I've been reading all the hoopla about Leap Day. Every four years we get an extra day. Ok. Extra day. 24 more hours than the last couple years... how do I make it count? I've decided to make today my own personal "Leap Year Brag Day".
I truly have so much to brag about. I am alive! That is the biggest!! Just in my lifetime, the death toll of family and friends is very high, and death has touched someone of every age. From the oldest, my grandfather in his early 90's, to the youngest, my granddaughter who was only 4 months old, I just don't understand death. I guess I am not suppose to understand it. With every death, I find myself with more and more questions as to the rhyme and reason of each life. Why are some so lucky to live a long life and others not given a chance to even know they have a life? I just don't get it. But!! The gratitude I have~ that I woke up breathing this morning, WOW!, now that is LIFE!!
I am happy to say that I also enjoy good health. As a 50's something, I can still get around pretty good. I have the use of all my limbs. I can still hear and see well (yes I wear glasses, but if you're over 40 - who doesn't!?!). About to hit a 15 year milestone of giving up cigarettes. (woo hooo!!) After all the drug experimentation back in the day and living life on the edge of everything all my life, I count each day a blessing. I think the most important of all is I have a good attitude about life. I am one lucky girl. I work 2 jobs, one is physically demanding and I can still keep up!! (Yay!) I am a gamer, I have a DS 3D that I take everywhere with me!! I read alot and now claim to be a 'writer'!! Can't get any better than this!
I am grateful for my relationship. I am coming up to a 4 year anniversary of the night I met Del. From the minute I met him, I was completely and utterly comfortable. I know that sounds lame. And not very romantic. I went through all that in my younger years, you know, basing everything on those 'feelings' of love and desire. Not to say Del and I don't have those feelings but from the very beginning we just connected. For the first time in all my history with men, I didn't just jump in the sack with him. We waited. And agonizingly we waited some more. We had this discussion about finding out if we could be friends first. Both of us burned so badly by mistakes made in failed relationships. We hung out, we drank, we ate, we enjoyed time together, acting like high schoolers with all consuming crushes.... and the wait paid off!! I've not felt so sure of anything in my life as I am about his feelings for me. As human beings we strive for the ultimate feeling of love and security from our partners, and in Del I have that. I must say also, I love him like no one else in my life.
I have a fantastic family unit. 2 great kids, 6 wonderful grankids. My Mom is living at age 77, by herself and to this day still inspires me. Lost my Father many years ago, and is one of the few relationships I wish I had today. I have both my siblings and all my nieces and nephews and their families.....and it just keeps growing!!
I also have a wonderful 'family' of friends. I was not much of a friend to women as I grew up, girls as a rule are just so stupid. (Guy friendships were easier because there was no competition, even now men are more approachable than women.) I did manage to find a rare few that clicked with me. I am not an easy woman to know if you are a woman. I am sorta standoffish. Not that I think I am better or that I don't measure up or that they are or don't... but just not that much in common. I've been told that I am somewhat overbearing. Not really, I just don't take shit and I think for myself. Some women find that trait hard to deal with. Good. If you have issues with that, then you have too much drama for me. I have discovered as I age that those few women I have befriended over the years, have become a great part of my grand scheme in life. Without them, how could I grow? In the last few years I have made a couple new girlbuddy friendships. I am learning so much about myself from all of these very different and amazing women. For this, I am grateful beyond words.
Am I happy? Yes. Am I grateful? Yes. Am I satisfied with my life? Mostly. Truth be told, I would not go back and change a moment. Every little thing that has happened in my life has brought me to today. How in the hell could I not be grateful??
Wednesday, February 29, 2012
Wednesday, February 22, 2012
Thank you Motley Crue!
I wanted to be a singer. Not for the fame. Not for the notoriety. But just cause it feels so good to sing. The endorphins it creates!! It's a serious happy feeling! I retain, in this damaged brain, lyrics to songs long thought forgotten! Due to not having any real singing voice, I am regulated to singing for myself ~ at very high decibels ~ in my car ~ with my stereo up ~ way too loud! Since the car wreck, my little thumper is out of commission, I now wear earbuds (this is so I still cannot hear myself!) because hoopty has only big hole where radio should be. But in my mind... I am the one belting out the heartfelt sentiment that every song carries. I am that pain. I am the rock. I am that joyousness. I am the roll. I am that lover. I am all those and more. It doesn't matter the genre of the music either. I have such an eclectic mix of music on my ipod which spans them all. If I had to choose a specific, it would probably be the blues. Sad, love starved blues, the sadder the better... what a pick me up!!
