In which I cover the good stuff and the hard stuff in my week, trying for the non-preachy, non-annoying side of ritual and self-reflection.
And you get to join in if you feel like it.
I would swear there were at least three separate weeks packed into this week, but apparently not.
Busy!
But what actually happened? I have no idea.
The hard stuff
So much busy.
And so much more left to be done before we start Rally (Rally!) on Monday evening.
It’s been a bit insane around here at pirate queen HQ.
Hoping things will ease up soon. And stop poking!
What could be possibly be more boring than this.
Yes, another week of me talking about how I want a proper vacation.
But I’m putting it in here anyway. At this point it might as well just become part of the chickening template.
Now there’s a depressing thought.
Massively underestimating the amount of time it takes to do something.
It took four hours instead of one.
And that really threw me off.
Oh no.
Wi-fi has been shut down at a favorite cafe where I like to write blog posts. And other things that require me to be out of the house and listening to The Cure.
Screw-up! Mine!
The Gwish Kits password: elevate sold out absurdly fast. Which was great! But then the First Mate was out of town and couldn’t ship them.
So someone else had to take on that massive project, and that person made a bunch of terrible mistakes.
And that person got yelled at and cried.
And that person is me.
Seriously losing my mind over here.
So here’s the thing about summer at Hoppy House. And I need to put this in the Book of Hoppy House, which is kind of a version of the Book of Me.
The heat is completely bearable, as long as all the windows are open. Cross-breeze!
It’s just that all of our neighbors have small children.
So the soundtrack of summer is shrieking, crying, yelling and UNBEARABLE recordings of Old MacDonald Had A Farm, Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, Head Shoulders Knees And Toes Knees And Toes.
Forever.
So it’s close the windows and die of heat. Or keep them open and die of crazy. I’ve been alternating.
I also started a Pandora station called OHMYGODMAKEITGOAWAY of loud music to play and drown it all out.
The good stuff
Accidentally overestimating the amount of time it takes to do something = pleasant surprise!
It only takes me 47 minutes to walk from my dance class to the Playground!
Which is pretty much how long it takes to bus.
Not two hours at all.
I like this piece of information. It bodes well for other things.
Island Time!
This whole week I’ve been carrying my green notebook and not being in a hurry.
It’s not anywhere near as good as an actual holiday, but it’s a taste. Each day had elements of being on vacation, and I got to try new things.
A very fun experiment, that I hope to repeat.
Having time and space to myself.
This might be my favorite thing ever.
Friends!
Remember how last week in the chicken I was all sad-mouse poor-me about how I have no friends and no one would come with me to the partner yoga workshop, and I even sang the poor-me song?
So I was wrong. First Casey helped me out with a bunch of things over the weekend, because she’s a total sweetheart. And then Danielle came with me to partner yoga.
And Dana and I went out for dinner and giggled for hours.
Then there was a sneak breakfast with my beloved Mariko who was in town for a day and kidnapped me.
And Casey came on the Thursday walk through Overlook Park (the one from the VPAs), and it was lovely.
See? Friends. Hooray.
Not everything requires a response.
Hilariously, I already wrote about this a few months ago. Mostly trying to convince myself.
Well this week there were all these … things that were wanting attention and responses.
But then I consciously decided to wait and see, and not try to fix them.
And every single one of them worked itself out perfectly. And without my help.
It was like this moment of AH WORRY ABOUT THIS THING RIGHT NOW! And then I would decide that I wasn’t going to respond to it for a while.
And then it would turn out to be fine. Yay.
So many great ideas!
Mind being blown by Shiva Nata, again, more.
I’m in this hugely creative period right now and it’s amazing.
Systems progress.
Spent three hours this week (with help from Cairene) on Rally systems and making them work better.
Feeling very enthused about this project, which is so much more useful than being terrified of it and avoiding it. So that’s good.
Lovely.
Reading this from Taryn totally cheered me up.
And … playing live at the meme beach house it’s the Fake Band of the Week!
My brother and I have this thing where we come up with ridiculous band names and then say in this really pretentious, knowing tone, “Oh, well, you know, it’s just one guy.”
