Age is Just a Number

I Can't Get No....

....SHUT EYE!

I visited a website called shuteye.com where I learned that my current state of insomnia is chronic.   Not transient.  Not temporary.  Not even tameable.  I started keeping a chart, more for my girl-doc's records rather than for my own entertainment.  This is NOT entertainment.  It causes me to want to hit somebody - whether by fist or bumper.   It causes me to walk around looking dumb.  It causes me to want to really, really want go off on a rant about The Mother who insists on wearing stretchy, clingy, cleavage showing outfits on a not-even-close-to trim physique to high school choir concerts.   It almost causes me to want to walk right over and ask her directly if she thinks she looks hot for all the teenagers lurking around....nooooo....don't go there!!  - but I don't have the energy.  The nerve, but not the energy.

Yep, tried the natural stuff.  Yep, tried the OTC stuff.  Yep, tried the pharmaceutical stuff.    More exercise you say?   If I am bumping into walls and hitting doorjams (let me show you the bruise on my shoulder!), how can I climb on a bike?  Swim?  I'll sink due to lack of muscle coordination.

Meditation?  Deep breathing?  BTDT.   Prayer...okay, that's a good one.  I have determined after extensive research - but I'll check my shortterm memory losses - that sleep prayers appear to not be God's bailiwick.  Oh yes, another ouch!  Dear Lord, I just simply ask for a restful night's sleep.  3.5 hours later I wonder if He heard me.  Night after night. 

So, I sit here beyond punchy, wondering if any of my coworkers will notice my lack of enthusiasm, wondering how many people are wondering why I didn't return a phone call or email, or even why I didn't so much as give them a glance in the hallway, wondering which week it is and getting reminded that this week will be June already.  I think I slept well once back in March.   But I can't remember.

 

These Days

This is what life is like recently:   noisy, bumpy, dry, scratchy sandfilled eyes and teeth, wearing stupid hats, weapons drawn, hammering through each day, and all very ungraceful and feeling too much like combat.  So, if my blog seems rather desert-like, lend a prayer every now and then....

 

In Recovery

This last week has been crazy.  Various family members in town, The Graduation, and a hefty bout of insomnia has left me feeling that I took a trip to Mars and am trying to find my way back home - through the galaxy.

My in-laws love to cook - and we ain't talkin' meatloaf here.   It's an event, starting with a trip to the store, and horse dervys at happy hour that eventually lead into the meal cooking process, ending with eating some time later that evening - every evening.   There is always the "activity" for the day, and it begins with meeting for the free breakfast for all of us at the hotel where they stay. 

The highlight, of course, was John's graduation on Sunday.  We had a well laid out, yet intricate, schedule that included brunch before the commencement ceremony.   8 people clammored into 3 cars to get there.  It was long and I heard complaints of bedsores.   Yet, it still brought a tear to my eye seeing John walk across the stage in his dignified and reserved manner.

The relatives have been departing in waves, and sheets are getting washed for the next round next week when my horn-playing nephew - also newly commenced - arrives for an audition with the symphony on Tuesday.   Once again, music in the house.   Like December, the month of May just sort of happens to you.

GradUation

 

Grad-Gee-Ay-Shun

John graduates from College on Sunday.   He has worked long and hard - 40 hours of the week at his real job - and long and hard after hours, to receive his degree.   It is done.   He has earned his Honor Cords, and will wear them proudly.   I often wonder how he did it with all the obstacles - sometimes those were me!   

I am very proud of him, and his persistence and tenacity.   I am especially proud of his intelligence, and his humbleness.   And I am proud of his hopeful attitude. 

I think I heard him jokingly say something about buying a 12 pack on the way home from his last final this evening......hope he doesn't kill any of those newly educated brain cells!

Not One, But Two

So we have a way-too-cool acting soon-to-be high school freshman cheerleader in the family.  But wait... not to be outdone, her older sister, soon-to-be college freshman got herself down to the campus and tried out for cheerleading...and made it.  I am happy for her.   Really.  Two cheerleaders in the family.  I have two step-daughters who are cheerleaders.

