Category Archives: Life

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Still Cranky

But Nina would be proud. I’m not taking it out on anyone… just sitting quietly in my office, and occasionally banging my head against the wall for fun…

Pilfered this from another blog’s archives…

last cigarette: early ’80s… I tried it, but couldn’t make sense of it so I quit trying
last car ride: this morning
last kiss: oh, let’s just don’t even go there…
last good cry: a few weeks ago, I’m due for another
last library book checked out: I haven’t checked out a library book since I graduated from high school…
last movie seen: The Incredibles with Nina and Toby
last book read: Egads! I can’t seem to finish a book these days…
last cuss word uttered: sh@#, or some variation thereof
last beverage drank: water, but I wish it was diet coke
last food consumed: mac ‘n cheese
last crush: Phil, in LA
last phone call: Wendy (on voicemail), Jamie – live and in person!
last tv show watched: West Wing
last time showered: this morning
last shoes worn: cool black boots I got last year at Norstrom’s rack
last cd played: Rita Springer
last item bought: Harry Potter 3 dvd from Target
last downloaded: updates for my Mac
last annoyance: my alarm clock this morning
last disappointment: Sunday night
last soda drank: diet coke
last thing written: blog post
last key used: car key
last word spoken: Bye
last sleep: midnight to about 7:30am
last im: Don’t use ims…
last sexual fantasy: hmm…
last ice cream eaten: Wow, I can’t remember!
last time amused: earlier today, as I broused a few Holidailies blogs
last time wanting to die: about a month ago
last time in love: too long ago… thanks for the reminder
last time hugged: A few weeks ago, by Nina before I left her house
last time scolded: a couple of weeks ago, via voicemail
last time resentful: See above
last chair sat in: nasty work desk chair… hate this thing
last lipstick used: Mocha Blast
last web page visited: India Tourism Site

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Crank-o-Meter – Extremely High

I’m so cranky today, you don’t even want to get in my space. If you have something against me and you’re looking for a fight, now’s the time to bring it on. If you want a sensible discussion, however, you better wait a few days…

I’m so tired, I just want to go back to bed and sleep for a week. I have a monster migraine, I can’t think straight, all I want for lunch is a small bag of chips but I don’t have enough change and all my usual change-hiding places are empty, and now in the course of hunting through my purse I somehow pushed the magic button my cell phone that made all the letters and numbers on the screen HUGE and left myself a voicemail full of scuffling sounds to boot.

Can I just go home and skipped the rest of the year?

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In Memoriam – William Sackheim

My former boss died last week. I worked for this great man for over eight years. It’s a sad loss for everyone. He’s was a creative genious, a wonderful husband and father, a doting and proud grandfather, and a good man. He was a sweet curmudgeon. You’d asked him how he was doing and he’d inevitably say, "Oy! Don’t ask!" He’d complain about his million-dollar home and his expensive cars not working right… Yet the moment you needed anything or showed any signs of concern over any situation, he was right there with you, willing to help in any way he could and comforting you with soothing words and kindnesses. The world will be a lesser place without him in it….

William Sackheim, 84; TV Writer, Producer Won 2 Emmy Awards
By Dennis McLellan, Times Staff Writer

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Road Trip Weekend

I’m off to South Carolina tomorrow morning! Yay!! 6-day weekend… cool. 🙂 Except I don’t get paid… not so cool.

I’m so looking forward to the drive tomorrow. The mountains of Tennessee/Carolinas are so amazing!

But I’m most looking forward to the time with Nina… and Toby and Stephen.

I may or may not have time to post while there… I don’t know yet. Nina and I always manage to fill our days up solid. And it sounds like she’s got a lot planned already. I do have one plan for Nina, though. She commented on my blog recently (check it out) and now she’s got a blogspot account. Oh, yeah, baby! You know I gotta get her hooked up with it! Hey, I got Wendy and Larry here… why not my sister! Besides, she owes me a obsession or two. She’s the one who got me deep into Creative Memories. So deep I’m considering becoming a Creative Memories consultant. Crazy…

Well, I need to finish packing and get ready to go.

I pray you have an incredible Thanksgiving. And a fun-filled weekend, packed with the stuff memories are made of.


Nina and Lu – Big sis & little sis…

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Arise?

I fell out of bed this morning.

No, really. I fell out of bed.

Realizing I was running late, I sat bolt upright in bed. Perhaps that was my first mistake. The room seemed to sway a little.

I tend to sleep in the middle of my bed, which is a standard double, and that’s where I found myself this morning. So I scooch over to the left side. I always get out of the left side of bed. Even though my bathroom is on the right side of the bed, I always get out on the left. Don’t ask me why. I just do.

So, anyway, I scooch over to the side and go to stand up. Now, my bed is one of those pillowy soft beds. So it’s rather tall. I can’t sit on it and still have my feet on the floor. Consequently, when I go to stand up from sitting on my bed, I have to slide my butt down the side a little before my feet hit the floor.

