Ramble On

Treats

Halloween pics of the nephews up on Flickr. The best photo I took all day was the one of Dana leaning down holding Max. She had the world's biggest plumber's crack going. She MADE me delete it, stood there and wouldn't walk away until she saw me hit delete.

The Dynamic Duo

Sam DID NOT want to wear a costume. The sounds coming out of the bedroom where they were dressing him surely sent the neighbors rushing to call DFACS. The bat ears didn't stand a chance.

This is a positively dreadful photo of Max, but don't you like my new embroidered jacket?

If you want to see a picture of Thomas with an actual pumpkin head, see my Flickr link to the right.

Happy Halloween!

Connections

    Yesterday I went over to Tish and Joey's house. Some people were watching a football game; mainly people were catching up with each other and chasing the costumed children running around the yard. It was The Doghouse crew, and it made me sentimental for the days when I lived in my Decatur house. I lived on one end of the street, Jill and Kristian lived about 8 houses down from me, Mico and Lisa lived next to them, and Brandon lived on the corner with Joey and then Bethany. Susan R was my roommate until Brandon moved in with me. And there was another entire group of people who did not live on the street but might as well have for all the time they spent there. It's where Tish and Joey met, where friends announced engagements and pregnancies. Even though some of the inevitable bad things that are part of life did occur while living there, I remember my time on the street as being one of the happiest periods of my life. Susan R and I would hop on our bikes in our pajamas and ride down to hang out in Jill and Kristian's hot tub on Sunday nights. We'd walk up to the Shell station to buy ice cream and stop along the way to talk to friends out in their yard. But The Doghouse, which is the garage behind Mico and Lisa's house, was Command Central for the social scene.  You didn’t need to call and see if it was okay to come over, there was always a group hanging out. Lazy afternoons would stretch into late evenings while the group would grow and more chairs would be pulled up to the circle. Mico's dad would be reciting poetry, Chicken would be making his hilarious and absurd observations, Lisa would be doing some last minute gardening. Food would be on the grill and there would be music, always music. Most of the people in the group played some instrument or another and would often start up playing while the rest of us sat around listening and drinking beer.
      It's hard to describe what made hanging out at The Doghouse so special. You know when you are sitting with a group of people you really like and everyone is laughing and sharing stories, most of which have been told before so many times that everyone in the group knows them already but is still happily listening and smiling in anticipation of the funny part they know is coming? And you suddenly get hit with the awareness that you are existing in a perfect moment? That is what it was like.
      I wish I could have bottled up the essence of those days- the carefree feeling, the camaraderie, the laughter, the feeling of being connected- so that I could pull it out now, years later, and drink in the joi d'vivre. At the very least, I need to remember it more often and make sure that I work harder to keep all these relationships alive. Sometimes I feel untethered, floating. I miss the sense of community, the sense of belonging. I haven't had enough of that in my life lately, and I am trying to make more of an effort to find that again. Even if it isn’t as easy and spontaneous as walking a few steps down the road.

Hanging At The Grocery Store Again

So what if I just made a post for Friday when it is actually still Thursday? Tomorrow is going to be a busy day anyway. Unlike tonight, when I thought I would be watching Thursday night television on my new (borrowed) tv but found out when I got it home I didn't have the right power cord.

When I was just at the grocery store, my new hangout, I saw a guy I haven't seen in about 14 years. He looked exactly the same and he called out my name and said he would wait on me to check out. So we were catching up in the parking lot and it was so amazing how we were immediately laughing and interacting exactly the same as when we had hung out years ago. He suggested we go get a drink to catch up more and I asked if his wife would think it was weird that he went out to get groceries and came home an hour late. Apparently she was out of town, but my question did make him pause and he said "Yeah, I guess I should just go home". And then he said it was weird being married and I said, "Really?" and he joked, "Um, you should know". (We had earlier noted the irony in the fact he is a now a divorce lawyer and I am a divorce getter.) So he gave me a ride to my apartment, which was all of about 200 yards away and I said maybe I'd see him in another 13 or 14 years. He gave me his card - I guess I seem like a good potential client.

He told me at first he didn't think it was me because I seemed a lot taller. Which was really odd, because with the shoes I was wearing I was all of 5'2". He obviously remembered me as being an Oompaloompa.