I have done this since I was a kid, my sister and me, on the big front porch, an old floor lamp with no shade and the bulb holder bent upward to look like a microphone on a stand, screaming out Diana Ross and the Supremes... Aretha Franklin and the Jackson 5. What a memory!!
A couple days ago, I looked out the window at my little blue car, sitting there in the yard, a sad wounded look about it. I longed to jump in it and run up the road.... sigh. Then a flicker of an idea!!! I loaded my ipod with a few heavy bump songs and grabbed my keys. I went out, started the car and plugged in the ipod. The first song began, I cranked the volume and began to feel it. The vibration of the bass flooded my little car, the drivers seat one continuous wave of subtle movement felt only by my body. And the music runs through me like water flows in a creek. Big sigh.. I miss this so much..... and so the singing begins.
(It's not an ordinary car stereo here, I (Yes I said I) removed factory stereo and replaced it with a Sony Xplode and I have two 12's driven by 800 watts, in a huge box that takes up the entire trunk. It may not be a high end system but it cranks for me!!)
I sat in that car, maybe an hour, singing, banging on the steering wheel, feeling the power of the music, feeling the love or pain of the words Iscreamed sang. The only thing missing was the movement, the actual driving of the vehicle. But inside me, heart racing, mind searching for lyrics, crackly voice trying to keep up, I felt alive!
I can't imagine what the neighbors thought I was doing, but it didn't matter to me, just as it doesn't matter to me what the average other driver on the road thinks when they spy me wailing away in my own little world. To me this is heaven. Sorry,
gotta go,
now playing....
Kickstart My Heart!!
=)
I have done this since I was a kid, my sister and me, on the big front porch, an old floor lamp with no shade and the bulb holder bent upward to look like a microphone on a stand, screaming out Diana Ross and the Supremes... Aretha Franklin and the Jackson 5. What a memory!!
A couple days ago, I looked out the window at my little blue car, sitting there in the yard, a sad wounded look about it. I longed to jump in it and run up the road.... sigh. Then a flicker of an idea!!! I loaded my ipod with a few heavy bump songs and grabbed my keys. I went out, started the car and plugged in the ipod. The first song began, I cranked the volume and began to feel it. The vibration of the bass flooded my little car, the drivers seat one continuous wave of subtle movement felt only by my body. And the music runs through me like water flows in a creek. Big sigh.. I miss this so much..... and so the singing begins.
(It's not an ordinary car stereo here, I (Yes I said I) removed factory stereo and replaced it with a Sony Xplode and I have two 12's driven by 800 watts, in a huge box that takes up the entire trunk. It may not be a high end system but it cranks for me!!)
I sat in that car, maybe an hour, singing, banging on the steering wheel, feeling the power of the music, feeling the love or pain of the words I
I can't imagine what the neighbors thought I was doing, but it didn't matter to me, just as it doesn't matter to me what the average other driver on the road thinks when they spy me wailing away in my own little world. To me this is heaven. Sorry,
gotta go,
now playing....
Kickstart My Heart!!
=)
Friday, February 17, 2012
There's always a knock at the door.
Two days this week I woke up and my first thought was about dying. Unfortunately for me, this is an underlying enemy in my everyday life, the idea I will die. As we all know... it's inevitable. I cannot change the outcome. We're born. We live. We die. There are those who believe there is life after death. There are those who believe there is nothing else. When I became old enough to understand the cycle of life thing, the burning question was... why? WHY? Why be born at all if that is the end result? I was never the same.
When I made friends with that nice guardrail last November, it was never so clear that I risk my life daily just waking up. I've had a strange feeling in me that I just haven't been able to calm. I had an absolutely frightening, in my face, introduction to the idea that someday I won't be here. Funny as that sounds~ as if I were just going to jump in my car and you wouldn't see me for a while but I'd be back, oh no! I won't be here. Gone. Forever. Period. Believe me, the idea of death scares me. I'm sure it does everyone, but I am so afraid I haven't done what I'm meant to do in this life (or have I done it already and don't know??) or what I think I really want to do... which is... what.. exactly?
