Doesn’t matter when… mainly because I can’t recall… but I sat there on a hospital bed hooked up to a heart monitor and a blood pressure monitor. I’d had a few doses of bp meds and it wasn’t going down. The words “heart attack” were mentioned a couple of times and I watched my husband flinch.

The doctor, my primary care physician said, “what is making you so stressed?” with her heavy Indian accent. I said, “My son had cancer, we lost our business, we’re on the verge of losing our house, the mortgage company has screwed us over and over again trying to modify the loan, my husband might be facing a layoff or pay cut that we can’t afford and my family is falling apart…”

I want to say something positive like she uttered some wise phrase that changed my entire perspective. But she looked at me with her beautiful eyes and said, “But you have to know this passes, everything does.”

Which is easy to say when your job is secure, your family has a lot of money (owning factories in India and whatnot) and your children are healthy and your bills are paid. It’s very easy to look at someone and tell them to buck up it’ll pass.

Or it’s condescending, lacking compassion, and silly.

Child birth passes, it doesn’t make the experience less painful nor does it alleviate the discomfort of recovery, but then again, that passes as well, right?

Fear not, the negative Stella has not returned.

She’s just occupying herself waiting for something else to pass.

Remember Princess Twatface? My cousin’s wife? The daughter of the owner of the company S.O. works for (that my mother’s boyfriend is supposedly buying out)? Well, Princess Twatface’s 19 year old son and his wife (shotgun wedding) just had a baby boy last week. Princess Twatface has taken off the last 2 weeks in anticipation of this baby’s arrival. She has taken far more than her vacation time AND CASHED OUT two weeks of vacation time on top of it, but I guess that is the perk of being the owner’s daughter.

She has the same position as S.O. she just watches over a different area. Part of their job is actually worked from home on the computer. But, instead of taking her laptop with her while she waited in the waiting room at the hospital – she had S.O. checking her stuff. Meanwhile she’s updating Facebook nonstop. Then she took the rest of the week off after the baby was born and today. She called S.O. a little while ago to tell him she is taking the rest of the week off because SHE has a circumcision coming up and doctor’s appointments for the baby.

Her son and daughter-in-law live with her. If I were that daughter-in-law I would be PISSED. This woman is posting pics of the baby, her with the baby, her son with the baby and refers to the baby (her grandson) as HER CHILD. Then posts pics of her son with the baby and says “my babies!” in the caption. There are loads of pictures of him with the baby, pics of the baby and HER with the baby but not a single picture has been posted of the MOTHER and the BABY.

Princess Twatface is the biggest drama queen I’ve ever encountered. It’s like she’s an adult who constantly has to make a big deal out of everything to prove how grown up she is.

My cousin (her husband) told S.O. last week that she was irritated with him for not taking time off of work to sit down at the hospital and wait for the baby to be born. He rolled his eyes… S.O. didn’t say anything.

But, here we are taking a PAY CUT and S.O. is doing his job and her job. Plus he got called out on Sunday for an emergency with his own stuff. And there she is cashing out vacation time and taking more time off (with pay) than she has on the books. Not to mention she’s acting like SHE is the one who had the baby.

One thing is for sure, I’m willing to bet this causes some massive problems with the daughter-in-law down the line. After all… Princess Twatface has tried for years to get pregnant including expensive fertility treatments – now she’s glommed onto this baby like it’s her own. Shades of “The Hand That Rocks The Cradle” here BIG time.

Julien and Scarlet have gone to San Diego until Saturday. Saturday my dad is coming over to help rip the patio off the house. Yes, we’ll rebuild it and no, I am not quite sure when. I’m hoping my dad rides in with a miracle in the back of his truck but I doubt it. We’ll see… In the meantime S.O. and I have some ideas on improvements and tweaks to make it more friendly so perhaps patio 2.0 will be a total win and all this will have been for some kick-ass goodness.

S.O. and I have had more orders this month than we have had all year combined. If this continues a pay cut won’t even be a blip on the radar… mostly.

What I’m working on right now is gratitude, if you can’t tell. “By the skin of our teeth…” S.O. and I often say, just as we were about to lose it all a saving grace comes through and yanks us back. I’d like to think that we’re being taught to have faith. That maybe that’s the answer to the whole “this life sucks” problem. Faith as small as a mustard seed… I’ve got a little more than that and I’m grateful for it. So many things have taken a radical turn and gone right when it was practically assured it was all going to go very wrong. And, that gratitude thing, when you look at your most used tags in your post stats… well, let’s just say that I’d like to start seeing “happy” and “thankful” show up in that list.

