Edgy/Happy Birthday, Frank!

I have that sense of impending doom again.  You know, that kind of unaccountable feeling that something bad is about to happen.  I can't quite pin it down.  It could easily be attributed to a glut of Halloween candy.  It could also be the result of Hurricane Sandy overload (I love continuing coverage of anything and have been following the news constantly for a week now...).  Whatever it is, I am feeling anxious and unable to focus and just a little nauseous.  I try to tell myself that I am lucky not to be back east and try to count my blessings but there is still that nagging nervousness.  Usually I am pretty good at not getting worked up over things.  In general those things are things I can see:  lack of money, too many dishes, bad weather, etc.  I have no real thing I am panicking about.  It's just a general panic.  (Hope it goes away soon... I'm making the animals nervous!)

It's Frank's (observed) birthday again!  That cat gets older and older.  Guessing he's around 20 by now.  The way he moved when I pulled out the traditional birthday roast beef you'd think he was a kitten!  But he is getting older.  Besides his hearing loss I am noticing he has trouble unbending in the morning (so do I, my feline friend).

Slow Recovery

Managing to get back to near normal after my visit to Seattle over the weekend...  It's a long road but many thanks to all for the fun times and caring conversation!
It is freezing in Olympia and I wanted to post a photo of the dog in front of the fire (very Norman Rockwell).  I managed to figure out how to get the camera to take a picture of the fire at night without automatically adjusting the scene for being too dark and I put the disk into the computer which then automatically adjusted the photos for me.   Grrr... Sometimes technology is just too overprotective.  I will attempt some more cosy fire photos in the future when I figure out how to defeat both the camera and computer.  It is a nice warm scene with the roaring fire and the dog and cat stretched out on the rug.  The cat is camera shy these days so when I reach for the camera he gets up and wanders off but the dog is not so easily moved (unless treats are involved).
In other news, Paul is being nice and I am confused again.  (He's "Gaslighting" me, I know he is.  Too bad he doesn't look like Charles Boyer!  Hm, by that same token it's too bad I don't look like Ingrid Bergman.  Oh well...)  I expect him to go back to being a jerk so I'm not getting my hopes up but in the meantime it's nice to be treated well!  I'll take what I can get.
I was going to rant about some stuff today and was on a really good roll after having to go to the store but by the time I got home I had lost most of my venom.  I know it was about the lack of respect for personal space.  (Some woman was so eager to buy her groceries that she was standing on top of me while I was checking out and it pissed me off.  She was so close that I didn't even see her and while I was putting my change into my wallet I was looking down but when I looked up I hit her chin with the top of my head.  That's how close she was.)  Then I was fuming about how I try to use cloth bags at the store (they're sturdier for a start, doesn't matter if they get wet and I don't have a huge build-up of plastic bags in my kitchen) but when I have to pack them myself (which I prefer anyway) the checkers never leave enough time before moving to the next person in line and shoving their groceries at me while I try to fill my bags.  It's just irritating that nobody can seem to wait an extra 10-30 seconds for anything anymore.  (People even lean on their car horns when the traffic lights take more than a minute!)  Anyway, I had a good rant earlier but have lost it for now.  I'm sure it'll come back to me the next time I have to go to the store.  I'll work on it.

Spiritual Distance



 Wow!  My last post elicited a huge response from family and friends (I had no idea how many were even reading this blog).  Most people want me to keep being positive.  (I did say my negativity was hormonal and temporary...)  One benefactor (who wishes to remain anonymous) has even offered to help out in a bigger way until I can get a job.  (I told him that with that attitude he may have me, dog and cat sleeping on his floor before long.)  I just need to say emphatically that my friends rock!  They are supportive and loving.  They can be my biggest fans and harshest critics.  No matter how stupid or short sighted I am they are always there to help me up and tell me how stupid and short sighted I'm being.  It never matters how much time passes until we see or talk, I can always depend on them.  I hope that I live up to their example and can be as good a friend to them as they have been to me.

Now, obviously I have a talent for picking friends.  I don't know how I managed to get so lucky in that department when I have so little ability to choose boyfriends.  When I told Paul about how supportive my friends were he told me that was their job.  He's right, of course, but I would expect my boyfriend to be a friend as well (it's in the job title...).  My hormonal retrospection leaves me scratching my head over my relationship.  I don't want to talk bad about Paul, he's just on a completely different path.

