Travel?

Duane and i had an interesting experience on Saturday. 

He'd gotten one of those things in the mail promising airline tickets and hotel stay (and food, too), if we sat thru a 90 minute presentation.  I don't usually go for these things, but we've never done one before.  So we went.

It actually was a really great opportunity for travel.  I told him his parents should have come instead of us.  They like to travel and do quite a lot of it.  They've taken an Alaskan cruise and gone to Italy and Ireland.  

But travel is really not in our future.  I have a difficult enough time with our 2 day trip to OC every week.  I've wondered what will happen when there is an important funeral back east - at this point i can't imagine going.  

Still, at the end of the presentation the gentleman (salesman) offered what was really quite a good deal.  I sent him away so i could talk to Duane about it.  I asked if he would like to travel, if i'm holding him back, if i should try harder.  He kind of laughed and said, "I'm actually stressing because we have to take this free trip in the next year."  I laughed and laughed at that, and then we laughed together.  No, i'm not holding Duane back.

Part of me would like to travel, but the fact is even before i became so limited i wasn't much of a traveling person.  Yes, i have wanted to go to England - but i wanted to LIVE there, not just visit.  I wouldn't mind going back to Portland, or Montana/Wyoming/Colorado, or visit New England during the Fall, or just bop around the South - i've lots of memories there i wouldn't mind revisiting.  But i really can't do that these days, and i am rather a homebody person.  The truth is, i wouldn't want to visit those places, i'd want to live there, and i can only live one place at a time!

The gentleman could see early on that he probably wasn't going to get anywhere with us and didn't put on a lot of pressure.  He did say he feels sorry for us.  He told us that he lives in a million dollar house in Irvine and drives a Lexus, but that traveling is what makes life worth living for him and we can't imagine what we are missing.  Although he then admitted that if we don't desire to travel then we really aren't missing anything.

The fact is, we feel sorry for him.  That he has all those things (and is stuck in Irvine) but lives to travel is sad to us.  There are a lot of people in the world who endure, hang on, survive until they can escape from their every-day life with a week or two of vacation.  We are quite happy with our every-day life and have no need to escape.  Really, why would i want to spend a weekend in Arrowhead or in Yosemite when i can have the beauty of the mountains here at home and the comfort, too?  I can see some benefit from travel, but i also see a lot of benefit from being happy at home.  

My family traveled a lot when i was a kid.  It wasn't bad, but i kind of feel like i've left bits and pieces of me all over the country, and i have a longing for many things that i can't have all at once, anyway.

I've very intense, poignant memories of many things from my past.  Some times i see or remember something that brings these memories back so clearly in my mind that i can almost cut myself with their sharpness. 

One such memory is of the dogwood and redbud looking just like this in the Spring in Tennessee and Kentucky.  I don't know why it makes me ache so, but it does.

Another is of waiting for the bus along one road that looked just like this when i was seven.  Those colors and the memory also makes me ache.  I could go on and on with such memories, and they are precious to me, but i could never relate them to another person in such a way that would impart 1/100th of their import, meaning, and how heartrending they are to me.  

So, the very good thing that came out of this was that Duane and i enjoyed a day trip together on Saturday, and had a good meal together at a nice place after the meeting.  And we found, again, how compatible we are in that neither of us is deeply longing for something but unable to do it because of my limitations.

Frankly, we probably should have taken the very last (cheapest and least time-involved) offer because it was transferable.  We could have given it to Duane's parents or mine, or one of our siblings.  If we were able to travel in the future then we could use it too.  (One week a year for life.)  But on the other hand, our bank account really can't handle a hit on it right now.

And, i don't ever, ever want to attend such a thing again.  Not even for the freebies offered.  I don't like sitting thru something like this knowing i've no intention of buying.  (Yes, many, many years ago i'd sat in some of these with hubby #1.  I didn't like them then.)  Duane and i had not done this before.  I'm not regretting it, but i definitely don't want to do it again.

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Groundhog Day

Well, we are being told that there will be six more weeks of winter.  (I hope so!  It has been a very dry winter and we are all worried at the lack of moisture.)  

From winter past:  

Groundhog Day is a strange one.  It also happens to be the anniversary of my first marriage, long long ago.  I got married at 20.  I always thought, in later years, that Groundhog Day was appropriate to everything about that marriage (that has since, ended).

I have no idea if it shows up on your computer, but this is a new font i found, called "connected."  As trying to be connected is something i strive for, it seemed appropriate.  

Duane is off the mountain today.  It is also Superbowl.  Duane's parents are taking several of the members of the family to Knott's Berry Farm and then later they will have a Superbowl party.  I would love to go to Knott's, but i know if i do i'll wear myself out and have trouble functioning later in the week.  But i really encouraged Duane to go.  He doesn't get much time with the kids.  

I think i kind of freaked last year on Superbowl, thinking it was a day we should be with people.  Duane was worried about me because of that, but i think more, last year i just felt i was keeping him from having a good time.  One thing i am learning, very clearly, is that i don't do well with a big group of folks.  I DO want to connect, and at a big party it doesn't happen for me and i'm disappointed.  I need to accept where my limitations are and play to my strengths, and the family does, too.  They don't really "get" why i didn't come down.  

However, i've plenty here at home to keep me busy. 

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Happy New Year!

It is hard for me to believe i'm coming up on 5 years of blogging.  

I was late to discovering blogs.  They had been around for quite some time.  I know i'd read some without realizing exactly what they were.  Blogging has changed a lot in the last 5 years.  I've gone back from time to time to see what has happened to people i used to follow.  Often the blogs are gone, or have gone private, or people just don't post any more.  I often wonder what has happened to those folks.

My life is often about connection - the desire to connect with people and my ineptitude in doing so.  I began blogging to try to connect.  Not much of that left, but still i continue to blog.  