This week’s band totally flew out of my head ever since I heard about this band in Denver (a real band, not a fake band!) called Nuns of Brixton — a Clash cover band that dresses like nuns.
And now I’m kind of obsessing over that.
So now I’m going to see my other favorite band to calm down a little:
Take Ten Breaths and Stretch
They don’t dress like nuns but their stuff is great. Though it’s actually just one guy.
Yes.
That’s it for me …
And of course you can join in my Friday ritual right here in the comments if you feel like it.
Yes? Anything hard and/or good happen in your week?
And, as always, have a glorrrrrrrrrrrrious day, a restful weekend and a happy week to come. Shabbat shalom.
p.s. It’s okay if it’s not Friday anymore. There’s complete chicken amnesty — you can join in whenever (or not) and it’s no big deal.
Follow
HAVI!!!!!
Every time you talk about music AT ALL it makes me happy because I can tell that we are basically the same age and I always get your music references and listen to the same stuff…
and I totally want your Pandora station, for the same reasons.
And I wish there were people near me who read my blog who would come play with me when I sing a poor-me song because I have no local friends… the other day I cried for a half hour because there was no one I could call to go on a Walking-to-find-ice cream-Mission.
Um, and also apparently I now have to go to Denver or fly that band to Massachusetts.
xoS.
It’s a little crazy how much I look forward to the Chicken each week.
This week’s hard:
– Starting the week under pressure to get a whole lot of stuff done and not being sure exactly how it was going to happen.
– Retiring a few favorite pieces that just haven’t sold. I like them and think they’re cool, but no one else seems to think so and they’ve been hanging around my shows for too long now, so they need to go.
This week’s good:
– Excellent show last weekend, my best one ever. Beautiful weather, gorgeous scenery, lots of friends and customers stopping by, all around fantastic.
– Projects not taking quite as long as I estimated they would, leaving me with some time for the garden this afternoon.
– Some much-needed clarity on something I’ve been noodling over for a while.
Happy Friday, Chickeneers!
*tip-toeing back in cuz I’ve just been lurking for ages (which I know is totally fine but I feel like I have to say this)*
The Hard
–too many margaritas on Saturday=antidepressant meds not working for the next few days.
–rocky times in my marriage
–arguing with my sweet, kind grandmother
The Good
–had my first Tarot reading and got so much useful information (Thank you Amy Goetz)
–feeling much clearer about a biz decision that’s been plaguing me for weeks
–my husband being home from work meant sleeping in til 5:30 and less driving for me
I always think that one of the most valuable things my mother taught us as children was No Shrieking Outside.
The Good:
So many new clients and money and wonderfulness. A full calender. People who trust me.
Wonderful cool weather.
A clean office!
The Hard:
Money fog heading back in as I get busy with work and forget to track and hope for the best. This is bad. This will be remedied.
Listening to The Cure (The Cure!) Truly chicken soup for the soul.
Okay, jumping back into the weekly chicken again!
Eugh at the Heat = windows but kids = noisy. So, so with you. Especially as I’ve actually had this week at home so I’m around to hear them. My Pandora station has a good balance of feel-good tunes [wham, weather girls, hamster dance] and death screamo metal 😛
The Hard
– Not knowing what the * to do with my time. I’ve had time! Which I don’t understand and am not used to and huh, what did I do when I had time? So i’ve kind of slobbed out with online TV shows which don’t make me feel like I’ve done anything good for myself.
– Knowing I could have worked and earned money this week [and avoided the noisy kids]…
– Losing my new, soon-to-be-favourite purple earring… I’ve got one left; I know I put both on my desk last week… and i’ve looked EVERYWHERE.. can’t find the other one.. i’ve pulled desks out, carpets up, gone through the hoover bag with a pen… no luck =( they were definitely rising to my favourite pair of earrings 🙁
– Been stuck on the inspiration lately so haven’t been able to write much
– I could have gone home last week – my partner has been there for a week. But I stayed here.. and he’s been in my house, telling me about my cats.. and I’ve been feeling that this just.. feels wrong. He’s at my house and I’m not there.
