I'm just your average, everyday, divorced 38 year old girl -- overweight, tragically unhip,
and trying to make a life for myself. I live with two furry beasts, Dave and Abby, whose
feline mission in life is to choke me with their fur. Nothing special.
Saturday morning. I've already been to the recycling center and Post Office, so the day is starting off more productively than usual. What I'd like to get accomplished today is complete vacuuming of the entire house, complete dusting of at least the upstairs, both bathrooms cleaned and disinfected, and all of the laundry done, folded, and put away. If I can manage to get the ironing done and drop off my dry cleaning, too, that would all be icing on the cake of today. With all of that behind me, I can work on the downstairs tomorrow, including going through my closet with a machete and dumping a bunch of stuff. Why do I feel compelled to share this? Who knows?!!
Gosh, I really wish I could do neat-o stuff with this page. I want to have a guest book and I've even signed up for an account but I don't know how to make it show up on my page. I inserted the code into my template but it doesn't show up. Perhaps it's just as well, frankly, because it's not as though anyone is reading this, so what would be the point. Hopefully that blogging book I've ordered will have ideas for drawing people to my site. Of course, wouldn't it be nice if I wrote something that someone else might be remotely interested in reading first? LOL
What I really want is this: a clean, orderly house and thin(ner), healthy body so that I can (finally) focus on the important things in life instead of simply the stupid minutiae. Again and again I come back to the fact that if I died right now, there would be nothing at all to show that I'd ever lived, other than the incredible mess of my house. I will not allow that to be my legacy!!!
Then there's the Navy penpal. Let's call him by his first initial, shall we? I think that, after where our conversations have gone this week, he deserves (at the very least) that consideration. So things between S and I have really changed in the last few days. From my being the older, wiser woman, I feel as though he's got the upper hand and is the grown-up now. How on Earth did that happen??? He's already figured out that I have terrible self-esteem issues (wow, most men don't figure that out until a second or third date so he's either really perceptive or I'm worse off than I thought) and is planning ways to "fix" that and has matter-of-factly addressed my weight problem as if it were just a blip on the radar screen that will be dealt with easily once he gets home. I cannot possibly let a 24 year old come into my life and fix it, can I? What would it say about me if I dated someone that much younger than me??? On the other hand, why do I care what anyone else thinks if it is right for the two of us? (Not that I'm saying it IS right, because that is just not possible to know when half of the discussion is floating on a ship halfway around the world, but what if it were?) Haven't I lived enough of my life worrying what other people think? On the other hand, The Biggest Mistake of My Life (long, horrible story...SO not going there!) happened at least in part because I was trying to live my life outside of the box, too, and look what happened then? But I can't tar every man that I meet who doesn't meet all of my carefully predetermined criteria with that a**hole's mistakes (and mine, if we're being honest), can I? Not every man who doesn't outwardly seem right for me (according to the "norms") is going to be a mean, selfish, lying jerk. I think the only litmus test that I ever plan to apply to a potential "Mr Right" is the "is he kind?" test. Basically, when facing a situation where he could do something nice for me or say something nice or, simply do nothing, or be flat-out mean which choice does he make? Don't look now, but I'm obsessing again...
To heck with it! I'm gathering my (copious amounts of) laundry and headed to the laundromat. I won't have to think there, just load and wait. I may be back later or not. How's THAT for decisive??? LOL.
Friday morning (barely). So much for daily postings, huh? Oh well...not like anyone's reading it but me so who cares!
Guess what??? I lost 4 pounds this morning!!! YaY 4 me! After 8 months of nothing but gaining, to see the negative sign in front of the "change from last time" indicator on my scale was SUCH an awesome feeling. By my birthday I should be halfway to where I want to be. I know, it's a long way from here to there, but I've got hope and "in the presence of hope, anything is possible".
Did I mention in my last post that I'm organizing people at work to send quart-size baggies full of stuff to deployed soldiers/sailors? There's this group that has a deal with the military to send out boxes full of these baggies so that people who are stuck in God-only-knows-where can have stuff from home. I think it's a neat idea and my therapist (Dr. Karen...what a hoot she is!) thinks so, too.
Do we need to talk about Dr. Karen and I and what I'm trying to do in my meetings with her? Probably wouldn't hurt. I'm supposed to visualize how I want my life to look once I'm done with therapy, so why not use this space to do it? Dr. Karen has really helped me see that I need to work on my isolation from the world and gives me some really great suggestions on how to deal with the anxiety I have when I think about doing that. The weight thing is just another symptom, I think. The weight helps isolate me because of the stigma attached (whether real or just imagined in my mind) and because I can say to myself, "I'm too fat to do that". Some part of me (actually, more and more parts of me every day) realizes that once I get out and start getting involved in the world that the weight will cease being an issue and that, once I'm more active socially and physically, I'll be more likely to run into men that are of the caliber I SHOULD consider dating, rather than the pond scum I run into online. (Note that I'm not saying all men online are pond scum, just that I seem to attract/be attracted to those that are.) So, I'm trying (with a little bit of success) to get involved in church again. I'm even considering taking confirmation classes, even though I'll be the oldest person in there by a factor of 20 years! LOL. Of all the things in the world to hold onto, my religion seems to me to be the one that is the most stable and will bring me the most fulfillment and happiness. Now if I could just get my lazy, anti-social butt out of bed on Sunday mornings. (It's not really that I'm anti-social, more just social-phobic. Is that a word???)
