SCREAM

I lost my internet connection yesterday later in the day. Before church it was fine. I came home, it was gone. The network and router just disappeared off my computer. It took hours to figure it out and restore everything. Why should I freak? I can journal by handwriting, wow, that antique practice! I could use the time to actually do a painting. OR finish painting the outside door. So why the freakout. Is the computer a bit addicting, hmmmmmmm? I'm talking to my self here.

How do you have the files in your computer organized?

I have hundreds of files in my computer. Somehow while organizing my folders and files to do the new website for art, I started moving files to a root folder to set up a site, and I jumbled my files up. Don't know how I did it. I've been doing major moves, moving pictures off the computer onto CD's, anticipating eventual storage problems if I didn't, so the usual place I had everything put and knew where files were was rearranged.

This sounds incredibly stupid, I know, but this computer came with a pre-set "My Portfolio" folder. So what did I do when I wanted to move all the art to a folder for the website? I set up a "myportfolio" folder which became jumbled with "My Portfolio." And the root folder I name "myart" while having another folder named "My art." Stupid, stupid, stupid! So now I have to move files, redefine the site. I've lost some of my skills obviously.

So I am not only housecleaning a house, but housecleaning the computer. I am thankful I only began the initial design of the web pages, and wasn't too far in or the links would have come out like the "spaghetti" of wires and cords on my floor by the computer.

My life feels just about as jumbled. I have given myself two months to get organized with some kind of "earn at home" situation. I want to do art, but putting the house back together is coming so slowly.

There are "projects" sitting all over - plastic containers waiting for scrap booking which would make wonderful Christmas presents. Art supplies. My exotic materials are in Wyoming and J loaned my sewing machine to someone and hasn't brought it back. I need to yell! But would I use it right now, no? I make these wonderful purses that are fun and would no doubt sell. Where is my "git up n go?"

I sit here at the computer gazing out at the palms and decided I really did pick the right place to plant them. I want to plant more stuff. But haven't really fertilized the flowers properly that survived my absence. I used to be such a go getter - here I sit at the computer, happily typing away and thinking. Yaaaaaaagh!

A day in my life some years ago: Get up and feed children breakfast, get self and children ready for school. (No cold cereal either!) Get them off to school. Go to work. At lunch go to Grandma's, check up on her and her house. Get off work, pick up kids, go home and cook dinner - a diet one for me, something the kids liked, and then something for an extremely picky husband who prefers living off of sausage and hamburger. Ok, then did the dishes, threw in the laundry, cleaned up the house, ironed hubby's work shirts and kid's clothes. Oh, yeh, throw in time to study/read the Bible. I prayed as I moved like a whirlwind.

Loved to have people over for dinner, to entertain.

If I didn't tackle the 2nd job of church secretary for the evening, I would sit down at the sewing machine and sew the girls' and my clothes. (Living in Wyoming is sort of like the mission field, not much shopping - these were pre-internet days). On weekends, it was more laundry and housecleaning. Then I would go over and clean grandma's house, and of course take her grocery shopping. My oldest would go with me and mow. Sometimes I did the mowing - grandma not only wanted the grass mowed, but we had to do the vacant lots and the alley. There are long stories to tell about grandma.

If her roof needed repaired, I got up on the roof and did it. I also went to church every time the door opened AND hosted a "care group" in my home. I repainted, redecorated my tract home, it was a beautiful oasis. My job was responsible, I was an administrative assistant to the City Manager. No wonder I'm falling apart. This went on for fifteen years, full steam ahead. My calendar had every 1/2 hour slot filled. No wonder I am crashed. BUT I WAS SO ORGANIZED AND GOT THINGS DONE! Now I can't even get the house clean all at once over a two day period. Or trim my blankety blank bushes!

All the memories my kids have of me in those years is of the busy whirl in my life. My son was living in another town with my mother in order to go to a private school. I would try to get down there when I could. That was a situation that tore me up inside, literally.

Sitting here at the computer now with crappy health and overwhelmed by the small (comparatively) amount I have to do now, I'm beginning to cry. I want to do it all, once again. If not all, just enough. No, be truthful, for me just enough is never enough. Don't like being exhausted after 4 hours. Don't like not being able to cook a picnic, pack it up, and pack to the beach for the whole day. Don't like running across these screwy situations I've ran across. Ok, ok, will talk to myself. I'm alive, I'm walking about, my family is nearby, I have a good car, my palms & yard are pretty, I have new skills, I have done about everything I wanted to do, that is within the constraints of my circumstances. But, still how I miss being young and pretty and energetic.

Have you ever enjoyed an incredibly beautiful day and you lived it to the max, being afraid it would be a long time before it came around again? Well, that is what life feels like and how I feel inside. I don't want to waste even a precious minute. I've yet to reassess what "waste" is, though, I guess.

Yeh, this rainy day is sort of giving me fits of nostalgia. The solution? Create the kind of life I want now within the parameters available to me. Meditate. Think! What is it? Focus and accomplish what I can. Look as nice as I can. Go to the gym. Eat right. Get enough sleep. Don't freak. Trust God, trust my gut. Pray. Be calm. Be calm. Be calm. Be calm. And paint. Just sit down in the middle of the blankety blank list of to do's and PAINT!