Still.... there is a yearning. And the death theme keeps looming...
Whitney Houston. It's taken me a few days to soak it in. Oh, I've heard all the things the media has said someone else was quoted as saying. She was an angel. She was an addict. She was beautiful. She was a wreck. She had talent. BIG talent. I was mesmerized by her voice. So clear and crisp. She sang with such sweet grace. Yet for all her success, she was an addict. All that beauty, and she looked in the mirror and an addict looked back. And she was an addict for a very long time. I don't know all the details, but she rode a roller coaster ride of drugs and disfunction. Only she had money and fame to do what ever it was she was doing. Money doesn't save you. Fame doesn't save you. And now... dead at 48. Did she accomplish whatever it was she was supposed to do before leaving this life? Is her death just another wake up call for me?
I don't have fame. I don't have money. I'm not an addict. Well at least not a drug addict. (I have other vises that could be considered addictions. But we'll leave that for another post.) I will not do anything that will touch as many humans as the sound of Whitney's voice. So of the few hundred people who did, who do and have yet to know me, will I make much of a difference?
Whitney left behind, not only a child, but a legacy of music. My own ride from cradle to grave.. just what will my defining legacy be? Of course my bloodline will continue as I have kids and grankids, but is there something more? I can't stop my death, I can't even prolong it. My last breath will be just that. The last. I find myself on the razors edge. On the verge, as something keeps pulling at me from all sides. Is it just life trying to get out?
When I made friends with that nice guardrail last November, it was never so clear that I risk my life daily just waking up. I've had a strange feeling in me that I just haven't been able to calm. I had an absolutely frightening, in my face, introduction to the idea that someday I won't be here. Funny as that sounds~ as if I were just going to jump in my car and you wouldn't see me for a while but I'd be back, oh no! I won't be here. Gone. Forever. Period. Believe me, the idea of death scares me. I'm sure it does everyone, but I am so afraid I haven't done what I'm meant to do in this life (or have I done it already and don't know??) or what I think I really want to do... which is... what.. exactly?
Still.... there is a yearning. And the death theme keeps looming...
Whitney Houston. It's taken me a few days to soak it in. Oh, I've heard all the things the media has said someone else was quoted as saying. She was an angel. She was an addict. She was beautiful. She was a wreck. She had talent. BIG talent. I was mesmerized by her voice. So clear and crisp. She sang with such sweet grace. Yet for all her success, she was an addict. All that beauty, and she looked in the mirror and an addict looked back. And she was an addict for a very long time. I don't know all the details, but she rode a roller coaster ride of drugs and disfunction. Only she had money and fame to do what ever it was she was doing. Money doesn't save you. Fame doesn't save you. And now... dead at 48. Did she accomplish whatever it was she was supposed to do before leaving this life? Is her death just another wake up call for me?
I don't have fame. I don't have money. I'm not an addict. Well at least not a drug addict. (I have other vises that could be considered addictions. But we'll leave that for another post.) I will not do anything that will touch as many humans as the sound of Whitney's voice. So of the few hundred people who did, who do and have yet to know me, will I make much of a difference?
Whitney left behind, not only a child, but a legacy of music. My own ride from cradle to grave.. just what will my defining legacy be? Of course my bloodline will continue as I have kids and grankids, but is there something more? I can't stop my death, I can't even prolong it. My last breath will be just that. The last. I find myself on the razors edge. On the verge, as something keeps pulling at me from all sides. Is it just life trying to get out?
Saturday, February 4, 2012
How fast was that again?
30 years.
That block of time went by in the 'blink of an eye'. Stupid saying, but so true. Defined by my daughter Shelby, my 'Booboo', as I loving refer to her, who was born Feb 11, 1982. As her 30th birthday approaches I am so overwhelmed by thoughts of her. Her actual birth day was such a surprise! I had returned to Minneapolis just a few days earlier from a trip to St.Louis. A St.Louis baby shower!! It had been stressful not because I had flown, but because the day I was to board my plane and leave St.Louis, there was a blizzard and I couldn't even get off my Mom's street to make it to the airport!! The entire midwest was covered with record snowfalls.. most types of transportation were near stand still conditions! But it was just a one day inconvenience as St.Louis plowed through the mess and got the city going again the following day.
