It's Been Some Time

A month or more to be exact. Blogging hasn't been on my mind lately. What with the dance festival and all the preparations for that, I've been buried in work and excitement.

The festival was a wonderful success! The classes were excellent and the performances were divine. One, my personal favorite, was divinely inspired. Joe Williams did a Dervish number at the end of the last show that was...amazing doesn't cover it.

There wasn't a dry eye in the house. All he did was get up on the stage with a longish skirt thingy on and twirl around and around for about 7 minutes straight. It was stunning. It was breath-taking. I was practically speechless. The intensity of the music he chose rose and fell as he spun along. Several times I thought it was nearing the end only to start back up and keep on going.

Around and around. When it was over, he didn't fall down. He didn't act dizzy. He didn't seem different. But I knew I was different.

My time with Joe Williams was short. I took one class from him called Meaning in the Body. I was reluctant but I allowed someone to talk me into going. The only word I can find to describe how the class was for me is 'transcendent.'

By the time the class was over, which was far too soon in my estimation, I felt a fundamental shift in the way I see dance. Joe was able to help me tap into my 'inner artist'...someone I didn't know existed until he showed me. I've been dancing for 4 years (sometimes it seems like forever). From now on, it's more than just dancing. It's expression.

This last weekend I was talking with my husband about dancing. I'm taking a break again this winter to focus on hearth and home a bit more. I need some space to learn what exactly this inner artist wants of me. I'm wondering if I can apply what I learned about myself in other areas of my life? Can I approach my daytime chemisty job as an artist? Can I learn to see what others are saying without hearing the words that they speak?

With Joe's help, I think I can.

The Ghost of Christmas...

I'm struggling with this huge desire to hunker down and hibernate. The cooler weather and the rain have me thinking about hats and scarves and sweat pants and fuzzy slippers. I've caught myself looking longingly at the tea kettle many times in the last few days.

It's a struggle, but it's a good one.

The garden isn't cleaned up yet. Probably won't get it done before the snow flies. I'm busy getting things ready to vend at the festival next month. I'm also busy getting the Christmas stuff ready for sale on Artfire. I've got a few ideas and I only hope I have time to use them before the season is over. I feel like I'm getting a really late start.

I had a talk with my husband the other day while we were wandering through WallyWorld. We happened upon the Christmas tree display. The sales clerks were having trouble with the lighting in that area of the store and it was semi-dark in there. Perfect for enjoying the lighted trees on display. We looked at the trees and we both immediately fell in love with a white flocked 4 footer with multi-colored lights. Practically at the same time we turned to each other and said, "You know, I kind of miss decorating for the holidays." It was one of those 'Hallmark' moments that you can't plan for. In that moment, I knew that we were back on the same wavelength again.

It's been a rough summer for us this year. I work too much and he's left on his own a lot. The distance makes it hard to maintain a good relationship sometimes. We've talked about what we can do to fix that. Not much it seems except keep trudging on.

Back in the day, I used to have a big Halloween party every year. It was and is still my favorite holiday. We'd decide on a theme, usually it was BYOB, and a costume was usually required. Lots of music, friends, decorations and fun. I love it.

Christmas has always been a thorn in my side. I hate the commerciality of it all. I hate the TV advertisements. I hate the hokey decorations that so garish. I hate the fakey-ness of it all. I do miss the decorating though. I love a nice tree decked out in homemade ornaments. I like the wreaths and the garland. I love a nice, gentle, shimmery glow over everything. It takes me back to a much earlier time. A safer time. A time when there was no war or disease and everyone had enough of whatever it took to live.

Christmas was important to me as a child because I knew I'd be seeing people I love and didn't get to see very often. Christmas is about family and being with people that mean something to me. It's about sharing a meal and some peace.

I don't usually get the Christmas Spirit. I haven't for years. I must be making up for lost time because I got it bad right now.

:D

Bleh

Sick. Stupid cold. I had almost convinced myself it was plague, but my husband insists it's just a cold and I'll probably live.

Bleh.

At this rate, I'll never get my garden cleaned up. I still have tomato plants to pull out and some potatoes to dig up. I want to clean it up before winter gets here for real. Today, I tried to go out and work a bit. I think I might have actually picked a couple things up and then just gave up and went back in the house.