Deirdre and I have been doing some school shopping online. I had nearly forgotten that school starts in just a couple of weeks. Between homeschooling, high school, and college my back to school expenses have been reduced dramatically. It’s nice and I’m thankful. Sure, in the long run teenagers are more expensive, but I can get by with doing a little now so there are some nice, fresh things to enjoy as school starts back in and then do a little more as the weather cools off.

I’ve slept pretty well the last couple of nights. Last night S.O. and I settled in and enjoyed Memphis Beat both of us laughing out loud and pretty hard at several different parts… “What we have here… is a ghost plane.”

S.O. just rolled in fresh from the gym still wearing his athletic shorts, t-shirt, and sunglasses. Today I’m super grateful to see my husband come through the door and to find him so steamy attractive.

and I’m happy to hear my girls giggling in the floor a few feet away from me. I’m grateful all my children are happy and healthy.

and I’m so happy to be going on 4 weeks without anti-depressants as of this Sunday.

It’s not perfect but life is good.

Mother guilt. It’s awful.

Deirdre wanted to go to a friend’s house today. I actually said no.

She’s had a pretty busy summer. Summer school, a trip to Hurricane Harbor water park, trip to Magic Mountain, she’s been to more movies in the last month than I have been to in the last 6 years. So much so that she is actually blogging movie reviews now. She’s been to summer plays, spent nights at friend’s houses and so on and so forth. I mean… the girl has been super busy. That doesn’t count having friends and her boyfriend over for bbqs and dinners here.

So today she wanted to go to a friend’s house and I said no. Some chores didn’t get done over the weekend, there are things we need to do around here. Julien is out placing job applications and running an errand or two for me. I’ve got an order for our business to take care of, not to mention some etsy listings to place and a website I’m working on for a friend. I might need an extra hand on deck.

Still, I feel guilty. I rarely tell her no, I rarely ever do not let her go do whatever it is she is wanting to do.

Then there is the S.O. thing, they finally lost the big contract. He doesn’t know if/when a pay cut is coming but chances are it’s inevitable. Right now I’m trying to see if a whole lot of “little things” will add up to a decent thing. You know… not putting all your eggs in one basket kind of thing. I don’t want to stress and give this more energy than it deserves.

Here we go again… the Wicked Witch of the West (shortly to be turned into an acronym because I’m tired of saying my mom, my mother, etc.) or WW is on a warpath again. She’s emailing S.O. constantly for stupid reasons and of course, we know from my cousin’s wife that S.O. is the ONLY employee she harasses.

She has some lovely, pompous posts on her blog that contain little jabs here and there that, of course, only I would recognize.

About the time I begin to think that I’ve never had a “recurring” dream. I do…

Oddly enough it always centers around Christmas. Seriously. Ridiculously.

Several months ago I had a dream that I woke up and realized it was Christmas Eve. I hadn’t bought any presents and nothing was decorated. I freaked. To put it lightly. I ran around everywhere and couldn’t find my list, couldn’t find my decorations, and then realized that no one had gone grocery shopping and I would have to do that too.

Last night I had a similar dream. It was Christmas Eve and again, not only had I not done anything for Christmas I was somehow supposed to return 5 tickets to the local drive-in (that was torn down YEARS ago) for $200 to go buy a tree – on Christmas Eve. The people at the drive-in felt very sorry for me. Rowan was with me and it was just… awful!!! Then I remember looking at the trees thinking, “I don’t have enough time to pick a good one!” and then fretting because I thought I had read somewhere that the freshest trees were bought weeks before Christmas. Then I panicked because I went to the tree lot where we always buy our tree – the same one Jake works at and I was upset because he wasn’t working there.

And, just try looking up, “forgets to decorate for Christmas” in a dream dictionary!!!

Ugh.

I need a Yoda, I’ll even settle for an Obe Wan Kenobi. I’m a little lost and I need someone who sees my potential and someone that nods knowingly at the end of the day after I have hauled his ass through swamps and up and down hills and swung on vines and fought imaginary fights and confirms that yes, it was all for a very good reason. That in those grimy, slimy, gross, and terrifying moments I was growing, I was making progress, I was FINALLY getting somewhere.

