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Calamari, packing badly and being shifty at the imaginary bakery
I’m comfort eating. Calamari to be exact – and fries and some delicious chili sauce thing that reminds me of a savory marmalade.
Calamari took my mind on a little walk and they shared a memory about the first time Amanda had calamari – it was in Italy.
Gawd.
I used to actually DO things you know? I have done and experienced AMAZING things! Seriously! From almost being sold in Afghanistan to staying up for days and days surrounded by crazy ravers.
I still DO things. I have a busy life. I just make it look easier than it is because I make time for things and people who are important to me.
In my ‘spare time’, I play this stupid game that I can never logistically win – and even if I did – it’s a virtual flipping game – not like I’m going to improve my life or bank account by playing it.
Anyway, I got the following compliment last night. (Which did NOT creep me out like the ‘are you single’ question from some guy playing in the same room as me last week. Ew.)
I don’t think I look anything like Jennifer Anniston – but hey, she was married to Brad Pitt, so I’ll take it. (Although, never have been attracted to Brad Pitt – he’s too ‘pretty’ for my tastes, so why in the world did I just say that? Food stupor.) I usually get Gwyneth Paltrow .. (who also dated Brad Pitt … what the heck?? Maybe I just look like someone who would get dumped by Brad Pitt? Hmmm ….) What do you think?
Tangent. Did you enjoy that?
So, I’m comfort eating and remembering a comment my dad made YEARS ago. I was feeling sorry for some homeless people in an awful part of town. He made the point, “Um, they are homeless … they can be ‘homeless’ ANYWHERE.” That made an odd sort of sense to me. Why not be homeless somewhere with comfortable weather and lots of people spending far too much on food and tossing it after just one bite? If I was homeless, my thumb would be out for a ride to anywhere but here, that’s for sure.
Feel like a kid lately who just wants to ‘go’. I want to run away. LOL! Pack like, 10 pairs of mismatching socks, no pants, toys, only 1 pair of underwear and forget to pack tops and my toothbrush. You know, like we did as kids when we were in a hurry to escape. You’d open your suitcase, or whatever container you grabbed at time of packing, and realize ‘wow, I can really do nothing with any of this.’
But seriously. I have this sudden urge to just ‘bail’. Get out of dodge. Run away.
I could start anew in a tiny idyllic village. Maybe even under an assumed name? I’d rarely be seen out … slip in and out of the bakery and butchers – with dark glasses. Looking very dangerous and shifty in a trench coat. Okay, maybe not so dangerous – probably more like an idiot in a trench coat, dark glasses and eclairs in hand from the bakery I just slipped out of.
But, probably I should just address whatever is making me want to run away in the first place. Because, no matter where I run to – I’ll still be there. LOL
Enough!
Cheese and Rice! I have managed to sad myself right into depression. But, I’m not having it! Nope. Enough.
If I had to analyze myself, I would say my mood of late has been a culmination of several pretty big events.
1) My Nannie, who was a HUGE bright loving light in my childhood, turned 90 on the 23rd. My mom went over to England to surprise her and to celebrate her birthday. I have to face the very real fact that the odds are I will never see my Nannie again.
2) Nic turns 18 next month. I’ve done post after post on how I feel about that (click on the ‘Motherhood’ category).
3) I think I’m having a mini-midlife meltdown. (My first clue might have been when I dyed my hair from natural blonde to brown.)
While I am grateful for everything I have, and blessed beyond my wildest dreams when it comes to friends, family and those most important things that cannot be bought, I worry.
I worry that I have no savings, no retirement plan, no health insurance to turn to with my very real health issues. Very easily interpreted by an imaginative mind into: I have no future.
4) I’m beat! Seriously tuckered out. It’s been a hell of a few years!
I stopped drinking, asked for a divorce, got the divorce, was almost homeless, was unemployed, moved, got a job, got my smile back and started a blog to share it all. Throughout all of that I’ve dealt with my heart condition, my lung disease and penny by penny, caught up with past due bills and by the grace of God – I made it!
But jeez – sometimes a nap is in order after such exertion. 😉
5) The tooth. This will be the last time I mention it. (Until I get it pulled, then I’m all up in your eyes with a post about that) But being physically knocked off my perch was the final straw for this camels back.
But here’s the thing –
- Not once have I wanted to drink through any of this.
- My Nannie is alive and amazing
- My son is here – and we have an outstanding relationship
- I am not hungry. (OK, I’m a little bit hungry lol, but I have food, just can’t chew)
- I am not homeless
- I can afford my medicine
- I woke up this morning
- the bills ARE paid
- I have an appointment to handle the tooth
I have got to focus on the positive, because God hasn’t let me down yet.
So what the heck am I doing not using that smile?
I’m glad I blogged about how I was feeling at the time though. I hope that maybe someone who feels like I felt, but wouldn’t say what I said – knows that there is ALWAYS the choice to decide to be happy anyway.
I am grateful. I am loved. I am human. And I’m going to have times when I feel overwhelmed – and those times will teach me how to be stronger, without putting armor on. I have learned to reach out. I have learned I don’t have to put on my wonder woman cape. I am enough.
I’ve done an awesome job of climbing over obstacles, and even though my muscles are a bit sore (I really should stretch before all that climbing), it’s so great to get to the other side.
Out of the dark, up and over into the light of my loved ones.
(Oh, and poor Teddy, getting dragged into such a somber post. I owe him his own. He’s been through a LOT with me.)
Teddy and the tomb poem
Finding myself on a hamster wheel. I reached out tonight to a friend so I wouldn’t be morose in bed, hugging on to my teddy – my 40 year old touchstone.
I’m tired of listening to my own thoughts, so I can only imagine how you must feel reading them.
I know what it is important in life. Love – family – serenity – service – enduring friendships.
I’m burned out on the wheel though.
If I had a magic wand, it would put me somewhere with a future. A chance to spread my wings and not have them operated by ‘must’. Must fly here – must fly there – must not touch the light.
I wrote this poem years ago, and it’s become a metaphor for what could have been.
“In memory of …” the tomb began,
I could not read much more.
My loss engraved in cold grey stone, was too much to endure.
I turned away, too pained to stay,
And walked to clear my mind.
All the while regretting what I had to leave behind.
Debauchery Soup 