Archive for November, 2009
>A pleasant afternoon…
>
After I wrote my post early this morning, I got dressed in my carefully selected outfit and walked the dog around the field. It was not raining and the wind was not blowing, although it was a little cold, but nothing compared to how it has been. After I had walked the dog, I made a shopping list and hopped on my bike and went to the grocery store where there were hardly any customers, just as I had hoped, and there was only one cash register open with yawning cashier. I got my groceries in the shortest amount of time and found out that if you go that early in the day, you get very good deals, like three loaves of bread for two Euros fresh from the bakery, So I got those to put in the freezer at home. I figured it was my lucky day. I got my milk and porridge and the other groceries and zoomed through the check out stand and loaded up my bike and rode it home in the shortest amount of time, and when I got home and unloaded everything, I still had time for a cup of coffee before I had to leave for creative therapy.
When I got to creative therapy, I sat in the smoker’s room with one of my favorite people there and I will be sorry not to see him again after this week. He’s a very good artist and a kind and intelligent man who suffers from depressions. Everybody is going in different directions now and we’re all saying goodbye to each other this week.
I was just interrupted by a phone call of a friend of mine who is feeling low and needed a bit of cheering up, so I did my best to do that. It did wear me out a bit because she had nothing but bad news and I had nothing but good news, so we were talking at odd ends. I’m too sensitive a person not to be influenced by that and have to shake myself free of it right now and get back on my high road where I was walking so merrily in my color co-ordinated outfit.
I finished my pen and ink drawing, which I filled in with a little brush with colored ink and made another one with multiple petaled flowers and colored those in too. I finished it just on time and took them both home with me. I’m just filling in my time now and doing unimportant things, because there is no time left to start a big project. I would love to do another painting, but I will have to do it at home, because there is no chance right now for me to do it anywhere else. I can get a canvas at Action, they sell them cheap there and maybe I’ll go over there tomorrow and have a look and see what’s available. I do have a limited amount of paint, so I probably want to get a smaller canvas.
That reminds me of another number of projects I have to do that I’m committed to and I better do those first and I’ll tell you about them as I do them. I have to get myself organized and not walk around with my head in the clouds. I must get down to some serious work and produce some things. Sure, and I don’t have the least amount of stage fright.
I’ve been sitting here for 45 minutes thinking about the things I have to do and coming up with ideas and my brain is working overtime. Of course, it’s not helping me finish write this post. I’ve got lots of possible ideas in the meantime and I have to bring them to fruition. I will start with the first thing first and that is to create a work of art and send it on to another artist in an art exchange scheme that I’ve become involved in. I will start on that immediately today and get that finished as soon as possible or my name is mud. Good, that resolution has been made. I will pick up the super sized envelope I need to send it in tomorrow.
I like decision making. If you take it one step at the time, it is not too bad. You have to break everything down in little chunks of activities and make them manageable and bite sized. And separate one project from the other. Do one, finish it, start on the next. Hey, I may make it far in the world of management.
And now I have to eat and walk my trusty four footer, not necessarily in that order. It depends on if he stays asleep for a while longer. He’s had his dinner and is digesting it now. I would like to do the same.
Have a good evening, everyone. Wish me luck on my project. I need inspiration.
Ciao,
Nora
>Early in the morning is also good…
>
I’ve had a few hours of sleep last night and then I woke up and was all done with that, so I got up and walked into the kitchen, turning the computer on on my way there, and made myself a cup of coffee. The dog decided to be difficult immediately and start whining for things and I got very angry with him and he got the message and went to sleep under the coffee table on his blanket. I was just tired of his behavior and I’m going to keep being this strict, because he’s getting out of hand. He’s like a darn whiny kid who is a regular pain in the you know what.
I had thought about sweeping and mopping the floors while I was up, but I never did get around to that and answered emails instead, which always takes me a little while, because I want to take my time doing it and think about what I want to write. Not that it is then anything earth shattering, but I do want to put some thought into it. My oldest niece sent me oodles of pictures of her beautiful daughter, so I had to admire those and copy them into the right folder. I think I have more photos of her than I have of anyone else. She has very proud parents.
In my last post I said I had to pick out the clothes I was going to wear today and I did. I’m going to wear black leggings and a blue denim skirt, with a purple long sleeved stretch t-shirt and a black long sleeved top over it, so that the purple t-shirt shows at the top, and a black bolero over that with a black and gray and purple striped scarf. I’ll be wearing matching bracelets and my comfortable boots. Isn’t that just splendid? I was going to wear my black and white and gray dress at first, but decided against it, as it made me look kind of bulky and I must prevent that at all cost. I’m always glad when my scheming little mind thinks of another good outfit to wear and it works. I used to think I had no fashion sense, until I got a part time job in a clothing store and I had to help people find clothes and look good myself too. That was lost of fun, especially since I got my clothes at a discount. I always kept a close eye on the sales rack and made my move when something good was put on sale. I had a very easy size back then and could fit in all the clothes that were sold there.
