them in the act before it gets worse.  Cats are very good at hiding when they need medical care.  Dammit.  I really don’t have the cash for more than a blood test or two, so hopefully whatever it is shows up on that.

Also last week, Minime cancelled the wedding celebration in Jamaica.  They’re already married, but they wanted to take a couple dozen people down there to party this coming midwinter.  Too many people are strapped for cash right now though, including me, although I wasn’t one that spoke up about it.  I am a little relieved that the pressure is off to make that trip, but it’s a bummer for her and my son in law – HeWhoStillDoesn’tHaveABlogname.   Because of the cancellation though, I’ll get the money that I’ve paid toward the trip back, and that will cover 85% of my unexpected out of pocket expenses for the surgery, so there’s a blessing in disguise. I’ll make it to the Carribean one of these winters. I have family that has property on Anguilla and they winter down there, so all I have to do is get there and I’ll have a place to stay for a week. One of these years…

Instead of Jamaica, they are having a celebration of their marriage at their house in a couple of weeks, right near their first anniversary.  They’re renting a tent and chairs and inviting half of the planet to a BBQ, but it should be fun.  I’m bringing a few things, and offering the suggestions that I think she will consider. It’s their party though, so I’m mostly just doing what’s been asked of me.  I am considering changing one of the dishes that I’ve been asked to bring, just because it’s a lot of work for a little bit of food, but I’ll talk to her about that before I do it.  It might also be another good piece of time to spend with BFF and her oldest daughter. That would make it extra cool, if they can get away.

I was looking into getting a passport too. I’ve never been out of the country, but the possibility exists that I’ll visit my friend in NY in the fall for a photo walk through the Adorandacks, and while I’m up there I’d like to see Niagra Falls from both sides. Crossing into Canada now requires either a passport or a passport card.  The fees for them go up Tuesday, so I blew it by not getting that done while I was off, but I’m thinking that I’ll just get the passport card, because that’s all you need to drive through any border near us. It’s good for Canada, Mexico, and the Bahamas on the one condition that you arrive by land based craft, so either car or boat. If I fly I’ll need a real passport. I need to apply soon though because it takes a month or two to get it in the mail. 

I was also reading about the passport cards and how they have RFID chips in them. They come in a pouch that supposedly blocks the signal.  That’s probably crap, unless the pouch is made out of some kind of thin metal. I thought about it though, and I carry a smart phone that tracks everywhere I go and pretty much everything that I do anyway.  I suppose that if I were doing something wrong, I’d care more, but the price of the technology these days is giving up certain privacies, and I have nothing to hide. There is also safety in these devices. If something happens, they can track my location by just a phone signal, so it goes both ways.  In any case, I don’t think that a card with an RFID in it, that will live at my house in my safe unless I’m traveling, is a problem.  Bummer that I now have to pay a bunch more to get one, but such is life.

I guess that’s it for now. I’m too tired to be profound. I do have some thoughts that I’m putting together though. Maybe next time… Have a good week.

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I’ve had a pretty laid back day.  My best friend came over for our Sunday morning walk, which today was around the block, and not 2 miles at the arboretum.  She’s going through a really hard time right now,  so we talked a lot, and played some video games. I don’t know if it helped, but at least she got out.   I’ve been through a lot of what she’s going through, and while the situations aren’t identical, I can at least be a friend and listen, and maybe give a little input for her to think about.

I was thinking this morning about all of those years that I, as a child, would spend a day or two wrapping my bike in red white and blue streamers, and ride in the neighborhood parade.  The local grocery store would rent a flat bed truck and some of their employees would through various things, frisbees, hats, candy, all stamped with the store’s logo, but we didn’t care. I think I still have one of those frisbees.  After the parade, I’d race home, ditch my bike, grab my mom, and go to the park, where the community association sponsered a very fun lunch in the park.  Complete with, grilled meat,  iffy potato salad, banjo music, and a creepy clown or two (shut up, all clowns are creepy, even if they tried to be nice, I stayed away from them).  There were also sack races, and balloon tosses with prizes.  It was typical Americana.  We went home mid afternoone, swam in the pool, blew off wheaver firecrackers, bottle rockets, snakes, sparklers, or snap pops we (mostly my brothers) could get our hands on.

There were a couple of years where we went downtown for the fireworks, but mostly we just enjoyed the evening in the neighborhood.  There was a typical Chicago Irish cop who lived down the block, and he always had some pretty good “confiscated” fireworks, so we didn’t go without.  His family sponsored the summer block party, which always fell around the 4th, and we did those fireworks as sort of a finale of the block party.  Everyone could enjoy them, and who was going to arrest Officer F for having them? so it was sort of cool.  There still wasn’t anything that was super stupid, but there were a few of the M80s and some roman candles and such. It was better stuff than we could get, so that was cool with us kids.