– Also the training I stayed here this week for got cancelled this morning. So I could have gone home and had time with him/the cats.
– Just Rawr.
The Good:
– I’m going home tomorrow!!! I get to see my cats and my beloved.
– I did have a lovely Harvest celebration Sunday which I would have missed if I’d gone home.
– Erm. I got paid today for last week [my final week inhaling chemicals at summer job]. Money is helpful.
– I had a lovely night and day with two friends this week and I get to spend 2 days with beloved next week before he’s goes back to being 100 miles away.
– I have some good music accompanying my cleaning/packing this evening.
Cheers Chickeneers!
The Hard:
– 23 hours in vans, planes, and airports = very cranky and tired me
– coming off 4 weeks of vacation
– altitude sickness while I re-adjust to Boulder
The Good:
– sleeping in my own bed for the first time in a month
– not having to do an exchange rate conversion every time I buy something
– happy hour
The Hard- why no work. universe?
skin troubles, ow , ow
The Great:
My dear friend blasted me with unconditional love. And I saw clearly the difference between DOING and BEING and all I need to do is be, which I already am. Such a gift.
Having new friends.
One of whom is all on fire about helping me self-promote my artwork. WOW. I needed that. Takes the scary out of it!!
Oh, I can relate to the issue of annoying children’s music! When the Mercurial Maiden was a little bitty thing, we went to great lengths to develop her musical palate. There is a lot of great kids’ music out there, very accessible to adults, plus we started sharing our own favorites with her from an early age. Of course, we still had the Endless Repetition problem, but I have a higher tolerance for that than anyone I know. Comes in handy in my line of work.
Anyway. Chicken!
Hard:
–Coming at last to the realization that I am not going to complete this PhD. Letting it go. Having to tell people. Having to face the anger of one particular person.
Good:
–Getting so much support, understanding and kindness from everyone I’ve told. Even the person who was angry, after expressing the anger, appears to be letting it go and moving forward, being as loving and supportive as ever. I can’t help wondering whether the other shoe will drop (or get thrown) at some point in the future, but if it happens, it happens.
–So very many surprise benefits of letting this degree program go! What a shining example of the thing you’ve been talking about, where what we think we know turns out to be wrong. Just one aspect of that: I had feared that I would be modeling abject failure to my daughter; it turns out that I’m modeling something else entirely: sovereignty, empowerment, confidence, freedom, self-definition…
Sending love to you all, along with my wish for a glorious weekend!
Chicken! I haven’t in such a long time. But whatever, I am *today* and that totally counts.
The hard:
– getting sideswiped by really long chains of connection-spotting while simultaneously trying some other experiments. overwhelm. fatigue.
– the Hippie putting his urgency on a project that doesn’t need to happen right now. Trying to understand his reasoning for urgency and not. worrying.
– slogging through a quickbooks file that some scooter mechanics and well-intentioned friends have been doing for a couple of years. I like puzzles, but this one is rough.
The good:
+ enormous shifts that have sent me (happily) toward trying new things. playing.
+ seeing/understanding really long chains of connections and really starting to sense the power of shivanata.
+ finishing “Stroke of Insight” with new sense of my right to choose to stay right (brained)
+ the Hippie’s company keeps getting work
+ taking an evening walk with Havi. the comfort of being able to start and stop conversations around interruptions. shared language makes things so much easier.
From where I sit (a fairly sad spot this week)
The GWISH KIT arrived at exactly the right time with exactly the right stuff
Optimism for me–a happy, happy mug! ( I love it)
Ideas for making life sweeter without any mean actions in getting there
grounding! wow
My song of the week is Mesopotamia–don’t ask why—-
The Hard:
-Argh, the anxiety issues. Affecting every corner of my life. Feeling disconnected.
-Also, distrust. Linked to the above? Probably.
-Sadness around day that would have been my mother’s birthday.
The Good:
+Taking action to try to stave off further anxiety.
+Day of pampering was lovely! New bouncy hairdo, shaved legs. Oh my!