I think I will go to the grocery store early this morning before I go to creative therapy. They open at 8 am and there will be hardly any customers there. It really is the best time to shop and it will be better than waiting until this afternoon when I will feel like it less, because I will be tired and it will be busy there. It is a heck of a lot less intimidating to go there when there’s hardly anyone there and there was a period a few years ago when I always went shopping first thing in the morning. I think that may have been during a long hypomanic episode, I don’t quite remember, but I do know that I got a lot done in that time. I think I was always cleaning and doing the dishes and vacuuming. I should have one of those episodes again soon. It would come in mighty handy. I like it when I have boundless energy and I can take on jobs as if they are the easiest things in the world. That’s mighty nice.
I’m so ready not to be serious this week. I feel like all last week I was dealing with serious subjects and kept myself occupied with the inner workings of my mind, and especially my past, and today I feel like doing none of those things and to be carefree and to let things come as they may and I’ll see what happens with them. That doesn’t mean I’m not going to plan things carefully, but I’m going to do everything to my advantage and not worry about if I’m doing it right or not in other people’s eyes. I’m simply not going to care. I hope I remember I said this tomorrow. I’ll have to be reminded of it if I get too serious again. I sure hope one of you will do that for me.
So far the dog is behaving very well. I’ve let him out back for a piddle, but I talked very sternly to him and when I gave him his bone I said very harshly, “Here you go and that is it and no whining!” He has gone back to sleep without a peep out of him. I guess I’ve been too nice to him lately and he is getting the wrong message. It’s my own fault, I have to set the limits. He moves within the boundaries that I set. It’s like having a whiny blooper for a kid. You’ve got to say a loud no at one point and be very serious about it and mean it. Otherwise they don’t know what to do with the freedom that you give them.
The coffee tastes especially good this morning. I must have gotten a hold of a good batch. Actually, I just opened a new pack, so it is very fresh. I love the smell of it when I first open a new pack of coffee pads. You just want to dive into it with your whole face and drown in the aroma. I always imagine that I can taste the difference between the new pads and the old pads, but that may just be my imagination or wishful thinking. I love a new cup of coffee so much that I assume all sorts of things about it, depending on where I drink it, but in the Netherlands I’ve never had a bad cup of coffee. I did in a roadside restaurant in France, that was truly the worst cup of coffee I ever tasted. Hardly anything is worse than looking forward to a cup of coffee and having it be a bad one. I’ve talked about this subject already haven’t I? God, there’s nothing worse than repeating yourself and catching yourself doing it.
I’ve come to the end of this post anyway, because it’s time to take my medicines and get the show on the road. I will go out in the world, neatly dressed and ready to face the day and willing to tackle whatever comes my way.
I hope you all have a nice day with lots of good weather. I hope for the same here.
Ciao,
Nora
>Sunday is lovely too…
>
I’m going to drink lots of coffee, because I need it, as I just woke up from a comatose nap on the sofa and I think I have the seam of the arm cushion imprinted on my face. Actually, I wasn’t as comatose as all that, because I had coughing fits every now and then and that bothered the dog and he barked at me every time I did (my gastric band was regurgitating the salami I had eaten earlier). So I suppose you could say that I had a fitful comatose nap, because I was completely out of it in between the fits of coughing.
A few hours passed this way and now I have to stay up until 10 pm at least, so I’ll be on a normal schedule and sleep through the night, so I can go to creative therapy in the morning. There will be much temptation to stay in bed, I know it now, and I’ll have to convince myself to get dressed and go and overcome my own resistance. I’ll find excuses not to go and want to give in to the lure of my warm bed and maybe I’ll be in a low mood and I’ll have to sleep more. All of these things can happen. I even think that I’ll stay home and clean house and go grocery shopping instead, which are things that also need to happen, but I can do those things later in the day, except that it seems harder to do them then and I have lost a lot of my motivation by that time. I’ve run out of milk and do need to get that and I also need to buy porridge and dog bones.
For some strange reason, it hasn’t rained all day, although the wind is blowing as hard as ever, reminding us that it’s still Autumn and that we’re not out of this low pressure system yet. The sky has been overcast all day and the sun didn’t shine once. At least all the puddles in the streets have dried up and the street cleaner came by on Friday and swept up all the dead leaves. Do not very quaintly imagine a man with a broom here and a pushcart. It was all done with a truck with big revolving brushes underneath it. We do not have babushkas with twig brooms sweeping in the streets like they do in Russia. There’s not that much romance in it, after all, and all the leaves on the sidewalks are removed with those horrible leaf blowers. That is, when it’s not raining. When it rains, I imagine the men play cards or have their days off. Isn’t it strange how you never wonder about that? What do they do when it rains?