I lived in that neighberhood until I was 25.  My daughter got to experience a few years of the 4th that way too.  I’m glad that she’s got those memories.

My more recent 4th’s have been more subdued.  My village is filled with idiots that have big boomy things that they’ve been blowing off for a week already. That gets old quick.  The village fireworks are pretty good, but I’m not ready to walk the mile to the park and back yet, so I’ll enjoy what I can from my front window.  I can see most of the sky show over the rooftops that are between me and that park.  It looks like the rain is going to hold off for long enough to get them in, so that’s good.

I like to watch the program that is broadcast from the Mall in DC. Some day I’ll get there to see it live.   Last night there was a broadcast of the celebration at Ford’s Theater too. I’m a sap for all the patriotic songs and stuff, so I watched that too.

I’ve written before about my own personal patriotism and I don’t feel the need to re-hash how much I love this country, and how I owe a lot to all of our veterans, including many in my family and among my friends. The sacrifices that are made on behalf of freedom and for love of country aren’t lost on me. The flag flying in front of my house is more than just a decoration.

I found a quote that is probably the most appropriate way to explain the way I celebrate our nation’s anniversary:

“You have to love a nation that celebrates its independence every July 4, not with a parade of guns, tanks, and soldiers who file by the White House in a show of strength and muscle, but with family picnics where kids throw Frisbees, the potato salad gets iffy, and the flies die from happiness. You may think you have overeaten, but it is patriotism.”
Erma Bombeck

God Bless America.

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1.  I’m officially stir crazy. Today is day 17 that I’ve been off of work, recovering from surgery. Daytime TV, even on narcotics, is ridiculous. I used to like Oprah, but after how many years she’s been on, there’s not a lot of new content, just rehashed stuff with different people. I’m completely not into the needless conflict/confrontation of the Jerry Springer/Steve Wilkos/Maury types. Talk about a waste of energy, and why bother propegating that kind of negativity on commercial TV?  The world needs more positive shows.  I do like Ellen Degeneris who is very up, positive, and dances because it’s her show and she can, and Bonnie Hunt is cool, but she’s already been cancelled (boooooooooooo!).  Those two shows focus on positive, happy, enlightening, energetic things. We need more of them.  After the talk shows are over, I watch Dr Oz and The Doctors. They’re at least interesting and somewhat educational.  Lately I’ve been watching my Netflix movies in the morning.  So far the best one has been Grand Torino.  Clint Eastwood is just talented, and that movie has a decent story to it.   I’ve also seen Precious, which I didn’t enjoy as much as I thought after all of the hype about it, and New Moon which was about what I expected. Yes, I’ve been sucked into the Sparkly Vampire craze, but the warewolves are WAY sexier, and not undead.

2. I tried to wear jeans yesterday. This weekend I’ll be washing a few skirts so that I can avoid pants for a couple more weeks. My belly is just too tender for anything pressing on it. The jeans aren’t even tight, and I took them off after about 45 min, but I hurt all day because of them.

3. I have a new mobile phone. I dropped my AT&T service because I refuse to pay that much for a service that drops every other call, so my iPhone is now an iPod touch, and my new phone is a Droid Incredible.  It’s pretty slick.  I also have a new policy of not buying any apps. The free ones are fine, and abundant. I left more than $100 of apps on my iphone, and the most expensive one doesn’t even work now that I don’t have cell service to it anymore. Lesson learned. Also Verizon service is about $15 cheaper per month, and they have better coverage when I travel.  I’ve been slowly gettingthe new phone set up. Yesterday I got all of my e-mail accounts onto it. The Droid OS handles mail differently than the Apple OS, so I have to figure that out too. The last things that I have to do is figure out how it handles pictures and music files. Once that’s done, I’m all set to go.  I’m glad I got the phone while I have time to learn my way around it.

4. I’m doing a little financial clean up and slimming down my electronics diet.  All the services that I’m paying for are adding up and I’ve been pretty strapped lately.  I have a friend that is buying my satelite radio, so I can cancel that subscription and put the money toward paying down a credit card.  I’m reducing my cable package too, but I have to decide which way to go with that. If I drop down to the next lower package, I save $15 a month and only lose about 3 channels that I watch consistently, and the movie channels.  The next package lower than that would save me $30 a month, but then I’d lose nearly all the channels that Roomie and I both watch. If I do the first, and only go down one package, I’ll also kill my Netflix subscription, so I save $24 a month total.  If I kill it down to just the basic “family” package, I lose most of the stations that I watch, so I’d keep Netflix because I can stream it on my Wii to my TV but the savings by doing it that way is only $21 a month, but I get any movies that I want to see for that $3 difference.   Decisions decisions.

