Happiness Is ...

... a cat lapping up the sun!

(with a snowman in the background)

Living in a Bubble Wrapped World

I often wonder just how much I shield my heart from the risk of being hurt.

It's not that I don't care. I do. I appreciate out loud. I feel great empathy and I trust. I cherish the gift of friendship and treat it with reverence and respect. I share my heart, my ears and the-story-of-me easily. But I have an escape clause. I can listen, feel, empathize and care. Then, I can simply turn it all 'off' after I walk away resume life-as-I-know-it just as easily.

A friend who needed a gentle ear called me a few nights ago. She knows far too many people who know people who are getting sick. And dying. It is not just one or a few. It is not just elderly people who have had a good life. It is people our age. It is happening far too often. She is so very sensitive and she physically feels what her friends are going through. And it hurts. It hurts her so very, very much. She can't turn it off and she can't find a release valve for her pain.

In that moment, I felt for her. Ouch. I cannot imagine claiming ownership of someone else's pain, physically feeling it and taking it home with me.

I don't feel like I would be as effective as a support person if I carried the weight of another person's burden on my shoulders. I am very stoic in my supportive role. I know that when I have been the one who has crumbled and fell I need to surround myself with quiet strength. So that is what I unconsciously give.

Then again I wonder. Do I care enough?

When I hear a friend talk about their broken heart, I know that I have never loved that deeply. My heart is bubble wrapped in a protective coating that prevents me from the inevitable fall.

If someone doesn't call (or call back) there is a reason for that. I justify it in a way that I justify when potential daycare families don't follow up on their planned appointments or return phone calls. If a relationship starts out that way who needs it? And I stand by that reasoning.

My love life could be written into a Disney movie. It is pretty much (who am I kidding? it IS) non-existent. I create little fantasies over small 'school girl crushes' that I have had as the years pass me by. My heart is safe in my dream world. Then when I do actually dream of what that reality could be, the dream is of the Walt Disney variety. It consists of eyes locking and hearts beating a little faster. Then it fades to black (or daylight).

I keep my heart safe and protected in my bubble wrapped little world. I have loved before and it is intoxicating. I have also lost at love. A heartache is worse than a hangover the next morning.

My friend that wears her heart on her sleeve and takes on her friends' pain as her own is also longing to find the love-of-her-life. She is not content to sit and wait for the phone to ring. She is proactive and makes those phone calls herself. She has been rewarded at times, heartbroken at others.

What is the right way? Is there a right way?

I am completely self-sustaining within my little world. I live in a supportive and supporting environment. My heart is open to feel all that life sends my way. But it is surrounded by a porous layer of protection. Perhaps not of the bubble wrap variety after all. Maybe it is more like the styrofoam packing peanut variety. It moves and seeps into the places that need protection the most.

What is most important of all, is that I don't build up a callous from repeated wear and tear on a broken heart muscle. And that ... is simply not going to happen.

Really?!??

It is going to be a snowman kind of day today. April 29th ...

And that is all that I have to say about that!

Sigh.....

**Update**

If life hands you lemons, make lemonade they say. Well? If life hands you snow on the second last day of April, I say "Make a snowman!"

 Then later in the day, all the snow had melted (except "Slushy, the Snowman")

A Wellness Vet Visit

Saturday was Vet Day in our home. We packed up our two black kitties and took them for a car ride to our friendly neighborhood vet.

I felt like a new mom as we took our cat family in for their Wellness Visit. This was not an emergency or SOS visit to the vet for the first time in a year. It was simply time for their annual check up and shots.

I hate to count the number of times we have been at our vet's office due to Junior Cat's diarrhea and Senior Cat's pneumonia/asthma/cancer (or otherwise unknown) visits.

Almost a year later we have discovered two things that have changed our cat's lives for the better. Gold Nugget Cat Food (also known as feline gastro intestinal food) and steroids.

Each of our cats has hit a plateau with their varied symptoms. Our vet confirmed that they are in a nice holding pattern, weight is good, teeth are good (all things considered) and generally they are pretty hale and hearty cats.

