Ick!

I really do hate being sick. It steals all of my energy. I've been sick now since last thursday. On saturday I felt markedly better. Now I feel yuck all over again. The whole family has it too! We are a mess.

Is It Just me?

Is it just me or is Hee-Haw (pictured above) regarding me (the taker of the picture) with great interest? I couldn't help but wonder if he recognized a familiar stubbornness.

Foster Stigma

I just spent the last few days reading a REALLY LONG book. It's the life story of a girl who tragically lost her mother and because of an unfortunate law grew up between foster care and the streets. She actually ended up being a lawyer. It was a pretty amazing story. The book, however, was a hard read. It was hard to read in way too much detail exactly what she went through. I can't imagine it. It was also hard to read all the language. I've put down many other books that had a 1/4 of the language this book had in it. I just really wanted to know how it ended up. Now I know and can get on with life.

I remain frustrated that there seem to be more stories about how terrible foster parents are than there are ones the state otherwise. I'm not gonna drag out my soapbox here, but I really want to.

I talked to my oldest about that particular frustration I had with the book. We've had the conversation before. We went to a concert last year where the speaker was trashing foster care. Her feelings were hurt as were mine.  I keep telling her that she needs to write a book about her life. She says she wants to. Maybe one day we'll write one together.

As The World Turns

Because I'm "Cool Like That" I keep M&M's in a dispenser thingy on my desk. All of us that work in my area pitch in a try to keep it filled. Well......the dispenser emptied by mid-week last week and I had run out of refills. At the beginning of the week my coworker brought in some fall colored M&M's. They were pretty ugly but they were fallish. They were a mixture of red, dark yellow, light brown and dark brown M&M's.  * aside - we decided the Mars company totally flubbed by not including orange, so I picked some orange out of the other bag of original colored ones that another coworker brought in so I could make the fall mix even more fallish. I was much prettier with orange included.*

When I was a kid I don't remember having a bunch of different kinds of the same thing. M&M's, for instance, came in plain and peanut. Now you practically need a menu and a half hour to figure out what kind you may want. There are peanut, almond, pretzel, coconut, raspberry, peanut butter, mint, etc. They also come in every color you can think of.

M&M's isn't the only thing that's been done that way. When Doritos came out with Cool Ranch flavor I thought that was pretty radical. Now, one of my children's favorite flavors of chips is Cheeseburger flavored Doritos. I SWEAR they taste just like a cheeseburger. It's creepy.

Last night the Oldest came into my room. I was reading a letter that I got from my Grandmother yesterday. Oldest was intrigued by it. She's of the email generation so a letter is an odd thing for her. It's rare to get an actual letter in the mail. That grandmother is 92 and lives in Colorado. It was a precious letter. Anyway... we were teasing Oldest about how she better teach her children one day to keep up with us when we are old and frail. I had written to my grandmother and that's whey I received a return letter.

After the kids left the room, for the first time I was able to kinda look out around the bend and imagine myself a grandmother. I started wondering what kind of chips my grandchildren will eat. They will probably have fancy kinds that change flavors several times while you chew them. I wonder if people will still even write letters. Will email be archaic? Will there be Cheeseburger flavored M&M's?

A Something That Points To Somewhere I Don't Wish To Go

~That morning the sky possessed the quality of blue that assured me the day had infinite possibilities. Coupled with the cool breeze it seemed more than my senses could take. I don't know why I didn't get to my feet and march off into the world to do something productive. For the moment, I chose to give in to the the invisible anchor that tethered me to that place. I wasn't sure which I preferred, familiar captivity or new found freedom. They both held an inexplicable allure. I felt as if I had won the lottery. I had the means to do anything I wanted but was paralyzed by the notion that if I set out to do anything I would be overtaken by unknown evils that I was certain were lurking.~

There ya have have it. A beginning of something, words on a page..... This is the type of thing I am tortured by. The other day I actually sat down and wrote part of a chapter of a something (beginning with the above). The trouble I had was that it was emotionally hard. I find that every time I try to write something the same emotions are underneath of it. I can write short stuff with levity, but when I try for a real story, something to actually be developed, the same emotions bubble up. That's frustrating. I feel like the key to my literary freedom is to actually put the time in (it could be years) to write the story that's stuck in there. It's the story of my life. Then I can move on to other stuff.

BLICK! I don't want to do it.

Put Up or Shut Up

Thing said recently by me: "If I had MPD...and I don't... but if I did, one of my "many" would be a common street thug."  That thought just came flying out of my brain. It made me laugh.

I said before that fall is my most creative time of year. I feel more free, for some reason, to be playful in thought. I'm more apt to share with others the crazy that exists all the time but sits quietly in the backseat during other times of the year. Still, though, I vacillate between giving in to the creative or hiding securely in the boring/sane/usual.

I read somewhere recently a quote. I don't know who said it. It's this: "Whether you think you can or you can't, you're right."  In my half-hearted search for a real/possibly lucrative outlet for my creativity I hear the same suggestion over and over again.  One of these days I'm gonna have to put up or shut up.

It's Raining Outside and Fall is Coming

This afternoon I read for a while in the hammock on the back porch. As evening fell and the bugs began doing their night-time thing little drops of rain also started to fall. It's a familiar symphony that I love with all my heart. It inspires me and provokes in me a deep sense of satisfaction.

I came inside because I was creeped out by the book I was reading and because the symphony put me in a really good mood. I found my bestie on Facebook and we chatted for a bit. It was one of those conversations that could only be appreciated by us. It was serious and crazy all at the same time. I really enjoyed it. 

Fall is coming. I LOVE fall. It is my most creative time of the year.

Yes, I realize this post has an odd randomness about it.

The End