The dog pretended he wanted to eat, but when I filled his bowl, he turned his nose up at it and went to sleep. Well, there’s only so much you can do. You can’t say I didn’t try. It seems I spend the day trying to figure out all his different demands and it is getting worse the older he gets and I think that’s because he is getting a little bit confused and doesn’t know himself what he wants. He is a little bit addled and the other day he barked at a tree. I think his sight is going as well as his hearing. He bumps into things sometimes in the living room, although most of the time he navigates his way through alright. It’s when he gets in tight spots that he makes misjudgments and clonks into things with his head. The other day he was stuck in the corner of the hallway, right beside the door, waiting for me to open it. I had to redirect him to the right place.
I wonder if and when I’ll ever turn into a proper housewife again. I seems that I lose control over the household on a regular basis and then somehow in a short amount of time have to pull it together again, but I never get it as clean as it ought to be. It always gets out of hand and I seem not to be able to just keep up with it. I feel enormous amounts of frustration and I’m happy if I just get the most basic jobs done, such as the laundry and the dishes and changing the bed. The bigger jobs are a challenge and I only do them when I have no other choice and I don’t do them well. Even my sense of pride isn’t big enough to motivate me to get them done right, because I feel defeated halfway through. I used to be such a good housewife and be real house proud. I can certainly not say that about myself now. I must talk to my SPN about getting help in the household on a regular basis. Someone who will come in and do the big jobs once a week, so that I can do the little jobs in between, which there are enough of. I must clean house well this coming week, because J. is coming next weekend and I want the place to look nice and I want the floors mopped, which badly needs to happen. Oh, how I hate linoleum. I wish I had never gotten it. It’s the bane of my life and it’s hard to clean. I am just having an anxiety attack now, because I have so much to do.
I must look in my closet and decide what I’m going to wear tomorrow. It needs to be something new and interesting, because I’ve been wearing the same old thing nearly all week. It must match the green scarf I am wearing, otherwise I have to find a different scarf and I like this one a lot because it’s very warm. They’ll have to be warm clothes, because it’s still cold outside and I will want to wear layers, which is fun. You can make amusing ensembles when you wear layers and scarves. One thing I know is that I’m going to wear my denim skirt. So I must find things to match that. I will be fun to dig into my closet and find the possibilities. The stuff is packed in there so tight, that it’s easy to overlook something. And then, of course, everything falls of its hangers, which is a major frustration, and the stuff ends up in the bottom of the closet. I do always forget which clothes I have and it is always a revelation to see what I run into. I have dresses that I hardly wear, because I prefer skirts with pockets and boleros that are cute that I can wear over long sleeved shirts, but those may be too cold. Oh well, I’ll see. I’ll take some time and really make a study of it. It will be something to look forward to. I’ll let you know what I end up with. I have some good ideas already.
I’ve walked the dog for what I hope is the last time today. It’s funny how he can be completely out cold one moment and demanding something unknown to me the next. Usually he settles down alright at night after we’ve had our last walk and he really settles down when I’ve gone to bed. There’s not a peep out of him after that, usually, I must add.
I’ll go look in my closet now and see what I can come up with. Something very exciting hopefully. It must be warm, that’s one stipulation. I will not be cold these coming days.
Have a good rest of the day or a good evening, actually.
Oh, those of you in England, don’t send any more rain this way.
Ciao,
Nora
>Outside it is raining…
>
I’ll admit right from the start that I’m in a bit of a funk, so this may not become the most cheerful post I’ve ever written. I’ve just allowed a wave of memories to wash over me and that was triggered by an email of one of my blogger friends who unwittingly got me thinking about my past and this released a whole slew of images and thoughts and unresolved issues in my mind and a lot of sore feelings and regrets. They are all things that I have to learn to live with and that I normally keep at bay, but every once in a while there is an opening and it all comes bubbling to the top. Well, actually, it’s more like a mini eruption and I realize what I walk around with still and how that never will be resolved, unless I go into therapy with my first ex-husband and have about 20 sessions with him in order for me to heal. Well, maybe that’s exaggerating it a little bit, but it would be a lot of work, because there is so much sadness and resentment there. Then again, maybe there is so much there, that it would be like a huge destructive force that would destroy everything and maybe it’s better if it’s left alone and put away forever. Yet I wonder how much it influences my daily life and how it determines the things I do and say. I think maybe it makes a big impact.