+Felt the fog lift today. Not sure if it’s gone for good yet, but it’s a glimpse of life without depression/anxiety — one that’s otherwise hard to get when you’re knee-deep in all that muck.
+Did a good workout today. Pushed myself. Feet are sore from injury, but not as bad as I thought.
+Surprised by rebate I forgot about. Yay for “extra” money!
Hard:
* grogginess and mystery aches and twinges
* flour maggots
* juggle-lancing les billable / un-billable / pro bono stuffs
* spent most of today on a spec project that will need way more time than I want to spare for it
* spending hard-earned shekels on mediocre sushi
* Ticketmaster. Good freaking lawd.
Good:
* inspiring friends and kickass mentors
* the rhubarb-beet-honey-ginger-almond eingenmachtes I improvised this afternoon. Nommm.
* planning travel with my sweetie
* business tax returns done and posted
* progress on some ancient promises
* at least one photo from last week’s shoot turned out really well
* some of my books finding the right new person to live with
Shabbat shalom, all y’all!
I just came here to say I’m really happy that you like the Cure, and I see that I’m not even the first person!
Dude. I don’t think I can top flour maggots. [Is it bad if ‘flour maggots’ is the awesomest thing I’ve encountered today? In a day not bereft of awesome things, mind you…]
Flour Maggots = so totally a Fake Band. Too easy, in fact. A bloody-fingered, G-C-D barre chord bunch of shouters, they are. [But. Of course. It’s just one guy.]…
Rally envy…sigh.
But! I’m fixing to rally some young folks, so it’s almost the same thing. Except for not in Portland but we’ll just skip over that for now because that’s what the Cosmos wants us [Royal We!] to do…
Ooh: bus envy (hmm…)…
And: walking envy (ditto…)…
Re: “Not everything requires a response” — Yes! There’s this quantum physics guy, who’s also from India which means he’s got extra bona fides to talk about stuff like, you know, Consciousness or something. Here’s what he said:
“If we can have conflicts in our life and we are courageous enough not to resolve them immediately — because fighting can lead to new possibilities and as soon as new possibilities come in our unconscious — guess who comes to process them…The ego loves the old. Who can process the new? Only God can process the new. So anytime we are creating new possibilities in our consciousness, we are inviting God…and God comes. And God processes. In a creative quantum leap of insight. In this creative way, we become renewed. We become better than before. But now we have the conviction of the “aha” insight. We can use that conviction to make real changes in our life, real changes in the way we relate to others, and those real changes eventually will stick.”
I liked that he said that. And that you (Havi) said it too.
Happy Friday…
Sorry. Forgot: said Indian guy’s name is Amit Goswami and he’s a theoretical physicist.
Chicken! I haven’t chickened for a while although I always love reading the post. The commentluv most recent post thing mocks me because I’ve totally neglected my old blog while flailing about brainstorming for a new site.
But maybe Chicken Amnesty extends to that too.
The Hard
One more for the Oh Good Grief It’s Hot club. I really dislike August.
Lunch with my mother. And her new husband. Which is a long story that’s possibly talk show worthy.
Just recovering from a bit of a freakout, but it’s actually a very funny story.
The Good
The lunch was without thrown shoes. This never happens. I attribute it to Love of My Life’s suggestion that an iridium force field might be a good idea. Either that or they were both imposters.
I actually had emotional bandwidth left over. Usually I’m toast for the rest of the day after an encounter with her.
Today, I emailed what I thought was a rough draft of a guest post and quickly received enthusiastic praise and “we’re done here, shall we move up the posting date?”
The Funny Story
Remember that website I mentioned?
Thanks to Shiva Nata and the Writer’s 10K Days at Fear of Writing, I’m actually making real progress on the thing. YaY me!
And I had promised my accountability partners the first peek at it during our call Monday night. Which of course meant that I had to take everything out of draft status and press publish.
Which of course I thought was perfectly safe since no one knows it exists. You see where this is going, right?
Today I got an email to approve a comment. When I looked at it, it wasn’t spam! The person had read the post! And wasn’t linking to anything!
