Holiday Obligations

I used to love the holidays. I would volunteer myself to bake and cook for days for my family and friends. I decorated cookies, made fudge, and put together candy calendars.

These days I still love the holidays. I can get into it, but not like I used to. I am tired. It isn't fun anymore. I am glad that I am no longer having to divide my time between my family and my late husband's family for holidays. That gets old fast. I no longer feel guilty for making 10 tins of fudge when I needed 12. I don't make it at all I I don't care.

There is one thing that is expected each year. I am the one making it happen. It is the Christmas picture with Maya. She has gotten wise to the whole selfie thing with the phone and tries to escape when she realizes what I am doing. This year I couldn't even get a good straight- on picture. I was holding her collar to keep her sitting there for this photo. She is 8, so I know that I only have a few more years to torture my beloved dog this way. I don't think she hates me for it, but I am pretty sure that I saw her roll her eyes at me, in the fashion of an annoyed teenager.

I don't feel obligated to send Christmas cards. I want to. I really do. But each year I buy them and then put off completing and sending them for a few week. I am not sure why. But eventually I get to it and bust them out in one evening while watching tv. It isn't even like I am composing individual messages or including a copied holiday letter. Nope. I sign them, address them and lick them shut.

I kinda wish someone had pressed me to make a pumpkin pie this year. I miss pumpkin pie...

Hello Christmas!

It is Christmas Time!!

I love the holidays. I love Christmas. I love the time with family, the preparations, food, festivities, games and family time.

I miss Christmas. I made the choice about 5 years ago to move where I want to... away from family and friends. I needed to live where I was comfortable, not where I was loved, but not really a part of things. Does that even make sense? I am not sure. But I moved from California, back to Oregon, because when I had lived up here before I loved the slower pace on life. I loved the green, the seasons changing... and I was so very tired of the hustle and bustle of the Southern California way of life. Not all of it. I loved the ocean. I miss being 15 minutes from it. I do miss family, but in general I am rather happy with my small town life.


This is the time of year when I feel the hurt. I miss all of those fun family things that I know are not the same as when I was younger, but I miss it anyway. I miss the magic of seeing children discover their stockings with glee. I miss the smiles and giggles when opening presents.

I have a tree. I couldn't not have one. But underneath are a couple of presents from a neighbor/friend and one send from my mom. I have stocking out that no one will fill. When I wake up on Christmas morning it won't be to excited children, but to the dog that wants to go pee.  I will make my own breakfast and open the present or two I have. I'm not complaining, really, I am expressing my sadness about the loss of such wonderful times that will never happen again. I know that there are so many others out there like me, so in that respect, I know that I am not alone.

I need to go bake some dog treat cookies. Maybe that will pull me out of my funk?

Hurrah for Cheese!

I had gone through a few scares recently which involved what appeared to be allergic reactions heading for anaphylaxis. Scary. The first incident sent me to ER. The second, several weeks later had me giving myself an Epi pen shot.  I have given shots before and been told that I make it nearly painless. I have to psych myself into getting shots. To give myself one was at least 15 minutes of bargaining with myself... it felt like hours. I tried to tell myself that I  didn't need it. I tried to tell myself that I would wait just a little longer. I listened to the recorded tutorial and had the injector sitting on my thigh ready to strike like a metal cobra. I totally freaked myself out. But visions of dying on the couch, only to be found 2-3 days later by my neighbor were my real motivation to do the deed. I didn't want him to come in to check on me and find that Maya was sprawled out on my bed, happy to have it to herself, Tinker curled by my head (because that is where she seems to end up) and Ziggy, my fat, fur ball cat, casually curled up with me, having gnawed off my thumb and first finger because I wasn't available for filling his bowl the previous morning. He loves me, but he sees me as a means to an end. I have no delusions on that end.

I thought about my boyfriend being worried and texting later... after WWE was over, and assuming that I had gone to bed. He might not truly worry until the next day when I didn't answer his texts while at work.We keep in touch daily via text, but sometimes one of us gets busy and texts are not answered for half a day or more. I think that neither of us like it and that we both get a little worried or uneasy, but we both realize that we have jobs to do. Of course, I am sure that I take it more personally than him, but then I am the emotional female. If I don't answer for a few hours he tries emailing, maybe a call if he is really worried. As for me, if  it has been a few hours I am already running scenarios through my head about a random meteor crashing through the atmosphere and turning his office to rubble, thus rendering him unable to answer "how is your morning going?" in a timely manner.