Okay, I’m taking a deep breath and allowing myself to come back in the here and now. This is where I am and this is where I function. I have to do that to the best of my ability and make a success of it and not stumble and fumble and fall down too often. I have to remember to stay grounded and to not let the past immobilize me and render me paralyzed with its power over me. I’ve got a second chance to do it right and to show the world that I do know how to function well and that my head is screwed on straight and that I can take a beating and come up fighting. I was so cast down after the first time, so mortally wounded and so very much near death that I didn’t think I was going to survive it. I didn’t want to survive it for a long time. I kept on living because doing the opposite is very difficult, selfish as that sounds to people who cling to life. If I don’t keep everything at bay, my death wish grows and I give up.
That’s why I have to make the effort to come back to the period in time in which I am living now and to stay there and to always live in this moment, like a true Buddhist. To not look back and to not look too far ahead, but to be present now and here this very minute. Me, sitting here behind the computer, while the dog sleeps on his blanket and outside it is dark and it rains. That’s where I find my peace. I hear the rain dripping down and I like the sound of it. I hope it will stop in a while, though, because I have to walk the dog one more time and neither one of us likes to go out in the rain.
Actually, it is very cozy in here with the lights on and the darkness outside. It makes me feel like when I was a child and everybody was home and we were gathered in the dining room, sitting around the table each doing various things that kept us occupied. My mother knitting, my father reading and my older sister and I making things with paper and crayons and glue. See, I do have some happy memories.
I’ve just fed the dog two slices of rye bread with grilled luncheon meat. He likes it very much. I’ve decided I’m not going to eat it myself anymore. It’s too painful an experience for too little food. I’m left hungry and unable to eat more and all I can think about is food. This afternoon I had a bowl of porridge and it was so very satisfying that I’m still full from it. I will only need a glass of fruit juice before I go to bed, probably. When I think about eating a slice of rye bread with luncheon meat, I feel a terrible distaste and I put it off as long as I can, until I feel faint with hunger. I figured that was no good either.
I think it has stopped raining, so I will take out his majesty. He’s been begging to go for a while now. In between begging, he falls sound asleep.
Sleep tight, have a good night.
Ciao,
Nora
>Actually…
>
I’m just trying to get to my 600th post as fast as I can, because that would seem like an achievement. I’ve passed that number already if you also count my posts on WordPress, but since I’m unable to import those, I’ve had to start all over again. No matter. It’s like beginning to write a new novel. You finish one and start the next and somewhere you leave the evidence that you were there behind you. It’s like the different phases in your life that you leave behind you when you’re done with them. How many memories of them do you want? I want very few. I only want the answers to whatever questions it turned out I had. Even if that is after the fact. I’m constantly trying to not live in my past, but to only live in the moment and in a very tiny little piece of the future. The only times I live in my past is in my dreams where I symbolically rehash all the things that happened to me in my past lives and come to some sort of a conclusion about what really took place then. I’m like an actress who is learning her lines after the final curtain. Or like Sherlock Holmes who is piecing together the picture after the wicked deed has been done.
I never look at photographs from the past. I have them in a drawer, in a box and in photo albums, but I never look at them. I don’t want to be reminded of it. I’m so very set on being me now and not being me then, that I can’t be drawn back into a time when everything was different and opposite to however it is now. Nothing in my life is a reflection of what it was like then, I may as well be another woman or have taken on a totally different personage. In a way I have. I have a different name and a different life and a different attitude. Even my psyche is different. It’s like I’ve gone into the witness protection program and have taken on a different identity. I don’t even remind me of who I was then.
So anyway, I’m working hard to get to my 600th post and the only way to get there is by writing whenever the muse inspires me, which is at totally odd times of the day and night. When I have no obligations, my 24 hours get divided up whichever way I please, and I sleep when I feel like it and I’m up when I feel like it and I’m active and lucid at the strangest times of the day or night. I feel a freedom that’s very liberating and I feel that I have to answer to no one and that I don’t have to follow any strict guidelines as to how I divide up and spend my time. I think that’s the best part about living alone. You don’t have to calculate in that other person’s schedule that he is stuck to and probably wants you to stick to also. That’s the pitfall of togetherness, it creates that restriction of physical and emotional space that I have a great need for. It would be wonderful if there were another person like me and a house big enough to contain us both. Then it might work.
It’s too bad that it takes some people a life time before they get to know themselves well enough to know what they really need and want out of life. It isn’t until these past two years that I’ve really come to know my own mind and my own needs. That’s because I never really lived on my own before. I was never a singular unit before. I was always a part of some social system and playing some pre-described role in it that, it turned out, was not well suited for me. I wish I had known all along what an non conformist I really am instead of trying to make myself fit in the picture, whichever one it turned out to be. The problem was that so far I haven’t fitted into any sort of socially accepted picture of what a woman ought to fit into. At least not those of the traditional kinds. Not up to now that I’m alone and happier. I liked having children, but was bent under the weight of the responsibility of it all and at one point that became too much, along with the rest of the trappings of middle class life and the resulting unhappinesses.