I was very confused. Until I read the Friday Chicken. And realized that someone pays attention to her incoming links. Then I had a visit from the But It’s Not Ready Yet monster.
Thank goodness there were cookies in the house! The monster is sitting in front of a nice movie with a glass of milk and a plate of cookies and (mostly) letting me type this in peace.
So come on over! There are still little bright pink notes to myself in the middle of posts, and I’ll be working on a nicer theme. There aren’t many posts up yet. But if you don’t mind stepping over a few boxes, I’d love to hear what you think.
While you’re there check out the page called Please Come to My Costume Party.
Happy Chicken!
Taryn
First and First First First:
YAY TARYN!
I love love love your blog just the way it is 🙂 and I’m so glad to see who you “are” beyond the nice/supportive/meaningful feedback you give me on my blog.
Yay again!
(and also thanks to sue and claire and my other havi-friends who are great supporter-friends-sweet peas)
The H to the A to the R to the D = HARD:
— FUCKING CANCER. Mom started a clinical trial and that seems to be going fine, but otherwise all HELL broke loose — cancer moved into her liver and the brain mets that she had treated with the horrific thing known as “GAMMA knife” are not gone. At all. They are bigger. And she is weird + in pain. Which makes me horrified + “what now?” + sad sad sad sad.
— dealing with relentless real life monster (who hates my guts and says horrible things to me and means every word of it but is the father of my son and therefore i can NEVER GET AWAY FROM HIM) about paying for college (which, if you haven’t noticed, costs about 21 billion dollars for in-state tuition) which brings up every monster/sad thing ever (because if i wasn’t such a fuck up i could pay for my son’s college tuition + not work + take care of my mom full-time)
— falling apart-ness and “what’s the point”-ness and doom doom doom.
— questioning my decision to stop all antidepressants + hormonal craziness. can’t sort out what is what is what.
— my mom becoming suddenly obsessed with moving out of our house (that she loves and i love and we just moved into one year ago) and triggering all my emotions re: how my mom moved us all the time when i was growing up. one day we lived somewhere and the next day we lived somewhere else and went to new schools and she was all “tra la la” and i was always “wtf? i’m the new geeky kid again?”
The GOOD! SWEET! YAY!
— i wrote a blog post “book of me” type deal re: the relentless real life monster and it felt sooooooooooo good + i got a lot of nice feedback/support/good ideas on dealing with him.
— i fell apart so much that my brother noticed and offered to let my mom come stay with him for a few days so that i could be ALONE in my house and maybe get my act back together.
— my falling apart was so dramatic that my mom was all “maybe we shouldn’t move right now” (because she knows that it would all fall on me — since she is sick and weak and tired, etc.) and i was all “NO WE SHOULDN’T MOVE” and “AS A MATTER OF FACT, I’M NOT GOING TO MOVE & YOU CAN’T MAKE ME”
— started reading “tired and wired” re: adrenal fatigue and am getting some good ideas on getting my body some help, finally.
— drumroll please: i took my old lady bike into the bike shop today for a tune-up. i haven’t ridden it in like, ummm, 8 years? major progress towards actually riding. newer fancy bike still in garage….
— went to slow flow yoga today — tooled across town with my convertible top down and THE CURE (Galore) cd blasting….. Woo-Hoo~!!
— met a friend at a funky little pub this afternoon. meaning (a) i have a friend and (b) i’ve been to a funky little pub.
xoxoxoxoxo
kim
It’s Friday?! Well, not anymore, not where I live. But I haven’t finished with the day yet.
But it’s really Friday?
It seemed more like Saturday because we did a weekend-ish kind of thing today and it’s thrown off my sense of time.
The Good:
+ Lots of thinking, pattern recognition, insights. Also inspiration. Living inside my head is pretty interesting these days.
+ Baby steps that have moved some big projects along.
+ Kitchen redo starts Monday!
+ Took Mom and my nephew to the Art Museum — awesome experience. We were there about five hours!
+ The Big OOD right now is a “survival celebration” for my husband’s 60th birthday. I sent out email and FB “save the date” notices and already the people we most want to celebrate with us have said that they will be coming.