I am willing to take responsibility for moving to Olympia.  I wanted so desperately to get out of my old situation that I leaped at the opportunity.  Olympia was never a place I would have chosen if I had been making the decision on my own.  Personally I would have taken my money and gone someplace warm and sunny.  This is all hindsight and the present is what logically concerns me.  Since moving in with Paul (and I mean beginning the day I actually moved in) he has told me that he is miserable and doesn't want to be with me, has told me that we should move to California, has entertained the idea of us going to Guatemala, has disappeared for a week, has told me he wants to move out and live alone again, has pestered me about us moving into a trailer or RV and heading down the coast to eventually settle in Southern California.  In short, he has confused the hell out of me.  Whenever I think I know where this is headed he changes the game.  He told me at one point he was just pretending to tolerate me (and dog and cat).  The man should be on stage!  He's a hell of a good actor.

Following our most recent conversation I have decided that I need to stop listening to him.  I need to make my own path. 

This time spent in Olympia has served to remind me what it's like to have a boyfriend (it had been 10 years since the last one).  While it can be supportive and loving it can also be lonely.  (At least when I was alone I wasn't being ignored or neglected.)  It has taken me away from my friends but has also made my friendships stronger.  

The Olympia sojourn has given me time to sit back and think about what I really want out of my life.  What I want is good friends (which I have), an uncomplicated life (which I can aim for) and a warm, sunny beach (and I know where to get that).

 

 

 “As you proceed through life, following your own path, birds will shit on you. Don't bother to brush it off.

Getting a comedic view of your situation gives you spiritual distance.
Having a sense of humor saves you.”
― Joseph Campbell

Rage

After weeks of loving humanity, the earth and all it encompasses, being a happy and positive person, doing good deeds and generally being a cheerleader around the house I have fallen into bitter, female hormonal rage.   Over the years I have come to recognize the signs of an impending need to stock up on feminine products and rage is one of the first signs.
Rather than fight my inner rage, I have always believed it is best to maintain a healthy distance from humanity and just be angry.  I recall a zen thing from who knows where:  "When the ordinary man understands, he becomes a sage.  When the sage understands, he becomes an ordinary man."  I am going to be an ordinary woman for a few days and that is fine and well and part of being alive (but I still long for menopause so I can leave the nonsense behind).  In the meantime, I should just stay away from any situation requiring me to be civil.
I try really hard not to take out my hormonal indescrepencies on those near and dear.  Instead I tend to take it out on myself.  All of my positive thinking that everything will turn out well is gone (for the moment) and I am in full self-blaming mode.  Hindsight is a glorious thing if the present is rosy.  The present is less than rosy and I only have myself to blame.  (Intellectually I know that all of this is temporary but now that I have imbibed a bottle of wine I just feel like putting it down for posterity.)
I know I should have started looking for work when I moved to Olympia.  I didn't.  I wanted some time off to recover from my last job (which was all consuming and I lived onsite 24 hours a day for 7 years).  I'm happy for the time I took but pissed off that I am now broke and looking for work is desperate.  Had I looked for a job and been working I would have more than enough to escape for parts unknown.  The peaceful part of me says I am in the situation I should be in.  I have created this reality for a reason.  The enraged hormonal part of me wants to kick the peaceful part's ass.
Today I made the mistake of trying to apply for jobs online.  I will remember the experience long after my hormones have brought my brain back to normal.  As desperate as I am for some income, I know that after today I will be so wary of looking for work that I will spend the next few days hiding under a blanket on the sofa and daring Paul to ask me what's wrong.  There are basic problems with the world economy and online hiring practices are the canary in the coal mine for the future job market.  I had visited businesses (door-to-door) and met and been introduced to very nice people in places I probably wouldn't hate to work but after talking to managers and meeting potential co-workers and being shown around  I was directed to "the website."  I will not go into a rant at this juncture, suffice it to say the whole process is a lot of nonsense.  Further, I will put a positive spin on it and say that anyone who hasn't hired me as yet is just so much less fortunate for not knowing what a hard worker I am.  How can "the website" possibly rate that?  I actually had an application today ask me what my GPA was in high school!  Thirty years later I really can't recall something so completely insignificant and so impertinent to adult work life.  I dare them to look it up!  (Jokes on them:  We didn't have computer records back then!!)

Now Or Never?