The ironic thing is that Junior Cat's lungs sound worse than Senior's. Senior's breathing is quiet and sounds good. Yay for the steroid medication which is doing its job! And ... Junior has a heart murmur. They don't do anything for this so it is simply a 'note in his file' for now. Our 'healthiest' cat is the one with symptoms that could go awry one day.

Junior struts his stuff around here like nobody's business. He chases ghosts, his tail, air mites, you name it. He is a feisty guy.

He is becoming pretty secure with his place within our family unit. I believe that going to the vet was a completely different experience in his Previous Life (where he lived with 20 cats, it was a long drive to the vet who gave them the best deal and vet visits were done as a group where they were dropped off in the morning and picked up at the day's end). He may or may not have been 'fostered' by other cat owners (I never thought to ask)), because when he comes home with us at the end of the office visit he simply acts grateful and relieved to come back home with his rightful family. It is subtle but it is there.

I wish that I knew more of Junior Cat's back story. You can tell that there is a novel within him by the little quirks and fears that he has. The subtle appreciation that I see in his eyes and feel in his heart each time that we have taken him to the vet and he has returned home with us in the same visit tells me that he has not felt this secure in a very, very long time.

It is a gift to love someone (or some pet) so easily. It makes one's heart swell up and beat a little faster to fall just a little bit more in love the more you get to know another. To feel that love and trust reciprocated is precious and special.

The Law of Diminishing Intent

I came upon this quote a few days ago and it resonated with me. 

I printed it off, taped it on the computer desk and it was to inspire me. How could a truth such as this inspire me after (over) five years of procrastination on our Family Book Project? It felt like a slap in the face. I could hear it telling me "See! I told you that you would never finish!! I was right!"

No quote is going to talk to me like that. I hobbled into action. Almost immediately.

I spun my wheels a lot this past week. It was a week of not being able to complete one task before I dove into the next. Then the next.

I (try to) write a quarterly newsletter for my daycare family. I succeeded with spring, summer and fall last year. I skipped over winter and we are well into spring this year. I started a winter/spring newsletter a week ago.

The project got aborted because the phone rang. Then, because I was waiting to find out the outcome of some potential interviews with new families. It was further prolonged by the fact that I can't string two coherent thoughts together in the form of a sentence while my little people are here during my daycare week. But most of all? Because ... the longer I waited to do something that I had decided to do, the less probability there was of me actually completing the task.

My column was accepted by another new paper this week. I just had to make one small adjustment to the writing samples that I had submitted. I had to make them longer. I am a wordy writer. I add too many sidebars and explanations and stories. I have little problem condensing my work. But adding to it? That took a completely different set of tools and energy. I started my revisions on Thursday. I tried harder on Friday. But the job still remained UN-done. The words "The longer you wait ... the less probability of the job getting done" haunted me. What in the world do I think that I am doing? I cannot take on any more. I am setting myself up for a nosedive here if I keep adding onto my to-do list. 

I didn't have the energy or motivation to update our daycare blog this week. Normally I write a blurb about each day, fill it with pictures and give my parents a visual of what goes on here while they are at work. Monday came and went without an update. So did Tuesday. Wednesday came and I finally wrote about Monday and Tuesday. By the time Friday night rolled around all that I could think was "Do not procrastinate until tomorrow. It will ruin your day if you have to start it with uncompleted work from the week!"

This line of thinking spurred me into action. Not only did I update our daycare blog at 10:30 p.m., I tended to my banking, I cleared the clutter (aka: unfinished business) from the kitchen table and the computer desk. There is a direct correlation between the state of clutter in these two places as to the state of chaos in my brain.

The next thing that I did was write a to-do-list. It contained three items:

• Newsletter
• Columns
• Chapter

Three items. Three words.

I knocked off the first two items on the list before noon. I could feel the procrastination gene rearing its ugly head once again. The words "the longer you wait ... the less probability of it getting done" taunted me.

Then I changed my tactic. One hour. I didn't have to complete one chapter within the Book Project. I would simply commit myself to one hour. 

