Here Be Dragons

2008-01-07

Today I spend my last day as a �free woman� because tomorrow I will start my first day at work since September 2006. Since then I�ve been on a rollercoaster of experiences with Fred. I�ve gained twenty pounds in an orgy of travel, love and eating. Time for some �Normal�, whatever that is. All I know is what it isn�t. Normal includes a more consistent schedule and a whole lot more time home with home cooked meals (or at least lean cuisines!)

I spent my last day of adjusting to normal by babysitting my grandson who was diagnosed with strep from his pediatrician yesterday while my daughter took my middle granddaughter back to the same pediatrician today because she looked glassy eyed and complained of a sore throat and had a temperature two degrees *below* normal today. Yup, she has strep throat too. With a diagnosis of two or more in the family with strep the doctor treats the whole family. Oh joy, the whole family is on antibiotics and even though I am not part of their immediate family guess who feels scratchy throated?

Yup, me .. but then again I am VERY suggestible and maybe just being back home will cure me. I think being this suggestible is part of what makes me so empathetic but I wonder how many times I�ve made myself sick in the past?

Otherwise, I feel rested and alert and ready to face this new adventure. It feels good to know that if this job doesn�t work out that I don�t need to cling to it to survive like I�ve had to in the past. Fred makes a powerful companion in that way which makes all the difference in my attitude. I feel much more powerful and feel like I have many more options if this doesn�t work out.

That isn�t to say that I won�t give this job a real effort because I will. Not only is that part of my nature but I�m getting over the �scared of the new� part and starting to get sincerely interested in the new opportunities I will have opened to me. Plus a dream of a commute ain�t all bad, is it?

While I�ve been out of work I�ve managed to accomplish quite a bit and I wonder how I�ll get some of these things done on a normal work schedule. I can�t even remember how a couple, both working fulltime, gets all this crap done anymore. I won�t be available for my daughter in a pinch anymore and I will miss that more than anything. The privilege of watching my three grandchildren while she worked last summer was more than I could have hoped for and I�ll miss it this year. I finally got to be the mother I couldn�t be to my own children for my grandchildren and that was not only fun but very satisfying to me on a personal level.

The experience of a lifetime taking weeks to explore some of the wonders of the east coast I will always remember, especially the Shenandoah State Park, it was simply beautiful. The feeling of being footloose and fancy free I will always cherish, just like being a child again. Getting Fred into a kayak for a two hour exploration of mangrove channels in the winter in Florida, my first Thanksgiving at my daughter�s. This and so much more I will always hold close.

As far as practical things we repaired the fascia boards and soffits of my roof and then we repaired a HUGE leak that developed in my basement that took TWENTY bags of cement to correct. I hand sanded my bedroom and my kitchen and my bathroom floors and than painted my upstairs bedroom floors and got a whole new bedroom set. We got a new kitchen set and puppy proofed my deck so Dash couldn�t get out and run into the street. I completed two jobs for my brother creating customer databases (last one only completed yesterday, talk about a close one!)

I also attended all the classes to gain my MCSE certificate and one of my only two disappointments is that I didn�t complete the tests corresponding to the completed classes although the vouchers haven�t run out yet and I may just yet. The second disappointment is that I have a HUGE scrapbook project that pretty much includes about 30 years of experiences that I have to complete too. But that project�s been around since I started it in 2003. One of these days I�ll get obsessed and just do it.

I think in the back of my mind I�ve been waiting for the Ex�s role in many of those years to become more real and less idealized and less traumatic to re-live. I shouldn�t be thinking of how much I loved him in the same breath with what a shit he was. It�s too schizophrenic. He�s getting to the place he belongs, not all bad, but certainly not good, and I�m separating out my rose colored glasses. I just want to get to the place where I�m not crying while I make the damned scrapbook but I�m not drawing horns on the pictures either.

Fred�s been a revelation in helping me get there. I�ve never felt so safe in so many areas of my life. It�s a real temptation to just allow him to take care of me but I think I need to get out there once more and be me again.

�Til Tomorrow �

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