So, again I’m working towards my 600th post on an early Saturday morning. In a little while I will take out the dog and go to sleep. One must sooner or later. There is no getting around to it. I’m going to fill up the weekend as I see fit and do things the way I want to do them. I want to have complete liberty to behave in a way that I want to. Sometimes you have to walk the line and sometimes you don’t. It is interesting that I haven’t mentioned the one person who keeps me undeniably tied to my past, and that is my daughter. I can never really cut my ties completely because of her. She is a constant reminder. She is not a constant presence in my life. She lives too far away from me and I can go a whole day without thinking about her too much. But she is always there in the background and prohibits me from forgetting where I came from. Children are mixed blessings.
Alright, the philosophical hour is over. We return to the reality of the day, which is not half bad. After all, I’ve got a warm bed to look forward to after I brave the cold of the early morning.
Have a good morning you all.
Ciao,
Nora
>Wasting no time and dressed warm enough.
>
Because it’s such miserable weather outside, stormy and rainy with gusts of cold wind, I have dressed in a double layer of clothes this morning and I am so pleasantly warm, that I am surprised at myself for not having thought of it sooner, because I was suffering for naught and being very unhappy in the cold and hating every moment of it. Now I am nicely warm, in the apartment too even, although it isn’t really cold in here, but it just feels that way. I’ve got my green scarf wrapped loosely around my neck and am wearing my comfortable boots with my thickest socks and I’m toasty warm. I don’t feel a draft around my legs, because I’m wearing two pairs of leggings. It’s true, I only imagine I feel a draft and think my knees are getting cold, but the power of suggestion does a lot to a body. I don’t even want to imagine that I’m cold, I want to feel that I’m really insulated. I’m wearing a long sleeved stretch t-shirt under my long sleeved top too, so my top half is also warm.
This made a huge difference when I got on my bike this morning, cursing the weather and praying that it wouldn’t rain again, and I almost made it to creative therapy without getting wet, but I was warm.
The good thing about waterproof mascara is that you don’t look like a raccoon when you arrive at your destination. All these things you have to think about. You could wear a hat, but it will make your hair flat and funny and you will look like a goof ball and no amount of fussing with you hair will set it right. Without a hat, there is a chance that it will get wet and that in combination with your hairspray will also give you a funky effect when you try to rub it dry with a towel. You will look like a punker and that is very hip and modern if you don’t mind that look. I personally mind it less than the flat and funny look, which makes me look like a nun without her head cap on.
I always wait for the rain to stop and I say many wishful little prayers and make deals with a higher being. As soon as it stops raining, I rush out on my bike and try to get wherever I’m going before it rains again. Sometimes I make it and sometimes I don’t. Sometimes it starts to rain when I’m out walking the dog and he picks that moment to decide he’s found a very interesting spot to sniff for a very long time, until it dawns on him that it is raining and that he doesn’t like that and we can go home. Needless to say, we´re wet by that time. Luckily, I don´t much mind the smell of wet dog and it disappears when he is dry again.
The gusts of wind make you feel cold through and through and that is really what you have to dress for. It´s more miserable than a cold freezing day without wind.
My sister came and picked up the paintings from creative therapy today. All five of them and it was the first time she saw them. She liked them a lot and told me to sell them for a lot of money. I´ve got them stacked against the wall of my bedroom now and I don´t rightly know what to do with them. I´ll have to ponder on it for a while. I suppose I can hang some of them up on the wall space that I have left, but I don´t have room for all five of them and I really should try to sell them, but I don´t know how yet. I´ll think about that. The problem is, that I´m attached to everything I make and only want them to go to people I like. The other thing is that I like a lot of people and if I knew they got good homes, it would be good advertising for me too. Like the collages. I could send those to people in a tube, if I knew they would get properly framed at their destination. I know one person who has a shop. I need to get in touch with her and see about selling my stuff there. I also want to frame some things for myself to hang up in the living room.
So you see, you create and create, but what do you do with it? That´s the question.
I was tired of lugging cans of dog food home with me, so I went to a pet store on line and ordered dog food there. I figured out what I spend at the store every month and then picked out what I could afford. It will be delivered free of charge in a few days. The dog has a surprise coming to him. He is going on a diet and will be getting smaller portions and more dried food. I will have to be very strict with him and not give in to his sad looking cocker spaniel eyes when he refuses to eat the very good dried food. I got him the best and he has to eat it. It will be a matter of his willpower against mine, except that he can bark when he´s stubborn and wake up the neighbors. He´s got that trick all figured out. He knows if he barks early in the morning, he gets what he wants sooner.
