Tuesday, February 28, 2012

The Other Side

Thank you all for your kindness.  Funny--I had actually made it through most of the day and was surprised at how calm I was.  Amazing how your emotions can sneak up on you.

Today I am fine.  I think because I am lucky enough to be surrounded by really interesting, kind, warm and inspiring people.

So here's the plan for the rest of the week.  Up early (very very early), lovely morning knitting (I'll post some pictures tomorrow), good things at work (although a few people are annoying the crap out of me this week), good food at home (my Brian takes good care of me) and (hopefully) getting the damn house clean.

My challenge to you this week--be happy.  Be intentionally happy.  Decide that you are going to be happy and do whatever it takes to do it.  Even if it is just for a minute or an hour.  Embrace it.  Because, you know what, if you know how to be happy, I believe that you will be better at being unhappy when the time comes. 

Monday, February 27, 2012

Today

Today would have been his 45th birthday.  I truly believed that I would be okay but it didn't really work out for me.  About an hour ago, I started weeping and couldn't stop.

This was not supposed to happen.  It was not supposed to end this way.

Sunday, February 26, 2012

Perfect Sunday Morning

Brian is sleeping on the couch.  Heather is sleeping on the love seat.  Smokey is sleeping on the couch pillow behind me.  Max is sleeping under Couch 22.

And I am playing with yarn. 

I've gotten a lot of gifts of yarn in the past few months and each one is better than the rest.  I've had them all out on my desk so I could play with them.  Sort of the equivalent of a little kid wanting to leave all the Legos out so she could build something anytime she wants to.  Although it really hurts to step on a random lego--not so much with a ball of yarn.

I'll show you some today and save some for other posts lest you all get greedy and try to sneak into my stash!

This pile of deliciousness was cleverly disguised in a Bloomingdales box on Christmas morning.


I know I've mentioned before that my parents are very good yarn shoppers but it turns out that my father takes it very very seriously.  When we arrived in VT for the Christmas celebrations I was wearing a sweater that I had FINALLY finished!  It's beautiful fuzzy Brown Sheep Lambs Pride bulky (I'll tell you about the sweater another time--it was a journey) and Pop started asking all sorts of questions--What kind of yarn do you use?  Umm--anything that's a natural fiber.  So the size doesn't matter?  Nope, not at all.  As long as it isn't fake.  And colors, what kind of colors?  All colors Pop. 

I didn't catch on that he was afraid he picked the wrong yarn until two days later.  He's so sweet.  And see what he picked.  The old man picked out Noro.  And not just one skein but two!  And that purple in the bottom corner--that's Malabrigo!  And then he pushed the envelope and picked out some sock yarn that I've never even heard of before.  Good times!

This lovely pile came from my neighbor Denis's trip to China.  He's the father of one of my childhood friends and he loves to travel (he's also brought my yarn from the market in Italy). 

The labels are all in Chines so I have no idea what this is or what the yardage is.  So far it has passed the wool test so I'm pretty sure that's what it is.  It is squeezy and delicious and I love it.  And one of the big balls is enough to make a Baby Surprise so, really, how wrong can you go.  There's more of it but it's already on the needles so you should be seeing more of this soon.

There's a lot more to come but I don't want you to start out your Sunday all jealous so I'll save those for next time.

Thursday, February 23, 2012

I Suppose An Explanation Is In Order

First things first.  About the Kenny Rogers video.  You see, we were at Maud's a few weeks ago and someone said something that triggered something in my brain but it totally misfired and I ended up having one of these conversations.

Me  "There's a song about a field."
Brian  "What are you talking about?"
Me  "A song--I know you know it--about a field.  With plants in it.  Come on help me out here."
Brian  "Okay sure.  A song."
Me  "It's a country song.  I think it's Kenny Rogers.  Yeah it's definitely Kenny Rogers.  Something about not be able to pick the crops.  Yeah yeah yeah."
Brian  "Oh yeah--I know that song.  What the hell is the name of it."
Our neighbor at the bar "It's a woman's name isn't it?"
Me and Brian "Yeah yeah yeah--a woman's name!!"
Our neighbor  "Ruby!!  It's Ruby!"
Me and Brian  "No, no, no!!  That's not it."
Me  "Ruby was the one that he didn't want to take her love to town."

And on and on until we finally sort of forgot about it until I shouted out "YOU PICKED A FINE TIME TO LEAVE ME LUCILLE" at the top of my lungs about an hour later. 

Of course now I had it stuck in my head for a few days so I decided that I needed to share the shame of it on my blog.  Or, I should correctly say, my other blog.  Feel free to visit but don't blame me when you get caught singing Sylvia's Mother on the 1 train. 

Somehow, I managed to post it to both blogs and you guys ended up with it.  Mea culpa.

Moving on.  

The blog has been dark and I am sorry for it.  It's not that I haven't wanted to write.  It's just that I couldn't.  The ex-boyfriend was my most loyal reader and his death is still oh so very surreal to me.  He visited the blog every day and I believe that it was his way of somehow keeping a connection with me.  I've been on an emotional roller coaster since January over this whole mess and, although my brain is very rational, my heart and my spirit have had a few bad instances of the "what-if"s.  Now I know that his problems were his own, etc. etc. but every so often my psyche takes off into some other place that is neither rational nor linear and I get stuck there for a bit. 

I've been reading Ann Leary a lot lately and last week she had a post asking her readers what was going on in their lives.  So I decided that it was going to be a really good idea to just dump all my issues in some strangers lap and hope that it would break things open and I would be back in the saddle again.  I wrote a response on her blog very carefully.  I chose my words well.  I really thought it through and, I think, said everything I needed to say to get my groove back on.  And I hit post.  And it got lost.  Gone. 

And in my head, I heard Denis Leary laughing at me, calling me a pussy and telling me to shut the fuck up with my whining and write about shit on my own damn blog (his words--not mine).

So I'm back.  There may be some whining and some wild irrationality but there's also been lots of good stuff to share.