It’s been a long time since anyone has looked at me and said, “Wow, you’ve come a long way. Look at what you’ve done! Sure, things look bleak, but not as bleak as before and let’s look at what you’ve learned here. No, no, put away the “bad shit happens to good people for no reason” thing, it’s part of your experience and that experience has brought you to some very important truths…”

Some jack off said “these truths shall be self-evident” but nothing is evidencing itself to me these days and I look around and there is no Yoda. No Obe Wan. The universe can’t even spare a Mr. Miyagi. I’m fresh out of ridiculous chores that will embed skills into my subconscious allowing me to later pummel the bad guy with some terrific waxing on and off.

It really bothers me that I’ve spent a lot of time plodding along, doing the best I can and no one says a word. Months after falling out someone says, “Wow, you aren’t as good as you used to be and you used to be awesome.”

Blink. Blink. First thought is always, “I was awesome?” Then, wait! That is the sort of comment that would have been nice to hear while I was “being awesome” not after I’ve fallen off the awesome truck and have been sitting in the gutter fermenting for a couple of months.

It’s sort of like those people who have lost a loved one and they say, “tell everyone you love them now because you don’t know what might happen tomorrow.”

What about “say every nice thing you’ve ever thought because if you ever get around to finally voicing it, it might be too late.” Mainly because you never know how someone is feeling while you think they are being awesome and maybe that moment would have been the best time to have spoken up and recognized that awesomeness right there on the spot. But waiting until they are no longer awesome sounds like you are disappointed in their current inability to be awesome and that makes it all that much harder to simply be even a tiny bit better than they currently are.

(and note here, I am NOT fishing for people to tell me I am awesome right now, please! Not the point! Honest!)

I’ve often said, “I’m so tired.” One day it dawned on me, I’m not physically tired at all, I’m soul tired. Soul tired.

I don’t need another cup of coffee, another Red Bull, or a vacation, or a good night’s sleep.

(although, let’s be totally honest, those things are pretty good band-aids!)

I don’t need religion, I don’t need to “find God.”

Over time I made the conscious shift to prefer peace of mind and inner peace to outer satisfaction. And, if you go back to that beginning paragraph, I’m in no way claiming that I’m totally there yet. I’m just trying.

I’m overweight, my health has suffered from all the stress and bullshit of the last two, nearly three years. I’ve found myself floundering, drifting, swimming against the current, treading water, and nearly drowning more times than I can count. Right now, what feels right is healing the inside.

“if you don’t go within you go without.” (Neale Donald Walsch)

Only going within sometimes leads to a quagmire. Stuck in stickiness that makes no clear sense, searching for a sign, some sort of familiarity… some… something.

I’ve always been a “jump in and get it started” type of person. I make the leap and then hope the pieces fall into place. Sometimes they do and sometimes they don’t. If I want to redecorate a room I’ll mention paint colors, S.O. will groan, and I’ll find myself dashing out of the house with Deirdre or Julien in tow buying cans of paint, tape, and rollers and then coming home with a “I’m doing this. You’ll like it, and no, you don’t have to help” attitude. Then I make due on whatever budget I have and hope it comes together nicely. I don’t spend a lot of time thinking, planning, and prepping for whatever it is I want to do.

Back to the paint example, I never move the furniture out of the room, drape it carefully and commence with looking like one of those scenes from a movie. I move the furniture as I go, taping off sections of the wall only if and when necessary and the prep is woven into the process of painting not a precursor to it. Sometimes that works brilliantly, sometimes not so much…She says about the spot on the family room floor that she hides carefully with a piece of furniture. Ahem.

If I have a big idea that requires research I’ll research it, make notes, and then move forward with putting it into action as quickly as possible.

But, this… this feeling of stagnation this rut that I’ve been in for months… this is something that feels a lot like waiting for something to happen. I don’t like it. I don’t know where I got this belief but it just seems wrong to “wait for something to happen.” I know I lack patience, sure… but I also sort of feel like if you want something to happen you get out and make an effort to bring it about. Maybe the problem is that I don’t know what I want to happen. I know the very basics of what I want, happiness, peace, and some sort of fulfillment, but I don’t know what that means.

Not yet, anyway.

– Do not search for life’s meaning, or the meaning of any particular event, occurrence, or circumstance. Give it its meaning. Then announce and declare, express and experience, fulfill and become Who You Choose to Be in relationship to it.

– The experience of your life beginning and ending is really nothing more than the onset and dissolution of your idea of yourself as “separate.” At a conscious level, you may not know this. At a higher level this is always clear.

All the above also from Neale Donald Walsch and I have no idea why I have plunked them down here other than I thought they were interesting.