oh look, the sun is shining

Okay, alright — yes, it has been FOR-EV-ER since I’ve written anything.

Busy is as busy does. It has just been an incredibly hectic time.

Despite this being the first Christmas without my mom, and despite missing her madly, it was really a great Christmas season.

I had more parties to attend than I could have imagined — and spent much of my time with friends and family participating in their celebrations. I even decorated, or rather, I had a decorating party and we had a great time. I still have some things up because I love them so much.

I have been so blessed by the people in my life — the best friends anyone could ask for. I spent much of the week/end of Christmas with friends from my childhood that I have reconnected with. There were a couple of families that were friends of my parents who had kids the same age as Ken and myself. Those few had girls and boys, rather than what always seemed like the standard “all boys” amongst my parent’s friends. Needless to say, I was always glad when my parents let us know that those specific families were coming to visit.

Reconnecting with S and D this year has been such a great surprise. Its crazy how after 20 years, we can still be the same friends as ever. The nicest part, especially through the holidays, was having people to share memories with. I’ve really loved that.

I spent my birthday (01-01  WOO) with family as well. It was nice just hanging out and visiting. I don’t know if anyone else ever feels this way, but there are days lately that I wake up and have to pinch myself for how well life is working out, and for how much love is in my life.

Back to work after Christmas, and things are crazy as ever. I seriously love working in this office. It not only is a culmination of everything I’ve worked for, but it is also a great launch pad for future endeavors. I’ve begun studying project management (paid for by the company — happiness! – such is one of the benefits of working in the public sector).

I swear I have found my pinnacle of careers in project management. Especially if I can combine it with a human services degree. I’m hoping to challenge some of the initial courses in the degree, since 20 years of experience in mgmt, training, and an education list that takes up an entire page, should count for something.

One of my long time good friends and I sat down recently — well actually, over dinner and a movie where the waitress asked if we were married because we are just on the same wavelength in conversations (he IS married to a lovely woman and anticipating child #2 – which makes me happily happy) — anyhow, JM and I discussed his entrepreneurial goals and development of his current company.

Starting this spring, I’m on board in his sales “dept”, basically seeing what I can do to increase sales not only through direct means, but also through training his current staff, and developing promotional ideas with him. I have a gift for sales – my current office has had sales increase almost 600% since I started working here, just through better marketing ideas. How ironic, considering I work for a nonprofit (which doesn’t mean the company can’t bring in revenue, it simply has to set a break-even budget)

I had my yearly review this past January and it was, as expected, STELLAR!!! I don’t generally get bad reviews — last year’s was very anomalous.  But it was such a great experience to hear my boss express such positive feedback. A lot of super hard work went into not only saving this job, but proving to them that someone with a corporate background and mindset really COULD create positive change in a very human oriented field.

So then getting approval to pursue my education using organizational funds — THAT was a HUGE bonus. This next year I’m hoping to complete the entire MCAS series as well as the project management courses. I won’t look at taking the PMP until next year and then follow that straight into the degree program.

Closer to the moment, though, other big things are consuming time — my mom’s memorial. Now that the step father FINALLY stopped being an ass and agreed to let me bury my mom — I’ve set the memorial date and am in full swing of organizing it. As usual, the step father is vocalizing the loudest about how much “he” loved my mom — more than anyone else — but I’m the one putting it all together, and speaking, etc.

Him and the ex! Really, just the two biggest abnormalities in my life. Generally most of the people I associate with are decent human beings. Go figure.

Anyways, JM is working with me on this really wonderful slideshow presentation on my mom’s life as well as my family’s life. Things weren’t always so crazy as they got to be — there are a whole lot of wonderful memories to share with people. I think that this will be such a great ‘movie’. But a LOT of work!!

I’ve FINALLY found a doctor here, who is working with me on my iron levels. The last tests came back showing 1/4 the average levels. Yep, I’ve been a tired girl. My naturopath told me that with my adrenals burned out and my iron so low, I’m basically standing on sheer stubborn determination. Yep — that’s a good characterization.

But really, when you have a life to live and things to do, going and lying in a hospital bed or just generally being lazy is not any kind of fun. I’m a DO-er. Generally speaking, the more I do, the more energized I get (I will admit, though, that the anemia is a challenge to this at times).

That’s where people like my friend MLC comes in — he has been so instrumental in getting my through my mom’s death, and making sure that I slow down when I need to. He isn’t above giving me a lecture or two.

Slowly but surely my health will continue to improve. I can tell the difference already with being on the new form of iron these past couple weeks (what a difference from the SLC experience — the ex told me at one point if I needed to go to the hospital, I could just walk up the hill to the one by the apartment. He suggested I didn’t need a car, because the hospital was so close — um, ya, dumbass, when a person is so sick they are barely able to make it from bedroom to bathroom, they won’t be walking up a hill. Then again, this was from a person who got angry at me when I blacked out at the zoo. Angry?!!!! Can you believe it?  Can you believe I was dumb enough to marry that guy?!!!! Seriously, my brain was on vacation that day.  Heaven help the poor lied to and fooled girl who he dupes the next time.)