Anything else? Oh yeah...if I don't do my laundry this weekend I will, literally, run out of clean stuff. When you've got as many clothes as I do, that's an accomplishment. Not one to be proud of, but an accomplishment nonetheless. Besides, I need to get that out of my hair so that I can focus on the rest of the house. Yikes! You'd think that someone who isolated themselves as much as I do would keep a spotless house but you'd definitely be wrong. Need to do something about that, too. Just add it to the list!
Tuesday afternoon. I had every intention of posting each day and yet, alas, it's been since Friday. Really? Friday??? Oh well...perfection is boring anyway!
I feel so positive today. No idea why. It's not as though I've done anything about so many of the things I procrastinate on (other than the fact that I made a doctor's appointment for a complete physical later this month -- first time since 99!), but I just feel a lightness of spirit. I don't know that the tumbling thoughts have stopped, in fact, I'm fairly certain that they haven't, but I think, perhaps, that they're starting to come together and surface into my consciousness, where I can do something with them. In any case, it's nice to not be a total bummer every day, you know?
The lightening of my mood might have something to do with the fact that this is day 6 for me of eating properly and exercising adequately. Cameron (aka Trainer Hottie) always says that the way you eat affects your energy and your moods and, as usual, he's right. Well, when I say "as usual", I'm only talking about the health related stuff. Cameron is a goofball about stuff other than health but he's so sweet about it that I just giggle. I am so incredibly sore today. I don't know if it's from the workout yesterday with Cameron, all of the walking I've been doing (45 minutes a day) or The Firm workout I did on Sunday night. My inner thighs and hamstrings are really painful whenever I get up, sit down, or walk. That pretty much leaves only sitting or standing perfectly still.
I can't wait until I get the new blogging book that I bought so that I can do creative things with this site. I want to be able to have people post responses to things that I've said, and have links to things that I think are neat-o, and stuff like that. Of course, I don't know if there will ever be anyone reading this, so I could just be doing it for myself. Nonetheless, it would be pretty for me and that's a good thing! LOL.
A few days ago, I told my Navy e-mail penpal that I'd take him out to dinner for steak once he gets home from the Gulf. I even offered that he could bring a friend with him, just to make him more comfortable with the idea. I've organized a microwave popcorn drive for my other penpal (shipped out 550 bags last week), but this penpal says that he doesn't need anything although the food on ship is pretty wretched, so I thought that, as a way of expressing my thanks for what he's doing, I'd offer to take him somewhere wonderful once he gets home. I am quite certain that I had no ulterior motive in offering this (I've analyzed and re-analyzed my thought patterns and there was definitely only the idea of giving him something nice and, perhaps, making a new friend) and yet in his response he asked if this was just a friendly dinner or if he should dress to impress. My first response was just to laugh. He's 24 years old, for goodness' sakes, and I'm 35. This can't possibly be anything more than just friends. I started out our correspondence with the pronouncement that I'm much older, old enough to be his older sister, blah blah blah and he just responded that he liked older women (yikes @ being the older woman now, btw!). I laughed it off at the time but when I read his response about the dinner, I suddenly started thinking that perhaps a nice dinner with a sweet guy (and he is very sweet) wouldn't be such a bad thing. (I know, probably the first step of many that will lead to a not-entirely-positive ending.) So, I said that we'd have to see how dinner would end up but that we should assume that it will just be friendly and then see if either of us is interested in something more. What am I thinking? Am I crazy??? Then, to compound the sin (deliberate word choice, btw), I sent him a picture of me, which I hadn't previously done. Now, part of me was thinking, "maybe the picture will scare him off and then I won't have to think about it anymore," but another part was hoping that it wouldn't because I would miss our correspondence and his companionship. Yes, I know, he's halfway around the world, but it really is nice to have his e-mails to look forward to. (Don't get me started on what that says about my "normal" life. I need to get out more...I know, I know!) So anyway, not only does he not run screaming, but he thinks the picture is "cute" and asks for more. I am stunned. As I sat at my computer last night reading his e-mail, I was laughing hysterically. I did send another pic, as requested. This one was of me in my Angels jersey last December and is sort of cute, I think. Nothing from him today yet and I'm curious to see what he has to say. My therapist would definitely not be pleased with this development AT ALL. Big sigh. I know it's sort of defeating the purpose of therapy to hide things from her but I just don't think I want to hear what she has to say about it right now. He's far, far away (for how much longer? Not sure and am scared to ask because I need to lose a WHOLE LOT MORE weight by then, my friends! LOL) so there's nothing really going on, she says to herself as she takes the first few steps on the road to Hell. I know it's possible that this might not end in fiery flames but with my track record and the age difference and the fact that I know nothing about him personality wise...well, if you're playing the odds, bet against.