Well, you know how that goes. Once I managed to reroute my thinking and change the wiring in my brain I suddenly was not setting myself up for failure. 

Thankfully the phone did not ring and no one walked into the living room to distract me. I got my hour. And then some.

I have been honing the art of procrastination a lot lately. It is robbing me of energy and motivation. It is stealing joy from my life. Unfinished tasks are weighing me down. 

I cannot take on the world all at once. I will not let the Law of Diminishing Intent win. I must reroute my old strategies and aborted attempts. I have to stop beating myself up over this. And just DO it.

I have said this so many times before. I don't know what will make this time any different than all of the rest. Except today? Sitting here at an empty computer desk and a kitchen table which is just as clean, I feel energized.

The only sad part to this tale is that I must go put in a bookkeeping day today. I must redirect this energy that I have at the onset of this day and spend it somewhere else. And that, is most likely the reason (excuse?) that the Book Project has been aborted so often and for so long. 

Since I started this project called The Book, I went back to school. I changed career paths. I started and stopped four different jobs before I returned to what-I-know-best (my home daycare). I started working at bookkeeping on (sporadic) weekends. I started writing columns for a handful of publications. I have taken part in a dance competition; gone on an Alaskan adventure; been a part of many family & friend gatherings; and simply put 'living-my-life' on the front burner. And that is a good thing.

Except ... I am so very easily distracted these days. Perhaps I have a few too many kettles in the fire. But then again, you know what they say: 

"If you want something done, ask a busy person to do it. The more things you do, the more you can do." ~ Lucille Ball

That must be what I am aiming for. But the key to accomplishing that feat is completing one small task at a time. 

Clear out the clutter that is weighing you down and start taking control of your energy today! I will try and report back to you...

One Hour at a Time

I cleared off the kitchen table last night before I went to bed.

I updated my bank book and wrote a little bit before I shut down for the night.

I filled up the liquid soap dispenser and tossed a used towel in the laundry before I turned out the lights.

The last thing that I did last night was to write a list with three items on it.

It is now 11:00 a.m.

I woke up to an empty slate this morning. No pesky little chores to derail and distract me. There was nothing to avoid and no reason to stay in bed any longer than necessary.

I sat down at the computer desk with my breakfast smoothie and a cup of coffee.

First? I read. I absorbed. I ate. I replenished my reserves.

And then? I sat still and started on one item on my to-do-list. By 8:22 a.m., my first mission was accomplished.

Then? I moved onto the second item on my list.

By 10:35 a.m., it too was 'signed, sealed and delivered' to its intended recipients.

That left the biggie. The one item that I have been successfully been putting off for the better part of the last five years. Only today is different. Today that item doesn't say 'Write a Book'. It says simply "One chapter".

I grabbed some more nourishment. I am ready to go. I am thinking "One chapter" sounds too big and too tall and too scary. So I have reworded that task into "One hour - book".

And that is exactly what I am going to do.

One hour at a time. That is all I can ask of myself right now. That is all I expect. One hour.

One hour without distraction will move me from the spot that I am sitting in right now. I can do this. I can do hard things.

One hour at a time.

Only Eight More Months Until Christmas

I woke up this morning, then peeked out of the window. 

Now that the sun is awake before I am, I enjoy looking for it in the morning. It has been so dreary the past few days, I was looking for blue sky.

I felt myself gasp for air when this what I found instead:

My first thought? I am glad that I bought more socks. 

In more news that Really Doesn't Matter, I started the fall/winter season with a supply of socks. I wore through the first set (usually about six pair at a time) in November when I stocked up on yet another set of new socks. Which had to be replaced in January, which in turn were all holey by April.

Does this mean that I put on a lot of miles? Or do I buy cheap socks?

Not much more to add to those deep and provocative thoughts so I thought I would add one more snowy picture:

I wonder if Junior cat is thinking about his footwear. Or is he simply grateful for the fact that he is a 100% indoor and thoroughly loved cat. I don't think he is worried about keeping his paws warm.