I've begun 2 new blogs.  Not that anyone is reading these, but i often posted things i didn't want to share widely.  It is a public blog.  However, looking for one blog is like looking for a needle in a haystack unless you have links and connections to find it.  So, even tho some of the things i posted here were to share publicly, i didn't share them because of the ability to then find other things.  

So i have begun a couple of other blogs that i can share posts on Facebook or wherever, when i have something i would like to share that way.    They will not trace back to this blog.

One is on life in general and my search to find children in our lives.  I'm looking for that to happen thru mentoring.  However, i have been searching for several years now with no joy.  Hopefully this will be about finding that path.  The blog is Life, Such as it is.  

The other one is on my search for health.  I'm hoping that it is a journal of my journey to lose weight and have better health.  It is mostly a private journal, too, but if i should discover something i want to share publicly, then i can do it there.  It is called Seeking Good Health.

My voice in writing the past few years has become rather whiney.  I hope to avoid that there, but am not sure i can.

Happy New Year to all.  I hope this is a year of blessing and joy.

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Thoughts of Christmas Past

 Christmas was an unusual change in my family.

My parents were very skilled at being hospitable, humorous, warm, and accepting with guests.  They frequently had company to the house for meals.  Those were pleasant times because whatever they “put on” for a guest was not the norm in our home.  My mother tends to be a bit formal, and i have found her homes rather cold.

Christmas was the exception.

Somehow our home was transformed for Christmas.  There was the excited anticipation, there was music and joy and hope.  I remember all of that as very pleasant memories.  Other memories of my childhood, even when pleasant, are usually mixed with other, darker feelings.  Christmas is an exception.  

I'm so thankful for that.  It leaves me free to enjoy Christmas as an adult.  It still is hard to have no children.  I don't care, at this point, that the children would not be ours, i simply want children in my life in some fashion.  But none the less, i do enjoy Christmas, the lights and music and sense of hope.  

As a single adult i did not do much for Christmas.  I didn't bother to decorate for years (a former roommate ended up with my Christmas things).  I did not go to visit family and as i had no one else with whom to share it, i generally would work for other folks who wanted the day off (no shut down of hospitals during holidays).  Still, i reserved Christmas Eve to attend a late mass.  That was important to me. 

I'm thankful that Duane an i both enjoy this.  We decorated our tree yesterday.  It was already up with lights and star.  (The Box story of why we do it this way.  BTW, i'm so thankful for Duane's wonderful proposal.  It is lovely to remember and share.  I was at a family BD party last spring and one of the aunts asked about our engagement and i shared this story.  Then she turned to SIL and asked about theirs.  SIL turned really red and said, "Well, i was getting out of the shower. . . "  I've told Duane several times that i'm so thankful that i don't have to start our story that way!)

I also had my two "girls" here to help me make pies and cookies.  That was a lot of fun, tho it was costly, too. 

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Connections

I've quite a number of friends on Facebook these days.  Many are not what i consider "friends" but more people i've come across with similar interests.

At least i have enough friends now that when someone "unfriends" me i am not usually aware of it.  Many people who are "friends" post things i find distressing and so i tend to change their status so that i don't often see their posts.

Quite by accident i learned a while ago that someone i knew from high school had "unfriended" me.  It bothered me a lot.  I thought about it, and then i was able to let go of it.  She wasn't someone with whom i connected much, and so i was able to tell myself it didn't matter.

Yesterday i discovered someone else has done that, too, only this is someone to whom i did feel a long-term connection.  We still belong to a friends group, so i wasn't aware of this before.  She has done this with a number of people.  In fact, i heard it there first before i went to check.  They were hurt, but i didn't expect to be.  I found i was wrong.  I understand her reasons.  She is in very poor health and is having to limit her interactions.  She is sick and frail.  I don't know that i'm hurt so much as i feel sad at the loss of connection.

It scares me a little, too, because she is someone who was vastly injured by the medical profession (and is a very intelligent RN herself - much more knowledgeable than most MDs).  But the scare is that she is someone who has done EVERYTHING right - good diet, limit of meds, good supplements, etc., and to find that she is frail and in poor health (maybe in her last days), tells me that even if you do all the right things after being injured, sometimes it is not enough.

I want to believe that i will regain at least some of my functioning.  This tells me that there is at least the possibility i will not.  Positive attitude is everything, but i also have to live in my reality.

Still other years:

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Life - what more to say?

I arrived at work today to find the Christmas card of the doc's family is announcing a baby boy to arrive in the spring.

Need i say i am often envious of this family and their good fortune?  I'm happy for them, but i really wish he'd given me a head's up on the thing.  I need some time to process.

On the way down the hill Duane and i were discussing various things as we are wont to do.  I mentioned that several people have expressed surprise that i'm not on seizure meds.  That puzzles me frankly, because we KNOW the seizure was a combination of stress and dehydration.  If i work at not being dehydrated, i'm not having any problems.  Why then would i take seizure meds?

???????

If you treat the CAUSE of something (if able), then taking meds for symptoms is worthless, or dangerous.

It then occurred to me what my life might be like if i had not addressed the dehydration but began taking meds.  OMG.  I said to Duane, "Can you imagine what would happen to me if i took meds for seizures but never drank more water?"

He looked very serious and said, "I don't want to think about it."

Frankly, neither do i, beyond saying i am sure horrible things would have happened, and i find the very thought of it scary.

He asked me what i want for Christmas.  There is no good answer to that.  I don't need or want for anything.  The things i do want - more energy and functioning, better memory and health, children, to lose weight - he cannot give me.  I'm so thankful for all that we have.  The things i so greatly desire are out of reach.

I've not taken pics of our Christmas tree yet.  Here are some winter pics from other years.

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