But, life is … well… good. And not just because the sun is shining, which I always like. The only REAL shadow is my friend MLC who is back in the hospital and facing some really dire situations. It is a difficult time for him. It is hard to not be able to be there for him as I would like, but the situation is what it is.

He’s the one who sat me down and said “Crys, you need men in your life, not boys.”  Um, hello, where have “I” been?!!!

The interesting thing that I notice about the men in my life — pre and post marriage – is that quality of people that they are. I still haven’t quite figured out what WAS going through my head with the ex, but then again, it was the catalyst for healing the relationship with my mom — from both sides. And for that, if nothing else, I will always be so grateful for that experience.

……but if I EV-ER lose my mind again….someone – PLEASE……..SAY something. Kidnap me. Drag me to a deserted desert island. Send me to Australia. Anything.

the joy of family traditions

I’ve been putting up my Christmas tree tonight — and all the attendant Christmas decorations. I think even for my grand tree (?) I have far too many decorations. I’m going to take some to work with me to bless our sparsely decorated office tree with. I love the idea of walking by that tree and seeing a part of my life there.

But tonight, for the first time in too many years, I’m putting up my own tree. It feels somewhat like so many years have been leading to this one.

In looking at these beautiful old decorations that I loved so much as a child, I at once look back with joy and the sense that I am not here alone in my reminiscing, and there is also sadness. Sadness for so many Christmases lost. Sadness that in my own attempts to begin a family and build family traditions there was so much heartache. But I feel so much hope for the future.

Today, at Church Conference, I met up with a lady I knew at the previous church I attended and I find it is still difficult to have people offer condolences. Yet I am grateful for the love and support that continues to be shown me.

I could not ask for greater blessings than I have in my life at this time. Janet and I were talking yesterday of how, as love begins to permeate one’s life more and more, those people who don’t contribute to our lives are moved out, either by our choice or by a strange “chance”.

Happily, as I did not finish decorating the tree before I went to sleep — and because I already had plans for a “decorate my tree” party….Tuesday will se the completion of my lovely tree. It is SO fun to have friends be so enthusiastic about decorating.

This weekend will be an opportunity to use up the last of my holidays for the year, not counting the 10 days I get off for Christmas (gotta love gov’t!). I think I timed it well because I have 2 Christmas parties in a row this weekend, so having a long weekend will give me a chance to finish making Christmas presents. Then I have another party next week. YAY for having an excuse to play — like we need excuses during this time of year.

On a less optimistic note, I generally despise this time of year for commuting. Bleh — this morning sucked. Back to the positive, Parkland’s Conference and the Christmas Devotional were FAB-u-lous. Really inspiring. I personally LOVE when the person leading a meeting has a good sense of humor.

On another completely random note — somehow, even after the not so lovely experiences, my prospects for dating are incredibly positive. Better than they were prior to the disaster marriage. Wierd how that is, but the quality of men in my life is vastly improved as well.

the silent monks

Top marks for creativity!!! Here’s more of the same, all done with varying degrees of success. They’re all fun to watch.

the pretzel experiment

I sure am learning a lot about making pretzels….or what look like odd breadsticks. I don’t know if they even begin to qualify as pretzels. But no matter Janet, Bernice and I are having fun.

With homemade wonton soup, intriguing pretzels and Shrek the Halls — certainly a day to remember.

I love spending time with Janet. She is one of my many favorite people — she’s always working on learning and improving, always goals on the go. She is a good role model, a great friend and an amazing mom.

I’m still bummed that last night’s plans didn’t work out, but today, with hearing about the road closures, the many accidents, and just the conditions of roads and sidewalks in town, I think it was wise to not go.

I think I’ll have to work on making pretzels again, but should probably do some research into making them better. Certainly have had a few laughs over them.

Oh and we watched ‘Food Inc’ as well. I recommend everyone see this show. It is a great documentary about the state of food production in our society. Especially if you are from an agrarian background — possibly more especially if you don’t. It is very eye-opening, but it also show how capable we are, individually and collectively, of changing the food production system. We vote with our dollars. Really good to remember.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1286537/

winter wonderland

Just ain’t so wonderful. This is the worst storm I’ve seen in awhile. I don’t recall having white out conditions like this last year — the only remarkable thing about winter last year is there were no chinook winds to blow the snow away or melt it. The snow just stayed and stayed and stayed.

My office closed down early to ensure that people got home without fighting traffic, since more traffic = more accidents in weather like this.

What REALLY sucks is that I had plans tonight. Chris and I were heading to the Jubilee for Vinyl Cafe and had reservations to Fleur de Sel beforehand. I was really looking forward to it — french food and gut-busting laughs — but I don’t want to risk life and limb for it.

Bad timing for bad weather. But like a coworker said — Go with your gut. If it feels unsafe, don’t. So I guess I’ll be sticking around home on a friday night. How anti-climatic is that? Hopefully VOD will have some good movies on tonight and I’ll just curl up in front of the fireplace with a hot cup of licorice tea.

Or maybe I’ll putter around and get some things done.

Oh winter — who says snow days are only for kids.