Productive living

My house is looking awesomely awesome. I am almost all done with the painting and I have to say that it looks like a professional came in and did the job. I even did all the baseboards and trim, which was tedious, but I'm so happy with the results. Everything is so clean and sharp. I'm so used to doing the same things day in and day out without anyone ever noticing and it was so nice to do something I felt really proud about, something I got excited about doing even though it got a little boring at times. I blared the ITUNES or listened to Rush on talk radio and time flew. I think I rock as a painter.

I got our Christmas tree today. It was small enough that I could carry it and fit it in my car (actually I got the guy at Home Depot to carry it for me), but I did drag it out of the car and into the house and put the whole thing up myself. I can't find my star or my tree skirt, so I'll have to go buy new ones tomorrow, but the tree looks good and smells spectacular. Of course it's about 60 degrees out today so the "feel" of Christmas is missing but I'm sure if I wait a few days, it'll get cold again.

I had to write another letter today...this time to one of my daughter's teachers. She is taking an elective course in "volunteering" and apparently the teacher told another class that the class my daughter is in (along with about 5 other girls) were "incompetent fools with behavioral problems." Excuse me? My daughter hasn't missed a day of school for sickness in all her high school years, gets straight A's, takes all AP and gifted courses, has played on a VARSITY tennis team since freshman year, and ranks in the top ten percent of her senior class (out of over 1,000 students) and this woman has the nerve to call her incompetent? I don't think so. I have spoken before about my disdain for public school teachers and if I had to do it again, I would have sent all my children to private schools. Public schools are all about stamping out the individuality of students in favor of mass producing cookie cutter kids. This might serve kids well in high school, but it sucks for dealing in the REAL WORLD. I tell my children to stand up for themselves and speak out for themselves and when my daughter DOES, she gets told that "things aren't up for discussion and to be quiet." Screw that. I tell her they are miserable people and when she's successful she won't have them to thank because they failed her on so many levels. Just because someone is in a position of authority over you doesn't mean you have to sit back and let them try to tear you down.

I also wrote a letter to the owner of the plumbing company who screwed me over. I let it all rip out of me because I know how I am and if I do not let someone know when I am bothered, I can't stop obsessing over it or forget about it. So I write. Once the letters go out, I feel somewhat free of the obsession. It's like I need to get it all out of me and then I can move on--at least sort of. Anyway, I'm big on writing letters/notes/emails lately. You know you've crossed the line and gotten on my bad side if you get a letter from me.

I'm off to watch Nancy Grace.

Every new beginning comes from some other beginning's end ~Seneca

"We are shaped and fashioned by what we love." — Johann Wolfgang von Goethe


After having a migraine for about 24 hours, I'm finally feeling better. It's hard to explain how it feels--it's like I go from feeling as though a board of daggers is being driven relentlessly into my skull, to this clearheaded nothingness and I'm so happy not to be in pain anymore. I start mopping floors, I'm dusting like a crazy person, I'm moving around and I'm so happy to be free of the daggers. I try not to think too hard about being happy it's over because I'm afraid the strain on my brain will bring on another migraine. LMAO.

So I've been absent and quiet but I've continued reading all my favorites. Sometimes I just think it's better to step away from always being negative which I feel I've been lately. I can seriously come up with at least one rant a day without even trying (like today I tried to order pizza from my favorite place and the phone rang and rang but no one picked up. I immediately called back and got a busy signal. For the next 15 minutes, the line was busy so I thought perhaps it wasn't open for some reason. I was out and about and went by the place and saw the big neon sign flashing OPEN, so I got out of my car, went in and went up to the counter and placed my order. I told the woman taking my order that I tried calling my order in but that the line was constantly busy. At that very moment, I happened to look down at her phone and guess what? The phone was off the hook! She quickly said to me (as she HUNG up the phone) that she had been having a conversation with someone, but that was a bunch of bull because when I walked in, she wasn't ON the phone, she was sitting there watching ONE LIFE TO LIVE! I know!!!), but I think that gets old for everyone, including me.

My youngest went back to school this week and so it's been quiet here during the day. I didn't get my usual sadness with the beginning of another school year because I've learned that endings aren't always bad and don't always mean THE END. I know my daughter is going to do great things with her life and so I'm just going to enjoy watching the show. She really is the biggest character I've ever encountered in my entire life. I wish you could know her.

My husband and I took the 5 hour trek up to where my son's car had broken down on his way home for the summer because it was finally repaired and brought it home. It's amazing how having that one extra car has alleviated a lot of stress in the household. It only took most of the summer, but I've already forgotten that in my joy at finally having it back.

I do have moments away from this blog when I think that I will never come back to writing here but something always brings me back. What brought me back today was reading a blog elsewhere and getting to the end of the post and being touched by the power of words, and remembering that's what I love best about writing--that feeling of being moved by someone else and coming back here to try to do that myself.

and the world spins madly on

"And even if you were in some prison, the walls of which let none of the sounds of the world come to your senses - would you not then still have your childhood, that precious, kingly possession, that treasure-house of memories?" ~Rainer Maria Rilke


We're going through our garage and trying to do some more organizing and throwing away. Going through the boxes we have stored there, it becomes apparent that I don't like to throw things away. There are so many things I've saved that I forgot I even had. In one of the boxes, I found my high school year book and we've all had a good laugh over my pictures in there. It feels like yesterday. It feels a million years away.

I also found a time capsule that I did with my youngest daughter. It says do not open until 2010. On the outside of the capsule I have written in red permanent marker, "TO BE ALIVE IN SUCH AN AGE ." I'm dying to open it, but it isn't 2010 yet. In the blink of an eye (because that is how time flies here), I know we will be opening it, and that is what keeps me from sneaking a peek now.

I got nosey yesterday evening and googled my oldest brother's name. I haven't spoken to him in 20 years but I found his flickr account filled with pictures of his family, my sister and her family, and my parents. It feels so weird being on the outside like this snooping through those photos, but if he didn't want just anyone to find them, he probably shouldn't have posted them on the worldwide web. I wonder if my sister gave him permission to post photos of her and her children because I know I would be knocking him into next week if he did that to me. I'm also pretty certain that my parents would not be thrilled to know he posted their pictures, but maybe I am wrong.

Going through those pictures leaves me feeling like the wind has been knocked out of me. I try not to think about them on holidays because that's when I feel their loss from my life the most. I feel angry, too, and I don't know why. I guess because I went through the pictures and looked to see if maybe I could tell if they're missing me like I always miss them, but all I see is their happiness in moments I will never share with them. I'm not one of those people who feels resentment when other people are happy. I mean, in general, I'm not. I find happiness in other people's happiness, but it feels painful seeing them happy without me.

It's thundering outside right now. The thunder is vicious sounding, and I can feel the ground beneath me rumble, the walls of my house vibrate. When the lightening strikes are close, that's when I feel it the most. It sounds like rage and sorrow and explosions that threaten to break everything into thousands of little pieces. I've been feeling sort of hateful all day and have had to fight saying mean things and writing mean things. And the mean things I'm tempted to say and write are truths that I am censoring because I cannot go around just saying/writing anything that pops into my head. Well, I could, but then everyone would hate me because none of us can stand to hear ugly truths and so I'll swallow those thoughts down and hope they go away or blow over like the storm outside my house, like the storm inside my head.