Flashback Friday

I am sitting on a mountain somewhere in New Hampshire while on a camping trip with my friend Sissy about 15 years ago. My idea of a great vacation now involves a lot more creature comforts than in those days. The whole week was packed full of long days of mountain biking, climbing, and hiking before heading back to our campsite. I am not saying I don’t like to do physical activity on vacation, I am just saying I have a much lower tolerance now for roughing it with my accomodations. I don’t think I would spend 6 consecutive nights in a tent now if you paid me. One or two, perhaps, but I have decided cool little boutique hotels are more my style. Seeking out and discovering interesting restaurants is more appealing to me than whipping up a tasty dish from a pouch on my camping stove. But mainly, my love for a nice hotel bathroom is what makes me look at this picture and think, “oh how young and foolish”. Give me the fluffy towels, little bottles of free toiletries, and if you are really lucky, the steam shower and plush robe. Well, give me a toilet, period, and it will beat the whole camping thing.

On the 5th day of this trip, we were both pretty disgusting despite our best attempts at cleaning off in the sink near our campsite. (Thank goodness I was in my boy haircut stage.) We drove in that night to the town and went to a local bar. We befriended the bartender who told us we could crash at his house that night. When we woke up, he had already departed for work, but his roommates told us we could use their shower. Sissy made the terrible mistake of saying I could go first. I have never taken a better shower. The whole Lather, Rinse, Repeat instructions on shampoo bottles? I interpreted this to mean “And Repeat and Repeat and Repeat” while the hot water scalded my skin. I shaved my legs, and then just stood there luxuriating under the water. I noticed the water temperature getting cooler and kept turning back the cold knob until I had only the hot water going. When the hot water disappeared completely, I finally got out and began to towel off. Sissy heard the water stop and stuck her head in and asked, “How was it?” I said, “Oh, it was great getting clean, but the water was cold the whole time.” Not very nice.

Creepy Me

Jen also told me my little eyes staring out over on the side of this page were creepy. I was trying to add a little color, add a little personalization to this very bland page. Months ago I designed a banner for the top of the page but couldn't figure out how to add it and lost interest. So a couple of nights ago I thought I'd put up a photo. I had my whole face posted originally, but it made me laugh when I saw it, so I just used my eyes. I hoped it would keep a little anonymity going. But I agree it looks stupid. It kind of looks like I am spying on you and saying, "I see you reading". Which would be cool if I really could. See who was reading, that is. Sometimes I am just curious.

So Close

(The following is a probably very boring post about my working to lose 29 pounds over the past year. Fair warning. Allow me to indulge myself.)

    It was so hard to get out of bed this morning in the dark and cold to run, but I had to because...   because I am only 3 pounds away from reaching the weight goal I set 15 months ago! I promise I have done this the "right" way, meaning I haven't starved myself or gone for days eating only boiled turtle eggs or anything like that. I have been jogging 5 to 6 days a week for the last 13 months, and about 2 months ago, when I realized I had been stuck on a plateau for a couple of months, I cut out carbs for the most part. THAT has been hard for me as I could live on a diet that consisted solely of bread, potatoes, and corn. But I have to admit that I have felt better physically and mentally. And I usually allow myself one day a week to just eat whatever - you should have seen my plate at this party I went to Saturday night. It was a potluck movie night, and the crowd was almost all new to me, so I couldn't hurt anyone's feelings by leaving their dish off, you know. I also take breaks for holidays and special events.
    I have observed the buzz surrounding Dove's new campaign for self-esteem and I applaud their efforts whole-heartedly. So I feel like I have to defend myself and my pride at having worked so hard to lose weight. My desire to lose this weight has not been to make others think I look better, but simply to feel good, have more energy, and look like myself again. I had always been a smallish person until about 5 years ago. I didn't even reach 100 pounds until I was 19 years old. I am only 5' tall and have small bones; my natural body type was always slim. Then a whole bunch of factors collided and the result was I gained weight. In a period of about one year, I hit my mid-thirties and my metabolism changed drastically, I started a new job that left me utterly exhausted constantly and as a result I stopped exercising completely, and a series of personal events including family loss and worrying about a loved one's health resulted in a pretty severe state of depression. The anti-depressant I started taking helped immensely, but also made me even more sluggish and also unfocused and unmotivated. When the weight didn't fall off quickly as it always had in the past when I had needed to get rid of a few pounds now and then, I became complacent.
    So in late July of 2005 I was finally ready to do whatever it took. I had changed careers, I started phasing myself off of the Effexor (Even though I didn't do this through my doctor, I did an extensive amount of research on it and cut back slowly. Still, it was utter and complete hell.) and started getting mentally prepared for the task. Then my marriage ended and everything got kind of crazy. I suspect some people I know think I probably started dieting because of my divorce, when actually I just kept going in spite of it. It made it harder in a lot of ways because many mornings I just wanted to stay in bed with my head under the covers and many nights I wanted to comfort myself with food, but I just kept saying over and over to myself that I was NOT going to let this throw me off track. And I would get up and run.
    I feel so much better all over. I am never going to have a perfect body and I am okay with that. But when I look in the mirror I look like myself again. A slightly older version of myself, but I am also okay with that. I am glad for my friends' support (although Jen has insisted that I promise to stop at 110 because according to her I don't look good at 105).
    I expect to reach my goal in another couple of weeks. If you live within a 10-mile radius you will know from the screaming you hear when I read the scale and see 110 in bright red digital numbers.