A slice of rye bread is the size of a slice of cake, but then much thinner. I just can´t eat a whole slice of rye bread with luncheon meat on it. The last bite or two are for the dog. I have to pay close attention to the feeling in my little stomach above my gastric band and as soon as it gets the least bit of pressure on it, I have to stop eating. As a matter of fact, I should spit out the bite that I have in my mouth and not even swallow it. That will prevent all discomfort. I have to chew my food very well, really grind it into the smallest possible pieces before I swallow it. That´s why it was so easy to eat the porridge. It just slid down without any problem, but it was very fattening and I put lots of sugar on it. It´s no wonder I gained all that weight. Eating the rye bread is okay. It tastes good, but it is a lot harder than eating the porridge and not nearly as satisfying. But it does make me feel full and that is the main thing. I´m not feeling hungry and I really have to think about if I want to eat again. If I eat too soon, I will be extremely uncomfortable and that is absolutely no fun. I can´t stuff my face, which I suppose is a very good thing.
Shoot, do you see how I jump from one subject to the next? That´s the way my mind works. Never dwell on one thing for too long, get on to the next thing as quickly as possible. Don´t be dull and long winded. Be surprising and amusing.
Well, I´ve been amusing long enough now and I´m going to end this long ramble that´s not going anywhere in particular quickly. At creative therapy, I drew a big circle and filled it with little four leaved flowers done in pen and ink. Now I´m coloring them with a teeny brush and colored ink. It´s monk´s work and it keeps me off the streets.
Ciao,
Nora
>Wasting time…
>
I went back to bed this morning and slept until 12:15 pm and it was so lovely. Wild horses couldn’t have dragged me out of it and the animals slept there with me. That means I wasted half of the day, but who gives a darn, right? It was all for a good cause, because that’s what sleep is to me and as a result, I feel fantastic. Like a newborn person. I feel I’ve been restored to good mental health. It means I only did a few measly jobs in the apartment, but I don´t feel bad about that and the day isn´t over yet. I still can empty the washing machine and hang up the laundry and put away the second load of dishes that I did. There´s time enough and I´m not tied down to a schedule, after all. There is no time clock that I have to punch my card into. I often forget that and think that with the coming of darkness my working hours stop, but there´s no rule that says it does and I can just keep on doing things as I please. How silly of me to think that I´m in a 9 to 5 paid position. I can do all the overtime I want and make up my own schedule. I remember scrubbing the kitchen floor late at night when my kids were babies. I can certainly hang up laundry at 6 pm. I think that´s an excellent idea.
On top of spending little time on the household as yet, the Exfactor came by for two cups of coffee, so I dropped what I was doing and we had a nice leisurely chat. I always do enjoy it when he comes by and he makes for good company. We didn´t have any complicated political or social discussion, but just talked about cows and calves as we say here and that was nice too. Sometimes we´re intellectuals and sometimes we´re just ordinary people. Well, intellectuals are just ordinary people too and I don´t really know how close we come. We may be outclassed by many others. Actually, I´m sure of it. We are just lightweights in the bigger scheme of things, but we do have our opinions and are well versed in them. If there´s one thing I appreciate, it´s a person with an opinion, even if it´s a different one than mine, as long as it´s not a narrow minded, bigoted one.
Oh my goodness, I had one slice of rye bread with three slices of salami and my gastric band is trying to deal with that, That may have been one slice of salami too many. It´s highly uncomfortable as the food is trying to get past he little opening that´s left by the band…there, I just threw ip the excess food and that action forced the rest of the food through the gastric band and now I feel better. What a relief. Sometimes I have to do that, because otherwise I sit here in agony. It feels like I´m going to upchuck everything and I don´t want to do that. Just a little bit is enough. I realize this is not a very appetizing subject, but it must be talked about when you discuss gastric bands and the evil that they do. I will be more careful with my next slice of rye bread. And now for a delicious glass of juice.
Oh, I see that it´s almost time to watch the news. Well, I mustn´t miss that. I´m completely out of the loop as it is. It´s also time to put on warmer clothes. Brrr…
Have a good night!
Ciao,
Nora
>Thursday early in the morning.
>
I was so tired after a, for me, intensive day yesterday, that I went to sleep at 9 pm, even after I had taken a nap on the sofa in the late afternoon and slept through the alarm clock at 6 pm, which is amazing with its incessant beeping. Since it was in the bedroom, it did lower the impact of the sound somewhat, yet normally I can hear it very well, but obviously I was in a coma and oblivious of everything. It was Jesker who woke me up eventually, because he needed to go out and was making very urgent noises right by my ear.