I'm pretty sure I took too much cold medicine. I followed the directions on the bottle...but that can't be right since it didn't really do much. I don't expect to feel pert and perky, but a little reprieve would be nice. So I took a little more...just a snort. I now feel loopier than a Hot Wheels racetrack.

I hate being sick.

Another Day in the Hit Parade

Things keep hitting me....or maybe I'm hitting them...

I hit a rabbit with my car this morning on the way to work.

I hit my knee on my desk drawer about 200 times today.

I hit a slick spot on the floor in the locker room this morning. It was almost a tragedy.

One of my co-workers hit me with a rolled-up report...I probably had it coming though.

I was finally hit with the realization this morning that I'm probably going to have to find a part time job to supplement my income for the winter.

I had thought those days were over. I used to have as many as 4 jobs at one time. I worked in a nursing home, made pizzas, waited tables and went to college all at the same time. I struggled and worked and graduated from college with a 3.95 gpa and managed to snag a really good job at a very stable company.

I thought I had it made. But then reality hit me.

With the recent economic downturn, my hubby's enterprises have also taken a downturn and money is pretty much NOT coming in anymore. My job doesn't pay enough to make ends even get close together, much less meet.

'Economic downturn.' I think if I hear that phrase one more time I'll scream.

Finding the patterns

I've been feeling under the weather a lot lately. I've been telling myself it is allergies and as soon as the ragweed is exterminated by a good, hard frost, I'll feel much better.

But then I started thinking as I am wont to do on my way to the homestead of a Friday afternoon. I left work early today for yet another I-swear-to-god-I'm-coming-down-with-something episode. And I could swear it still if I hadn't had an epiphany on the way home from work.

I ache. Everywhere I ache. My back, my legs, my arms, my head. Dull, throbbing ache. Just like last Friday and the Friday before that and the one before that. Achy breaky Friday is how I've come to think of it. I'll spend my weekend doing stuff around the house or the yard and come Monday morning, the ache will be less noticeable and I'll be moving around better.

Then another work week goes by and by Friday, it's the Achy Breaky Whine again.

It's only taken me months to notice the pattern. It's either the "I have fibromyalgia but I don't want to admit it out loud to myself" pattern or it's the "you're getting too old to keep up this pace" pattern. I haven't truly decided yet. But my husband was helpful enough to point out that my next birthday will be 47.

After a week filled with driving back and forth, working up to 50 hours, a couple of dance rehearsals and helping the MIL around the house, I'm whupped. I'm sleep deprived, hug deprived, puppy kiss deprived and just plain relaxation deprived.

Maybe I am getting too old to keep this pace up. And maybe the pace isn't making the (potentially) fibromyalgia symptoms any better.

And maybe if I could get my doctor to actually give me a diagnosis of fibromyalgia, I could take that to my boss and say, "See? I told you it's not all in my head."

But then it could all be in my head anyway.

Falling again...

I've been in hiding lately. Sort of. I've been staying away from the blogging. I don't have anything good to say these days and I really want it to be a positive experience.

But here I am anyway.

The annual fall depression is setting in and I need to nip it in the bud. I keep trying to think of things to send it packing, but it has a strong grip on me this year. Stronger than usual. Makes me angry and sad. So I'll just blog about what's going on in my life.

Work is work. We had a 'townhall' meeting on Monday at Champion's Fun Center (an arcade of all places for a business meeting). We got our quarterly dress down and report on how lousy we are followed by some rained-out go cart races and a rousing round of cosmic bowling. I recused myself from both activities. The go-carts are far too slow moving to interest me and I don't wear 'community' shoes so the bowling is out of the question. We were then treated to a gone-cold dinner of roasted chicken, boiled potatoes and cheesecake of questionable origins.

Yay. I can't tell you when I've felt so wanted.

The meeting was dry and unproductive and I personally left at the end feeling a little like I'd been smacked around with a velvet hammer.

The good news is I still have a job. Not that it makes a big difference since the bills just keep piling up. I have no money. Friday I get paid and I'm betting by Monday I won't have $10 left to show for it. Another 2 weeks down the tubes.