Love Is Embarrassing

This guy is an artist here in Atlanta and has a blog. On Thursdays he features artwork by his six year old daughter. Last week's post for Ava Thursday was too wonderful. I loved it because, after all, I did teach art in an elementary school for 7 years and I miss the charming qualities of kids' drawings. I also loved it because it was an illustrated book entitled "Love is Inbarsing" ("Love is Embarrassing") and, after all, it quite often is.

Check it out here.

House Update

People have been asking me about the progress on my house since I haven't posted an update lately. Things ARE happening, just not much to see. Because of the way we are building, a lot of the inspections and stuff that would be happening later for other types of construction are going on now for us. And in typical fashion, almost every step of the way there has been some issue with the city. We have gotten behind schedule because of these issues, rain, and things like that. But we'll get there. After the slab hurdle is cleared, we should have a few months of smooth sailing.

Flashback Friday

I am slowly trying to scan my print photos so I will have digital back-ups. Over the years I have lost many photos. One summer I stored a box of photos in my parents' garage and the humidity caused my entire photo album from a trip to France to stick together. The worst culprits are my cats. There is something in the chemical that coats photographs that is like kitty crack to those guys. So many once cherished photos now show the scars of having been through the kitty teeth shredder.

I decided to maybe once a week to post an old photo and write about it here. I wanted to be totally random in my selection and just pick one out of my box to scan. The rules would be that I would use the one I pulled out no matter how ugly or embarrassing (and as a girl who was a teenager in the 80's and had a perm for much of that time, I have many photos that fall into that category). The only exception would be if the photo would be embarrassing or upsetting to others in the picture (or possibly cause legal trouble for anyone!)

I didn't do so well with sticking to my rule, because the first photo I pulled out was of two guys who were complete strangers to me. What could I write about them? Here are two people that don't even look vaguely familiar to me, yet I have carried this photo around for about 20 years? So I threw it in the trash and pulled out another. It was a picture of me holding my nephew Alex when he was a baby. A cute shot, but I couldn't use it because it might allow me to go off on a rampage about what I want to do to the two little shits in his school who dunked his head in the toilet a couple of weeks ago and this is not the climate to be talking about hurting children, even if that is what I want to do. So on my third try I pulled out the photo below.

This is what it was like to grow up in the country, with no neighbors, a television that picks up 2 stations, and a mom who made you play outside from about 7 am to 7 pm, only allowed back in for a quick lunch of Spam cubes and canned pears. You play like small farm animals. You entertain yourself by running down the long dirt driveway to build up speed before jumping into big mud puddles. You play in sandboxes and dump buckets of sand on each other’s heads. (You get worms sometimes. How's that for grossness?) It was hard for me, because even then I didn't particularly like being dirty. You can see that I never dove in face-first like my sister. But entertainment was entertainment. Our mom would hose us off when our exile to the yard was over.

Good Dreams Gone Bad

Last night was filled with bad dreams. Except they were really very good dreams, and that is what made them bad. Because I would have to wake up and experience that slow realization of where I really was and that what had just been making me so happy wasn’t real. My body would seem to get heavier as it filled with disappointment and I would roll over and fluff up my pillow and go back to sleep only to have it happen three more times. Last night it seemed my own brain became a traitor to me. Maybe that is why I have a raging headache this morning, although I am pretty sure it is a sinus migraine instead. I sent an email to my boss/stepdad and now I feel that stress that comes from missing work. I just drank a giant dose of liquid Tylenol and if my liver doesn’t go into acetaminophen-induced failure I hope to get out there by lunch.