So my allergic reaction turns out to be more of an allergic problem that is more chronic and has nothing to do with food. It seemed to happen around when I ate and the link between incidents was cheese. I never realized how much I ate cheese, dreamed about cheese, and  planned for cheese type meals until I cut myself off from cheese for 58 days. I dreamed of pizza, lasagna, caprese salad, and grilled ham & cheese sandwiches. I googled cream cheese to determine whether I could actually it it (yay, I could) because I was pretty sure it wasn't actually "cheese". Upon finding out that cheese wasn't actually my kryptonite I went and bought a 2 lb block of Tillamook medium cheddar.

With all the bullshit that has been turning up to be midlife or menopausal issues I am so glad that cheese isn't one of those. I am glad to each cheese. I am happy that my boyfriend doesn't think I am avoiding his texts. I am  ecstatic that my cat isn't nomming on my appendages.

Getting back in shape for the holidays.

Last month's participation in Walk For The Cause was pretty great. Yeah, it took me 90 minutes to walk the 5K, but I am ramping up my game. On Thanksgiving I am walking in another one, but this time I want to do it in less than an hour. So walk more daily and be very hydrated when I walk. Yeah. I can do this. Then I can go home to chow on some great T-Day food and fall into a food coma. Just a couple of friends over. No family. No obligation to watch football, no kids screaming, no need for using the good china when paper plates are available. Still, I miss family. I could stand for a little football and kid screaming now and again.
By my reckoning, the calories burned while walking will be equivalent to the ones ingested at lunch. It is a nice trade off, I think. Part of my goals in life are to get healthier, do more things that I want to do and to not feel guilty or obligated. I think this pretty much fulfills those goals. 

Wait...why did I come in the room?

Have you ever walked into a room, fully knowing that there is a reason for it, and then totally forget what that reason was? I used to chuckle at my mom. Now it is me and it isn't so funny. I used to have a kick ass memory. I could remember the capitals of at least 75% of the world capitols. I could correctly repeat the US capitols in alphabetical order. I knew random, stupid trivia. Now I can't recall why I walked into the room. I go back where I think I started on my determined walk and start over in hopes that I can remember. No luck. But I know what a monotreme is. I know the square root of pi.

At the end of the day one of the partners asked me to do something. I was in the middle of typing something up, so only half way listened. It used to be that I would have a perfect memory of it. 5 minutes later I had totally forgotten about it until someone asked a question about it and then I only had a vague recollection of what he said. I had to go to him and say that I had been busy and just wanted to "confirm" what he said. I blame it on my lack of coffee.I would have had a full cup, or two but I put it to the side and forgot about it.

I have been fighting aging. I haven't had my eyes lifted or my lips plumped. I have just had this inner struggle for the last few years where in my mind's eye I am young, but then reality slaps me with things like gray hair, menopause, and a knee replacement. It is kind of hard to deny it after that. So, I decided to embrace it. I am going to be glad that I am 47 because I know people who didn't make it to 40. I am going to stop whining (mostly). I will look forward to my maturing. I am still going to cover the gray hair. I'm just not ready for that yet. Maybe after I have forgiven Mother Nature for those freakish hairs that keep coming out of my chin... then maybe I will accept the gray hair.

So this is me. I work hard and I play hard. I love my friends, family and furry kids. I am going to rock my age.

 I bought my dream car, a VW Beetle. It isn't the old Bug like my parents had, it is the new hip one. I like the way I feel  when I drive it. Is is weird to feel better about yourself because you like your car? Maybe. Superficial? Maybe. But guess what. I don't care!

 I can still hang with my bestie of more than 30 years, and we can still dress up so that we feel like a million bucks and go to concerts and rock out. Of course, this time we took a toddler (it was family friendly). It was a great girls' night out with a second generation loving it with us. I NEVER would have imagined doing that 30 years ago!

 Goat love. I love goats, grew up with goats, and some day will have them again. Any particular reason? Yeah, because they make me happy. I think if something makes you happy then by all means, include it in your life!

 I will never be too old to dance. I hadn't danced it in years, but here I am getting my Michael Jackson on, doing the Thriller dance with a bunch of strangers. I couldn't remember half of it, probably was very laughable, but I DON'T CARE! I had a great time!

Who would have thought that a little over a year after a knee replacement I would walk a 5K? And guess what? I am walking in another one in 2 weeks. Yep! I may not be fast, but my ass is out there chugging along. It makes me feel good to do it and I have the added bonus of doing it with friends.








This is me. I love my life. I am learning to live it to the fullest. I want to be one of those old farts who is out working in their gardens at 80 and tending goats at 90.