I did manage to make it to creative therapy and worked on my fantasy pen and ink drawing, which really is nothing special at all and I think I am just wasting my time on it and it is going to end up rolled up on top of my closet and never see the light of day again. That’s not because I’m down on myself, but because I absolutely don’t like what I’m doing and am just filling up my time. I only have one more class to go to on Wednesday next week and that is it.
I did get the proper form to request an intake for the SPC and mailed it to my SPN so she can fill it out and get the ball rolling on that process, It shouldn’t take long. Mostly it’s a question of formalities, which is good, because I got a letter with an appointment in the mail yesterday from Social Services to talk about my situation and where I stand in the reintegration process. I think that’s just a formality too, as I think it’s been a year since I was there last. They probably want to make sure I’m still as nuts as ever.
In the afternoon it started to rain again, so I had to wait for it to stop until I could run my errands, because I was not about to get soaked on my bike. Finally, at 2:30, it stopped raining and I took all the books that had to be mailed and went to the little post office first, where the damage to my wallet was not as bad as it could have been, so I heaved a sigh of relief.
Then I did my grocery shopping, in the most economical fashion, and I really took my time and compared prices, because I was buying things I normally don’t buy and I was also trying to buy enough groceries to last me for a week. It’s fun to buy new items and comparison shop and see how much difference there is in price and the assumed quality of the product, which can never be bad if you shop at a good supermarket. They’ve got they’re reputation at stake, after all. I do buy the store brand if I can.
When I got that done and had filled the bike bags and the shopping bag, I stopped by the tobacco shop for my weekly supply of tobacco and got home just in time before the next shower hit. It’s more fun to put the groceries away when you have new items and it is especially fun when you have three animals helping you. They always assume that I’ve brought home stuff for them and they assume right. I always give them something to eat, even if I already had that in the cupboards, because they don’t know the difference. The dog always gets a bone and the cats get fresh kibbles. It’s a ritual.
In an effort to eat healthier, and to lose weight, I had decided that I didn’t want to live on porridge anymore, although I love the stuff and can eat mountains of it. That’s just the problem. I had bought very thin sliced black rye bread and light mayonnaise and three kinds of luncheon meats. I have discovered that I can eat one slice of rye bread with two slices of luncheon meat at the time, and that I can eat another one an hour later. And I am satisfied then. I started off with salami and it was so good. It was the best thing I’ve tasted in a long time and it was nice to chew my food for a change. I have to chew it well, keeping in mind my gastric band, but all goes well and one slice is just enough. Rye bread is high in vitamin B, iron, zinc, potassium, magnesium, fiber and calcium. So that and drinking low fat milk and multi vitamin fruit juice should keep me in good shape. I have to lose 12 kilos, believe it or not. That’s what eating all that porridge did for me. That’s 26 pounds. Picture that in your head.
Well, anyway, I’m going back to bed for just a little while to sleeps some more. I think it’s too early to be up already. I’ve taken my medicines and the start of the day can wait for a bit. I’ve got a better thing to do.
Have a good morning you all.
Ciao,
Nora
>Wednesday in the morning.
>
Well, I managed to sleep through the night. It wasn’t a super long night, but I did it anyway. I went to sleep at 12:30 am and woke up at 6 am. That was after I had fallen asleep on the sofa for a few hours in the evening, which I had promised myself I wouldn’t do, but did anyway. The urge to sleep was stronger than the urge to stay awake. Now I am still yawning, but I think a few cups of strong coffee will take care of that.
Yesterday was another blustery, rainy day, although it was not as bad as the day before, and I decided not to go out on my bike at all. That meant I did no grocery shopping and I had to make do with what was in the kitchen cupboards. Luckily, there was enough there to eat and there even was enough dog and cat food, so we managed fine, but today I really have to go to the grocery store, otherwise we will be eating dry vermicelli.
I cleaned up that cubicle in the bookcase I had talked about earlier to make room for the latest mooched books. There was a big stack of paperwork lying there that I had to sort through and decide about what to keep and file away in a folder and what to toss out. So I did that and found some interesting bits of paper that I filed away that I had forgotten about. Now I know I’ve got them and where they are. I think the covenant of my divorce is very important, for example. I knew it was there, but I had never put it in a proper place. A lot of that stuff could be tossed out, though, as it was obsolete, meaning it was interesting a year ago, but not now. I put the books in the cubicle and they nearly filled it up, so soon I will have to reorganize another one, because I have 15 more books coming. Oh, but it’s nothing but fun and all for a good cause.