Between doing all of that and switching from AT&T to Verizon, I cut my bills by more than $50 a month with really not a lot of pain.  All that I’m really still paying for on an ongoing basis that I don’t consider a “required for living” bill is my web hosting, it’s less than $10 a month and I’ll keep that going.  I am going to change it from going on a credit card, to coming out of my bank account though. The bigger picture here is to stop bleeding financially, pay off the credit cards for the last time, and live on a cash basis.   I’m also going to sell a few things too. I have a bunch of old video games, and the only one I every use is my Wii. They can all go to Gamestop. I might get $50 out of them. I also don’t really need the iPhone anymore once my new phone is set up to play music, so I have another friend that will buy that.  All the little things add up and I’ll have a couple hundred $$ to throw at medical bills next month, so good for me for getting that stuff out of the way that much quicker.

5. I still have plenty of toys.  There becomes a point where living with the excess is just pointless and expensive. It’s a bad habit that I got from my ex. That is what #4 is all about. That stuff doesn’t add enough quality to my life to justify the cost.  I’m really just simplifying things, like I’ve been doing for months now.   I think that tomorrow’s project will be to clean another bag of crap out of my junk room. I haven’t done one of those in a while.  In a few weeks I’ll be able to use my elliptical agian too. It has been stored in there for months because my kidney couldn’t handle the strain. Now that the kidney is gone, my heart will appreciate the aerobics, and I’ll be back to my favorite machine.  Yay!

6.   I’ve been doing my monthly cat grooming this week. My female Maine Coon has IBS, so her getting hairballs causes issues. I keep her fur trimmed to short fur length and then she doesn’t get hairballs, but it’s a pain, and it takes a few hours over 3 or 4 days before she’s completely groomed. I think she likes her coat shorter like I keep it. It’s much easier for her to clean. Boy does it make a mess though. 

7. Five days until I return to working.  I’ll be thankful to have something that’s not mind numbing to do with my brain all day again, but I’m a little worried about my physical condition and state of recuperation. I have a new laptop from the office to work on from now on, and I have it at home to give it a test run for a week before I go back into the office. We’ll see how I do, starting next wednesday.  

That’s it for now.
Namaste

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It’s 2am on Father’s Day. I woke up in an/anesthesia induced sweat bath. I had a lot of it in 7 hours of surgery 11 days ago. I’ll be sweating it out for a couple more weeks if history repeats itself.  They say it takes a full year for the liver to process all of the toxins that are given during surgery. Sweating is good, it’s an alternative route for all that crap to get out of my system. So as uncomfortable as night sweats are, I’m choosing to look at it as a positive thing. 

I feel like I need to acknowledge my dad, but this is my 35th Father’s Day without him physically in my life.  He still exists very much in my heart though, and I’m still learning from him in ways that I never would have expected. He was a serious force of life and a prime example of living each day like it was his last while he was here.

People tell me all the time that I must be so strong for going through what I’ve been through medically in the last few years.  I’m not that strong, but both of my parents weathered much worse medical storms than I have, and in doing so gave me the tools to survive through my own trials.

As I’m recovering from what I hope will be my last surgery ever, I think about everything that he went through recovering from the severe burns that he experienced as a child. His accident happened in the mid 1920’s in the infancy of what is today’s modern medicine. It’s a miracle that he lived through it all in the first place, but to go on and find the joy in life that he found still amazes me.

My dad lived life on his terms, with the only exceptions made to that for his wife and kids.  He was a bit of a wild child, but his love for my mother tamed him enough to shape him into a truly good man with more than a bit of a fun streak. He also sang, all of the time. His beautiful clear baritone voice is one of my fondest memories.  It was so pure, and he sang things that were so filled with emotion, it was like the window to his soul.  I’m convinced that he lived at a higher resonance when he was singing, just a little closer to the angels than the rest of us. I used to strive for that kind of musical purity in my own life. I don’t think that I ever touched it, except for a brief moment or two when I let go and let it happen. My dad though, he lived in that state of joy quite a bit, and it showed.  He also had the frame of reference on just how terrible life could be, so he appreciated the good moments with that much more positive energy.