Not due until March 21st, my little sweetie decided she was ready to make her entrance... (so like her mother, with that unfortunate personality flaw - does not like waiting!!) And the next thing I knew I was holding this tiny little creature, all 5 pounds and 1/2 ounce of her.
If you had asked me, (well you didn't even have to ask me as I voiced my opinion quite loudly on the subject!!) I would have told you that I didn't want to have children. I was a very selfish entity that could only think about the immediate needs of ME. In fact, at 25, I still had growing up issues! My mind never wrapped itself around the idea of being a parent. I had even said many times that if I were to get pregnant, then I would take means necessary to change that status.
One day, after a few days of not feeling well, my best friend brought me a pregnancy test! No! Not possible!! But the damn thing said yes. Ok. Here I am. After all the bragging of what I would do if.... I now find myself at that crossroad. But, something inside... something inside.. I agonized over it, I changed my outlook on things and I stepped into a different world. The world of Motherhood. ugh. Even the sound of it. This is going to be so hard. What was I thinking??
As any woman can tell you having a first child is extremely frightening and extremely exciting!! There is nothing like it to explain the mixed emotions. The body changes... the belly... the mood swings... it was wonderfully distressing! I don't know if I would have been more prepared mentally for her arrival if it had been closer to the 'supposed' due date. The fact she busted out early was soooo my life!! When they placed this so very small bundle in my arms... my heart screamed bring it on!! I have so many stories about my little sweetie. So many cool things that only her and I share. The unconventional upbringing she has had shaped her into the loving, caring mother of three she has become. She is someone who taught me about myself in her innocence and teaches me to this day.
30 years.
It went by in a blink of an eye...
That block of time went by in the 'blink of an eye'. Stupid saying, but so true. Defined by my daughter Shelby, my 'Booboo', as I loving refer to her, who was born Feb 11, 1982. As her 30th birthday approaches I am so overwhelmed by thoughts of her. Her actual birth day was such a surprise! I had returned to Minneapolis just a few days earlier from a trip to St.Louis. A St.Louis baby shower!! It had been stressful not because I had flown, but because the day I was to board my plane and leave St.Louis, there was a blizzard and I couldn't even get off my Mom's street to make it to the airport!! The entire midwest was covered with record snowfalls.. most types of transportation were near stand still conditions! But it was just a one day inconvenience as St.Louis plowed through the mess and got the city going again the following day.
Not due until March 21st, my little sweetie decided she was ready to make her entrance... (so like her mother, with that unfortunate personality flaw - does not like waiting!!) And the next thing I knew I was holding this tiny little creature, all 5 pounds and 1/2 ounce of her.
If you had asked me, (well you didn't even have to ask me as I voiced my opinion quite loudly on the subject!!) I would have told you that I didn't want to have children. I was a very selfish entity that could only think about the immediate needs of ME. In fact, at 25, I still had growing up issues! My mind never wrapped itself around the idea of being a parent. I had even said many times that if I were to get pregnant, then I would take means necessary to change that status.
One day, after a few days of not feeling well, my best friend brought me a pregnancy test! No! Not possible!! But the damn thing said yes. Ok. Here I am. After all the bragging of what I would do if.... I now find myself at that crossroad. But, something inside... something inside.. I agonized over it, I changed my outlook on things and I stepped into a different world. The world of Motherhood. ugh. Even the sound of it. This is going to be so hard. What was I thinking??
As any woman can tell you having a first child is extremely frightening and extremely exciting!! There is nothing like it to explain the mixed emotions. The body changes... the belly... the mood swings... it was wonderfully distressing! I don't know if I would have been more prepared mentally for her arrival if it had been closer to the 'supposed' due date. The fact she busted out early was soooo my life!! When they placed this so very small bundle in my arms... my heart screamed bring it on!! I have so many stories about my little sweetie. So many cool things that only her and I share. The unconventional upbringing she has had shaped her into the loving, caring mother of three she has become. She is someone who taught me about myself in her innocence and teaches me to this day.
It went by in a blink of an eye...
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