I have always thought that it was never too late for anything.  As a result, I rarely started anything or, even less frequently, finished anything.  While enjoying watching the world go by, happy in the belief that I could start my life tomorrow, I became aware that I need to be doing more about achieving what I want to do and being where I want to be.
In earnest, I started throwing out junk that I had been holding onto.  I started just tossing anything that annoyed me (broken things I always figured I would repair but which instead got lost in boxes).  That was a really good feeling. 
Then I found a box of old photographs.  I went through every picture and tossed all the ones that I hated.  A lot of them were in the lost photo box because I just didn't want to look at them anyway.  They were of old boyfriends, people I never really liked, occasions I didn't enjoy, people I didn't remember, mistake pictures when the camera went off in the bottom of my purse, etc.  TALK ABOUT LIBERATING!!  I was raised that pictures were the most important posessions you could have and I believed it.  Some of those photos were 30 years old and I couldn't throw them out simply because they were photographs and it was a sin to throw out photographs.  Boy, do I feel better!!  It was like taking a really long shower after a week long camping trip!  I am reborn!
Okay, I am getting really into the project of minimizing.  My downstairs neighbors moved out today.  Oreo and I passed them on our way out this morning.  I was watching their crew loading furniture and boxes onto a U-Haul and I just kept thinking "That will not be me when the time comes."  I'm going to have a suitcase and maybe my backpack and that's it.  I want enough for one checked bag and a carry on and that's it.  (If I can manage to put it all in a carry on then so much the better!)
The universe is screaming "SIMPLIFY!"

Mark Twain

“Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn't do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.” – Mark Twain

 

I came across this quote today and absolutely love it!  It sums up my life's philosophy so well.  (I could do without the "Explore.  Dream.  Discover." part simply because it sounds more suited to a motivational wall poster...)

Lately I have just wanted to get rid of everything I own and lighten the load.  It feels like hanging onto all my posessions is holding me back, weighing me down and simply too much to carry anymore.  Over the years I have accumulated way too much stuff.  At one point I wanted to go through everything and keep the useful stuff but I am now of the opinion that it's all or nothing.  We'll see how this project goes...

Paul is still stressed but picks up his car today.  He should mellow out a bit for that alone.  We still need to figure out a source of income or some sort of windfall (whatever, as long as it pays the bills) but I'm positive it will all work out (he is skeptical).  It seems like I am on the verge of a breakthrough while he is on the verge of a breakdown.  Oh well, I can't change his mood and he only gets upset when I try.  Maybe one day he will learn that worrying won't help at all.  Maybe he won't ever figure that out.  It's really not up to me.

I am just happy these days.  I delight in the little things.  The leaves are so pretty right now and there are yellow flowers on the lily pads in the duck pond.  Everything is going to change soon (weather, life, etc.) but it will all be just fine.

 

Sunset last night from my kitchen window



"Life Is A Banquet..."

"...And Most Poor Suckers Are Starving To Death!"

(Auntie Mame said it best.)

I feel like I am feeding at the trough of life.  I really do.  Every day is another day.  I can choose to be happy or choose to be unhappy but it is my choice.  Sometimes it is just one of those days to choose to be unhappy.  Today I am choosing my happy option. 
Paul is in full panic mode and choosing to be unhappy.  Over time I have learned that I cannot help him when he gets like this.  He is just one of those people who doesn't like being out of his perceived comfort zone.  Currently he is having car troubles and has sent his "rig" to a shop far away (78 miles away according to AAA) so he does not have the luxury of being able to escape at will and that makes him edgy.
Another thing I have figured out about Paul is that on his list of priorities I fall well below the car.  From my observations his list is something like:

#1) car

#2) money

#3) school

#4) whiskey

#5) eating

#6) family

#7) dog

#8 & upward) running, camping, movies, me, etc.

Currently he is worried about the car and money.  To get the car fixed requires money and he only has a limited supply so he is facing going back to work before he had wanted.  He is panicking because the lease here runs out in December and he thinks we will be homeless after that.  In his panicky state of mind he thinks the only solution is to take a job he doesn't want in Seattle (where he doesn't want to be) and live in his car in Kirkland (??). 

My attitude toward matters is far less depressing and he doesn't like it so today I can barely get a grunt out of him.  (In fact, in the 10 months we've been living together I've had longer conversations with the TV.)  I have been looking for work in Olympia.  There aren't a lot of jobs but there has to be something.  I do not want to stay in this apartment.  I didn't like it when we moved in and I don't like it now.  When I moved out of Seattle I said (and quite clearly) "I don't care where I move as long as it's out of Seattle."  Must remember to be more specific.  (I am confident I can find a warm place and earn enough money to survive.)

When we moved to Olympia it was because Paul wanted to work at Evergreen State.  They haven't been hiring and he stopped trying.  I was never a fan of the location but I went along:  a) to get out of Seattle; b) to get away from my job; c) because I thought we had a future together.  I take full responsibility for my move.  It afforded me the chance to get out of Seattle and away from my job.  I had a nice savings for escape and now it is depleted (again, I take responsibility for that).  Rather than sit around moaning about what will become of me I think the wisest couse of action is to start earning money to get further away.  Next adventure is right around the corner.  I have a feeling I will be going it alone but I've done that before.  It would be nice to share it with someone but I want that someone to come along willingly.

 

It is autumn in Apple Park in more ways than one!