I have things to pay for that I want. I have a layaway that I want to pay off. I have classes to pay for in November. I want to henna my hair. I want to get my dogs their shots. I just want, one time, to walk into Hobby Lobby and buy the thing I went there for without cringing at the extravagance of it all.

Yes, winter is coming and I'm ambivalent. I have so much left to do in the yard like give it one last mowing and cleaning up the garden for good. I have things I need to put away that I also need to make room for in the garage (easier said than done in my tiny home). The things outside are complicated by the fact that I'm not actually home every day and my husband managed to serously injure his ankle riding my motorcycle around the block. So he's gimping around and doing what he can which pretty much amounts to very little. It's not the norm but it is frustrating to me to be saddled with everything.

Know anyone who wants to buy a motorcycle? I'm selling mine. Kawasaki Vulcan 750cc 1995. Low miles, excellent condition.

Another downer. Selling my bike. Makes me feel really old and pretty much a failure. After Jeff hurt himself on it, I just don't want it anymore. Makes me feel like a pussy. That bike has been my pride and joy. I love it. I often thought I'd be buried with it. Now I want it gone. I know I'll regret it for the rest of my life, but I'm not riding it enough to make the luxury justifiable.

Justifiable. That's one of those words we use at work a lot. We have to justify everything. I'm really tired of arguing my case every day over every little thing. If I wanted to argue for a living, I'd have gone to law school. Instead, I went to chemistry school. I'm not positive, but I'm pretty sure the two are very different.

Yes, winter is coming. They're calling for snow this weekend although right now it's only a 30% chance my neck of the woods. I hate snow. I just do. It's genetic. My Mother also hates snow. And it's not the snow's fault. If I am tucked in nice and warm in my house with cookies in the oven and roast in the crock pot, I'm happy as a clam to let it keep on falling down. But come Monday morning when the alarm goes off you can bet I'll be swearing at all that white shit on my car.

I can't keep up anymore. I've overslept four times in the last week and twice I was late to work. My boss is very understanding. We have a long-standing tradition of extremely flexible work hours and he doesn't care if I'm late so long as I make up the time. But the thing is I care. I have to care.

You see, I'm doing a big juggling act. I have to keep all the balls in the air and tapdance while balancing a sword on my head. I can't let anything fall and I can't stop moving. I don't know what to do anymore.

Thus Begins the Migration

Last weekend I was sitting on my porch in the morning watching the dew dry off the grass and contemplating the vast mowing job I had before me. It only took about 2 hours but that's not what this blog is about.

This particular entry is about butterflies in general and Monarchs in particular. You see, as I was sitting there on the concrete steps that lead to my front door enjoying my coffee and the gentle morning breeze, over the course of only a few minutes I counted no fewer than 25 Monarch butterflies wafting southward along the gravel road that is in front of my house.

It's not my first migration although this one caught me by surprise. I hadn't realized that it was that late in the year. I remember sitting on the porch at the house in Havelock and watching the Monarchs go by. In those days, there was no such thing as the internet so I packed my infant son up in the car and we went to the library. We spent an afternoon searching through the card catalog and reading about the Monarch migration.

Turns out that Monarchs are the only butterfly that migrate like birds do. What is normal for many species of bird is unique in the Monarch butterfly. They head north in the spring and south in the fall. Seems so very normal.

I learned that the Monarchs in our neck of the woods, the east side of the Rockies, migrate all the way down to Mexico and in to Central America for the winter. The butterflies on the west side of the Rockies congregate in Southern California for the winter. I found pictures of some trees that were literally blanketed with hibernating butterflies.

Cool.

I've always liked butterflies. When I was a kid, I'd follow them for blocks through our small town watching where they went and what attracted them. I had friends who collected butterflies but I could never bring myself to do that. Butterflies, it seemed to me, were beautiful not only because they had gorgeous wings scaled in brilliant colors. They are also beautiful because of what they do. They captivate. They sparkle and shine in the sun. They flutter on wings almost unbelievably beautiful and strong and yet they are so delicate that a mere touch of a finger tip will render them useless. Most of them pass through their adult lifespan in a single season.

Why in the world would you want to foreshorten that life? Why ruin it for them? They only get to be beautiful for a short time. Let them enjoy it. Let them do what they were put here to do. Brighten our lives. Produce the next generation.

It's only natural.