Something happened between the butt-sliding and the feet-hitting. I have no idea what. I just know I was suddenly very aware that the floor was rushing at my face at a rapid speed.

Then I heard a loud thud and felt a sharp pain in my forehead. Things came crashing down all around me. Books, my glasses, my journal. I looked up to see what I’d hit my head on and found my bed stand staring defiantly back at me. Wood can be very unforgiving.

I ended this journey on all fours, surrounded by the pillows I’d discarded from my bed last night, books, an open journal and a dvd — where that came from, I don’t even want to guess.

I was mad. I don’t know who I was mad at. I don’t even know who to be mad at in such a situation. But I was mad. My head hurt like crazy. I was confused. I wasn’t even fully awake, for goodness sake! Someone should pay for this!

I’d like to say I stormed into the bathroom in my rage. But I was still too dazed from my trip to the floor to storm anywhere. And I’m getting too old to to do that first thing in the morning anyway. I’m so stiff when I first get up that I look more like a duck than a lady. Lovely.

So I waddle into the bathroom and start my morning routine. It wasn’t until I was in the shower that I finally woke up enough to realize how ridiculously funny this whole thing was. And then I couldn’t stop laughing.

Not the healthiest thing when you’re face is under a strong spray of water…

So, that’s how I started off my day.

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Road Trip Weekend

I went to South Carolina for the weekend to visit Nina. I had a great time!

Just the drive was an amazing experience. The mountains of Tennessee and North Carolina are absolutely stunning this time of year! Wow. God is an amazing artist.

I had an incredible time with God on the drives up and back. Seven hours (each way) alone in the car with just Jesus and some music, you’ll either get closer to Him or wanna throttle Him by the end of it. 🙂

I had such a great time with Nina, hangin’ out and talkin’… went for a walk, and spent some time just listening to the sounds of the forest and creek behind her home… crickets, falling leaves, water rushing over the rocks… beautiful!

It was the first Sunday in her church’s new building… the whole day was a blessing to me; from spending time with her Sunday School class, which has adopted me and just blows me away with love and attention every time I’m there, to the sermon her pastor preached, to the great lunch they fed me before I left.

There’s much to tell from the weekend, experiences, insights, thoughts, rambling… I’ll post more about the weekend over the next few days, but I’m so exhausted I can hardly see the screen through the slits in my eyes. I have got to go to bed.

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Tragedy Strikes

I ran across Sarah’s blog while reading Paula’s and saw this tragic news. I just had to post it here, as a conscientious Music City citizen, in honor of such a great songwriter.

north of the border
With all the sadness and trauma going on in the world at the moment, it is worth reflecting on the death of a very important person which almost went unnoticed last week.

Larry La Prise, the man who wrote “The Hokey Pokey”, died peacefully at age 93.

The most traumatic part for his family was getting him into the coffin.

They put his left leg in. And then the trouble started.

SHUT UP. You know it’s funny!

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Some Pictures of My Home

It’s a rainy day, and what a better way to spend it than hangin’ out at home, listening to Mindy Smith, the Indigo Girls and Beethoven, reading, relaxing… and taking pictures with my handy-dandy Cybershot 🙂 I thought ya’ll might enjoy seeing a few pictures of our beautiful home (okay, apartment… but it’s home to me!).

Welcome To Our Home!

The Living room/Dining room areas – all lit up

The Kitchen – Adria’s favorite place! 🙂 She cooks up some really good stuff… come over and we’ll feed you sometime.

View from the dining room…

Another View from the dining room…

My room — It’s HUGE!


View from my bedroom window

View from our porch – my favorite place to hang out right now!

 

Just one last thing to show you.
Grandma’s Bible has a prominent place, along with the praying hands mom made years ago, and a picture of mom and dad. I see it every day and it’s a powerful reminder of the incredible legacy my family has been given.

Well, I hope you enjoyed this little tour… Please excuse the mess, we’re still getting settled in. Feel free to drop by any time. 🙂 We loooove visiters!

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Hard Days, Dark Nights

It’s after 2am and I should be in bed….. why, I don’t know. I won’t be working tomorrow, so what’s the point in going to bed "tonight"?

Narnia may be beautiful and magical, but it’s still full of the same pain, fear, frustration and uncertainty the "real world" is. The job I thought was going to be my new focus, isn’t working out as I’d hoped. Oh, I still like the job — and they still like me I think. It’s just, well, their non-profit, church organization. They can’t afford to pay me. Forget paying me what I’m worth! They can’t even pay me what I need to earn to survive, even working 40 hours a week.

Today, my boss told me he can only afford to pay me around 30 hours a week, so I better plan on taking tomorrow off.

The problem for me is that this will leave me somewhere around $425/month in the hole. Taking a second job was an option I considered, then rejected. No part time job could pay me what I need… and frankly, taking that second job would take too much time away from the reason I came here in the first place, to plant a church.