I am impressed that she took the initiative to get herself there and do this.   So why do I cringe?   Maybe it is because of my own hope that in college one would start thinking of what might make up a class schedule, or go on a future resume, like Student Council or other form of mentally stimulating extra-curricular activity.  It's college; we're not talking Florida State where a football team actually has nationally televised games - cheerleaders included.

What troubles me further is that the only fact we know is that she has been accepted to this college.  And is now a cheerleader for said (or not said) college.   Have we applied for financial aid? (we think:  No)  Have we talked to a counselor?  (we think:   No)   Seniors started registering in early April...is there a class schedule yet?  (we think:   No)  Not that we have heard either ... but we have cheerleading.   

I think what troubles me further is that there is some form of the Midas Touch in The Mother's camp that allows for irresponsibility, procrastination and other forms of non-Girl-Scout technique of getting and being prepared, pre-empting or otherwise planning ahead for life - and really cool (well, not necessarily in my opinion) things still happen.  Do you just walk into Freshman English on the first day of classes in your cheer uniform, sit down and start taking notes?    The Mother said "Go to college!  Have Fun!"   I guess this is what it looks like.

Arachnophobia

What happens in your car overnight in Saipan....

 

The BEST Birthday Card

If you read my post in March on Billy in the Box, you know the story of the fish that won' t go away.   If the real thing isn't enough in his tattered, dog-eared box arriving on my doorstep from a state where I know not a soul - he has come to wish me a Happy Birthday all the way from Saipan - via email, of course!

May Day

I was thinking about my mom this morning, as this memory often comes up on May 1st.   Right off the bat, I'll tell you that tomorrow is my birthday, and I've already arranged for a table in the lobby of the building where I work, as well as an extra Post Office Box to accept all the cards, gifts, flowers and other assortment of well wishes and presents from everyone I know.

When I was somewhere in gradeschool our class made May Baskets.  It was some combination of construction paper, ribbons, glue and highly skilled kid hands to make a conical shape ready to hold flowers and hang on a doorknob.   I carried it home on the bus and planned my mission.  I don't remember receiving instructions on how to do this, however my plan was to hang it on the front door, ring the door bell, hide in the bushes, and wait for mom to find her wonderful surprise.

This is a modern day picture of our once, really nice house built by my dad.  (No, the star was not part of our lives, and the bushes I hid in are no longer present, and it sadly lists toward the shabby side. )     

Typically our front door was rarely used, even in those days of real neighborhoods.  We had the garage, breezeway and back door into the kitchen that received the highest traffic activity.  But this day, in my young mind, I was certain that the front door was the one to use - it had a doorbell.  After all, who knocks on a breezeway door and expects someone from way inside the house to hear anything?   I thought through this all very well.  I carefully placed my handmade basket on the knob, rang the bell and ran like crazy down the two steps and around the corner.  Nothing.   I waited.   I crept up the steps again and repeated it all including the ran-like-crazy part.  Nothing again.  I started feeling bad in some way.  I tried again nothing.   Finally, I am sure with a hurt heart and a held back tear, I went inside to find mom to show her what was waiting for her outside.  To this day I only remember her picking it up, but no memory of what she said or what her actions were.   But I do remember my glee in preparing for this, the expectations and the letdown. 

Even though I have long forgiven my mom for her failure, I remember her humanness, her frailties.   When I was five she had a significant and major surgery on her back and was not expected to walk again...but she did.  Her toes were forever numb and her balance never returned, so we all knew to be careful with mom.  In whatever way that her life was at that time in May, only a few years after this trauma in her life, I was at the front door expecting her to just hear and make a beeline to the front door.   40 years later I can understand this.   Somewhere in midlife, there is a miraculous transition from only understanding how the world affects us ... to understanding how we affect the world around us.

We are all recovering from our upbringing.   Thank God.