• November 16

    I took some time to call people I haven’t spoken to in a while. I spent an awful lot of time talking about myself. All I have to say is people were very patient with me, and not bad at sounding interested.

    November 16
  • November 15

    Christina and I get 45 minutes between her dance classes to eat dinner together. It’s nice to have this alone time with her, even if we do end up spending some of it glued to our screens.

    November 15
  • November 14

    As it turns out, communication skills learned in therapy in other contexts do not work on teenagers. In case you were wondering.

    November 14
  • November 13

    What a long day. It required an orchestra of effort from several people, but somehow everyone got to everywhere and all the pieces of everything needed were purchased or reserved. I think. I even got Christina to practice some math before her unit test tomorrow. Don’t know if she did it right because I couldn’t see it before she went to bed, but I appreciate the effort nonetheless. Life is entirely too complicated to be enjoyable right now and I don’t know what to do about it. I can’t think clearly enough to make any decisions. I can’t think clearly enough to decipher the options. So on I go. Maybe an answer will become evident in time.

    November 13
  • November 12

    Today was Robin’s first cheer performance with her new team. The routine wasn’t totally ready, so there was a little bit of awkward while they just stood there, but what we saw looked good! I’m so excited to see Robin cheer on a team where she’s challenged and gets to be competitive. She seemed really happy, and that is worth everything to me in itself.

    November 12
  • November 11

    There was some kind of soccer tournament going on near the hotel. There were at least 75 kids running around the lobby and the pool after dinner while their 125 parents drank beer and wine and largely ignored them. The noise! The chaos! It wasn’t the peaceful escape I imagined, but we did get this moment to ourselves before the soccer exploded.

    November 11
  • November 10

    Against my better judgment, I solved a longstanding problem at work today. It was so simple and so drastic an improvement, it’s ridiculous that no one had ever thought of it before. Problem solved, I guess.

    November 10
  • November 9

    I went outside to check on Pinot in the backyard, because he likes to dig under the fence and disappear. He was sniffing around on the grass, so I lay down and looked at the sky a while. It was a really nice day, warm but not hot, sunny with a few clouds, not humid. I decided to pull a few weeds from the garden, which has really become overrun with them. I only intended to pull a few and go back inside, but after 20 minutes, I’d weeded half the garden. I cut my finger on something in the garden and I have dirt deep under my fingernails, but now I can see my flowers and they can breathe. There are still more weeds to pull, but it felt good to do something that means something. Something that yielded positive results. I feel like so much of what I’ve been doing lately has involved smashing my head into proverbial walls over and over and then being asked to do it again (but always with a thank you!). I’m tired. Beyond. But here is this rose that I found in the weeds. I think I have to work to find more roses.

    November 9
  • November 8

    I hate this photo. I don’t even want to post it. But this is what I got. I am definitely in a mindset of, screw it, I don’t care. I just want to sleep.

    November 8
  • November 7

    Had a tough day. Have not been feeling my best to begin with, but I had a lousy meeting that put me over the edge. Like, way over. To feel better, I decided to have some plantain chips that Billy bought for me, but he took them with him to his wrestling practice. So then I thought I’d have some of the Almond Joys he bought me, but Christina told me she ate all of them. I had to officially back out of the holiday pops and Messiah concerts this year, which hurts so much to do. Robin didn’t want me to sing to her at bedtime. I have not felt this low in a very long time.

    November 7
  • November 6

    I rediscovered an old playlist – songs that defined my life, every one with a story. Someday I want to write a book holding all of those stories. As I was listening to it after the kids went to bed, I thought about the sermon I wrote for church that was so well received and how good it made me feel to write it. Why am I holding back on this? It’s time to write.

    November 6
  • November 5

    Today was Daylight Savings, church and the silent auction, lunch at the Loop with the girls, Lowe’s and Michaels with Billy and Christina, working on the advent calendar (it’s coming along), pork loin and homemade applesauce, driving home from cheer, and trying to stay awake until a respectable hour. I’m almost there.

    November 5
  • November 4

    We went to the mall… paradise for the kids, meh for me. They got some cute stuff with their allowance and birthday money, which is now suitably depleted. Robin got these cute earrings. Even I got a couple things. It appears spending money is just irresistible.

    November 4
  • November 3

    Today was moody teenager day. Want to go out for ice cream, don’t want to go out for ice cream, go out for ice cream, want to play games, play games, don’t want to play games, life is miserable, can we just go home. Life is exhausting.

    November 3
  • November 2

    It was really just another day. I got some very nice compliments about the service I put together last Sunday and that felt good. It felt almost as good as doing the service in the first place. I’m very glad it was meaningful to other people too.

    November 2