So far, I’ve managed to make ends meet by living off my inheritance from mom and dad. I had such high hopes for that money. I wanted to invest it somewhere. Put it away and watch it grow, provide myself a nice little nest egg for my old age. But instead, I’m watching it quickly dwindle.

I know mom and dad would want me to use it this way, but, dang it! I don’t want to use it up this way.

God, I guess, has other ideas… What they are, I don’t know. He hasn’t chosen to share them with me.

How I wish mom and dad were here!! I miss them so very much. Their words of wisdom, their laughter… mom’s comfort, dad’s long hugs…. The both always knew how to make things "all better."  I don’t know how to live without them. Every day I wonder how in the world they lived for so long without their parents.

It’s not something you ever think of asking your mom and dad when their alive. It’s not even something you want to contemplate. I know. I never wanted to contemplate this life either. Even now, I try to find ways of not dealing with it. I watch waaaay to much tv, and eat waaaay too much. If there was another "waaaay too much" that I could figure out how to get away with as a Southern Baptist, believe me, I’d be knee deep in it already! Anything to escape the pain. Anything to not have to acknowledge the grief that consumes me.

I miss them so much my heart feels like it’s exploding and my soul feels inky black. It seems, many days, I still live in that darkness, and just visit the dream life I have here in Nashville. Even after experiencing days of unbelievable fulfillment by just life in general (something I never thought truly existed), I somehow find myself sucked back into the darkness, with the Monster sleeping nearby.  She is a Beast that demands to be fed and pacified, or she’ll turn and devour me. A beast of my own making, through months of running away and hiding from Pain. She is what keeps me from living in Narnia. She keeps pulling me back through the wardrobe doors, back into the past. Perhaps it’s her restless shifting that pulls me back, the same way something in the "real world" pulls us out of our dreams and back into the darkness of our night-filled rooms.

Between the Monster and my own rabid fears of financial ruin… did I mention I’m a drama queen? … poor Aslan is having a struggle getting an audience with me.

…Okay, I’ve finally run out of steam and am starting to fall asleep while typing… I didn’t know a person could do that. I’ve fallen asleep writing before, but typing…?

I will post a follow-up on this later.

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Perhaps Home

Boxes, boxes everywhere! How did I get so much stuff!! I thought I did the sort-discard-re-sort-discard-pack thing when I went overseas two years ago… in fact, I know I did. But in that year overseas, I seem to have collected more stuff…! And even the irrelevant things got shipped back — I wasn’t allowed to go back and pack myself, due to being on medical leave, so someone else packed me up. God BLESS them for it! But, it made for much chaos and confusion — and a bit of frustration — as I’ve unpacked. Searching for things I was sure I had, finding things I thought had been sold, and discovering things I’d thought were supposed to come back had not, in fact, made it back.

The place IS beginning to look like home, but the feeling still hasn’t come. The older I get, the more time it seems to take for a place to "feel" like home. Or maybe I’m just feeling the effects of all I’ve been through in the last couple of years, and my year-plus of living nomadic lifestyle. I’m not even sure what home’s supposed to look like any more.

But I know what it smells like. It smells like Nina’s basement apartment… mom and dad’s home the last six months of their lives.

I got back to her home last month, walked into the basement, got a good whiff of it and sighed, "aaahhh, I’m home!" Isn’t that weird? A place with such sad memories, the place where I my mom died, where I first saw her when I got home…. but it’s also the place I lived during the holidays last year. And those have become some of my most cherished memories, even though they were hard, hard times. I was so depressed and felt so without hope.

It was in the midst of that darkness that God met me, Nina and Toby carried me, the Holy Spirit enveloped me. Though I could not see Him or feel Him, I knew Jesus was there. No, I didn’t know, I just BELIEVED He was there…. I chose to believe and clung to that belief with all the strength I had left – which wasn’t much. It was either believe or die. Believe or be swallowed whole by the darkness. Believe or… or lose myself completely to the Abyss.

Perhaps that’s what home is. Perhaps that’s what the smell in Nina’s beautiful basement apartment really reminds me of.  The sweetness of being rescued by God. Sweetness that can only be fully known by believing what you cannot see or feel when all your senses are screaming that it’s over, there is no hope left.

I have many magical memories of home, but perhaps none so magical, or so packed full of hope, as last Christmas at Nina’s.  It’s a magic I’ve never known before, and didn’t know it then. The kind you cannot know unless you’ve clung to the precipice of the Abyss and, with fear throbbing through every fiber of your being, shouted at the top of your lungs, "I believe You, God!! I believe You are here, as You say You are. I believe You! I believe You love me beyond all comprehension! I believe You will rescue me! I believe You! And I refuse to ever stop believing!"

Perhaps that’s what Home is. Hope-packed magic that only God and a stubbornly willing heart can create.