It is those moments that I think about when I’m alone at night. I could be sitting here feeling sorry for myself, but instead I remain inspired by a man that died more than 35 years ago. He remains with me in so many ways. He never once felt sorry for himself. He had full reason to, but he made the choice not to live his life that way. I’ve been making a lot of my own decisions like that lately too. Releasing the negative, encouraging the positive to grow and flourish.  People ask me how I’ve lost weight, like there’s a magic pill or something. The most important thing in losing weight isn’t the diet. It’s the mindset.  Once I stopped feeling sorry for myself and all of the tragedy that I’ve lived through my perspective changed.  That kind of negative thinking keeps me entrenched in the past and not focused on the now and the future. Now I acknowledge that things happened that I had no control over, but I don’t let it eat me alive anymore.

 I learned that lesson from my Daddy.  His life could have very dark and full of hatred, but he chose to live with joy and posessed an inner strength that few people ever even saw.  He was an amazing guy. I couldn’t be prouder to be his daughter.

Happy Father’s Day.

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…just not moving so fast right now.

The surgery was successful. My kidney will no longer kill me. YAY!  The hernia repairs are pretty harsh. They’ll heal eventually though.  I’ve been home for 2 days now. The pain that I expected is about 1/4 of what I have. It hurts a lot more than I was prepared for, but that means it’s healing. I’m trying my best to balance taking it easy with moving around enough to keep things like blood clots from forming. 

I was under anaesthetic for about 3 hours longer than we planned, so that says something about how complex things got. My doctors got what needed to be done all finished though, so now, for the first time in 4 years, I don’t have any impending surgeries looming. I’m done, finished, through that chapter in my life. YAY! YAY! YAY!  My only job for the next few weeks is to heal, get healthy, and keep losing weight and gaining strength.

I don’t know if it’s the anaesthetic or the narcotics, but the crazy random thoughts that I’ve been having are kind of interesting.  This morning I woke up wishing I could go play at the robot park that I used to play at when I was little.  That park has been gone for 20 years, but I used to love climbing that robot, and the slides were the best at any park around.  This was before the days of wood and plastic park equipment, Robot was 100% steel, rivited, welded, and bolted together.  I couldn’t find a pic of the one at my park on line but this one is similar. The one at my park was probably 1/3 taller and double the floor space on each level. .  I don’t know why I loved that thing so much, it was pretty much a vertical kid cage. Parents loved it because we couldn’t fall off of it. Mom let me ride my bike there, which was a big deal because it was on the other side of a busy expressway entrance, so I felt really independent and responsible when I went by myself. 

There have been other flashes of memories like that, mostly happy times and places that I loved.

I think part of it is just the vast relief that this is all over. 

The rest of it is probably the vicodin, but hey, I might as well enjoy it, right?

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My surgery is in 3 days.  I’ve spent the weekend resting, recharging, and getting the last minute details taken care of. I still have some things to do but while laundry is going I thought I’d check in here.

My knee is much better. We went hiking this morning and I went shopping after that. I carried three loads of groceries up the stairs and two loads of laundry down. I’m doing OK. I can feel it but it’s not painful, just tight. So that’s good.

I changed my weight plan last week to maintaining for this week, not losing. I don’t want to go into this surgery at any kind of deficit. Full strength, full blood count, iron count, eating healthy to get all my vitamins, everything will be as optimal as possible. That’s the plan. 

I’m anticipating that the worst part of it all will be the day before when I have to drink the stuff and camp in the bathroom until my guts are empty. The Xanax that my doc gave me may come in handy then.  I can only have things like broth, jello, and clear soda or juice starting Tuesday morning, so that all came home with me from the store today.I really need to work at keeping hydrated. I’m starting to have a few tense flashbacky moments where I have to remind myself that I don’t have cancer again, this doesn’t have any of those overtones. There’s no underlying reason to have any dread about this going on and on. It’s a very cut and dried procedure, possibly followed by a second very cut and dried hernia repair procedure if everything goes well.  Then I wake up and start healing.

It’s kind of anticlimactic actually. All this prep for a 3-4 hour surgery. Once I wake up, I’ll be fine. I should be home Friday or Saturday.  The doc said plan on one day per decade of age, so I’m going into this fully pretending that I’m 30 again I know from experience and the doc emphasized at our last meeting last week that the faster I get up and moving, the better it will be for my body.  I’ll be up and walking by thursday morning, maybe even wednesday evening. We’ll see what procedures they end up doing.

I’ve got one day left at work to get a few things done. I’ll work on the one file that I need to spend a couple of hours on tonight, so I get it done and the people that are covering for me will have everything they need. Monday evening  I’ll pack my bag with everything that I’ll need at the hospital.  That will give me all day Tuesday to remember anything that I’ve forgotten.

I think that’s it for now.

Namaste.

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