Then I did a week’s worth of dishes. Yes really, I didn’t have a clean teaspoon left over, nor a clean coffee cup. I do let that go, you know? I keep stacking them up, until I realize they need to be washed and then I put them all in the sink to soak in hot sudsy water, but the plug of the sink doesn’t fit well and very slowly the water leaks out, until I am left with an empty sink full of dishes. Then I think, “Oh, the heck with it!” and I put it off until the next day, except that everything seems so chaotic and I get discouraged from looking at them and another day gets wasted. I feel ten feet tall when I get them done and you would think I had washed enough dishes for an orphanage, when in reality it amounts to hardly anything. That’s why I think I need a dishwasher. All those who agree raise their hand.
I’m trying to get some things better organized in the apartment, like the chest of drawers in the living room in which everything gets shoved that doesn’t have a home. I need to go through them again and toss things out, and doesn’t everybody have a junk drawer that is an absolute mystery to them as to what exactly the contents are? I know I have candles and mousetraps in mine, amongst other things and god only knows what else and I think I’m going to keep it that way and never really clean it up. I would just have to start another junk drawer with all the junk I’d find. Well, I’m not planning on moving any time soon, so I don’t have to worry about boxing up my junk and having to find a new space for it.
Now I have to get the show on the road. It’s time to get dressed and walk the dog. I have to go to creative therapy. I mustn’t miss it. I have a busy day ahead of me. I’m not sure how much I like that. It’s the riding my bike part that I don’t like. Not in this weather.
Have a good day.
Ciao,
Nora
>What’s wrong with me anyway?
>
Here I am sitting behind the computer in the middle of the night as if I haven’t got a care in the world and I have an appointment with my SPN in the morning that I just remembered about. So, I just took my medication and hope I get sleepy within the next hour, so that I will go to bed and sleep for a couple of hours. Really, I can be so foolhardy. I had visions of myself sleeping late and getting up all leisurely and sitting around in my bathrobe forever, or as long as the dog would let me, but no, it is not going to happen. I am so wide awake, though, because I slept on the sofa for a couple of hours in the evening and got over my worst need to sleep. I will come to regret this as I sit here in the morning with a very strong cup of coffee trying to wake up. It will be like going on a long journey ill prepared. And the weather will be bad.
It is completely quiet outside now and has been for a couple of hours. There is no wind and no rain, but on the weather forecast they promised more of the same for tomorrow and the rest of the week. It is just going to be bad weather. I think it stinks, because I have to go everywhere on my bike and it is so awful. I really, really dislike it. But then I have to remember that if this is the worst I have to complain about, life can’t be all that bad and this too shall pass. Besides, I will find something else to bitch about when the weather is normal again. There’s a always something, right?
When I wrote my last post, and I thought I wasn’t quite coherent, I was actually a little hypoglycemic and a big bowl of chicken soup took care of that. I felt much better after that. I do have a tendency to forget to eat on time and to live on coffee and cigarettes. I ignore my hunger pangs and get so busy doing other things, that I don’t realize that I need to eat. I get to the point that it seems like too much work to fix something to eat and I know I’m not thinking rationally then and have to force myself to do it and take the time to eat. I don’t have snack foods lying around, so I can’t just grab something. I really need to fix myself something to eat. If I had snack foods lying around, there would be too much temptation to eat them all in a short amount of time and have nothing left for when I really needed them. I’ve tried that experiment and failed at it, because I like those sort of things too much. It’s better if I have none of them in the kitchen cabinets and have to prepare my food, so that I can’t impulsively eat. The drawback is that I then forget to eat, or don’t make time for it.
Eating soup is something I started to do just recently, I like the taste of it and it fills me well. I am satisfied for a long time afterwards. It’s nutritious, yet relatively low in calories and I make enough for one big portion. I nuke it in the microwave and add vermicelli and soup vegetables for substance. It’s a good meal.
I don’t feel my sleeping pill working yet, but it ought to any minute now. I should start longing for my bed pretty soon. It will be nice to lie down and pull the duvet over me and get some shut eye for however long it lasts. I think I will send my SPN an email and cancel the appointment. It is only for a half an hour anyway and then at least I will be able to sleep long enough. I just can’t face getting up after only a few hours of sleep. I will be incredibly grumpy and discontent. It will be like being dysphoric and having to go out on my bike in very bad weather on top of that. Besides that, the Exfactor is supposed to be here sometime in the morning and I don’t want to miss him. He may be able to help me with some of the groceries. I also have to go to the tobacco shop and the post office to mail the books for this month. I’m mailing seven books to England and France.
Okay, I will end this now and email my SPN and then go to bed. I wish those of you who are also going to bed a good night and those of you who will read this upon rising a good morning.
Ciao,
Nora
Another Splendid Day 