The Hard:
– Trouble getting ahold of someone we need to coordinate things with for the kitchen work.
– Not getting what we need from the guy who is supposed to repair the garage.
– Pain.
– Having to get everything out of the kitchen before Monday. Having to find a safe place to put breakables. It’s disrupting a lot of arrangements. But it will only be for a week. I hope.
The hard:
The tiredness.
The feeling that I will never be able to afford things I want to do. Feeling too tired to process this.
Cherries that were horrible.
The good:
Deciding to take a week off (see tiredness).
My MA dissertation is all written in draft.
Being excited about topics for the contextual essay that goes with it.
My tattoo has healed beautifully.
Summery weather.
Meeting up with a favourite friend last night for wine and talks
Incredible mind blowing insights – I feel like I’ve had about ten years of ‘normal’ insights in the last five weeks.
Lunch at my favourite cafe.
Books!
Buying and using meditation CD and book.
Paints!
Kitties being incredibly adorable.
Have wonderful weeks…zzzzz.
I swear the universe has been trying _incredibly_ hard to make me unhappy this week. And I actually found myself thinking “Chicken? Is it time to chicken yet? CHICKEN PLEASE.” So, there ya go.
The hard:
– Monday put me in such a bad mood. Traffic was awful, weather was awful, my lecture was too packed so I had to stand, bleh. But I did manage to shake off the bad mood rather quickly, and I was really happy with how impenetrable I felt after that.
– Finding a new car has been so very difficult. And after writing out in words exactly what the problem was, it all seems so insignificant, and honestly I am very grateful for the things that have gone right, and they truly squish into oblivion the stuff that went wrong. So, whilst it has been a very frustrating few weeks, the outcome is good.
– My bike broke 🙁 I feel like I’m in a pretty crucial area of Getting Fit and not having my most important piece of Getting Fit equipment, I feel lost and kind of anxious. However, this won’t last long because I’m going to buy a replacement tomorrow!
– I envy all you Northern Hemisphere peeps because it is fah-reezing where I am. And the sun just sits there, casually mocking me, because I haven’t wrapped myself in enough layers to endure the cold. Even though there are no clouds! I do not get you, weather, you are so deceptive.
– Partner made a comment in passing, which was supposed to be a joke, that kind of attacked my Tiny Sweet Thing. Which obviously hurt and made me feel very reluctant to share any more of my progress. Still haven’t quite bounced back from that one.
The good:
– Friday was a perfect day. I had a delicious breakfast with my mother, sat and read in the sun for a few hours, then enjoyed a proper evening date with my partner. And my old jeans fit me again after not having worn them in over a year.
– This semester is looking to be really fun and fulfilling. My last-minute decision to change classes feels *right*.
– New car is actually exciting, even if we didn’t end up getting the model I had my eye on. It’s small enough for me to drive without having a huge panic attack, but still suits us both.
Hello chickeneers
What’s been going on? I cannot remember. My body is busy doing other crap that means my brain functioning is well down on the list of priorities right now. This is the first hard. Even though I haven’t started the list… Okay I will just ramble so please excuse the atrocious grammar and severe lapses of logic to follow. (And welcome to my world!)
The Hards
– my body is taking over and will not be appeased in any way that fits very easily with my life. Naps will be had but then I push myself to oh-my-god-the-incredibly-late-hour-of-eleven to get the washing hung etc and even if I sleep in til EIGHT I basically feel pretty hungover ALL the time. Varying between extremely (right now) and mildly (occasionally) hungover which is extra shit because I have GIVEN UP HANGOVERS. Also, how much food can one person (well….) actually need and also deciding whether I am hungry, thirsty or pukey is very difficult to determine because they ALL FEEL THE SAME ALL THE TIME. Urrrgggghhhh
– love of my life is in fear of the recession and is angry that I’m not and thinks it’s because I’ve never really been at the mercy of blah blah and I’ve always had someone to fall back on and I don’t know maybe he’s right but getting depressed about it doesn’t seem like a very empowering response and besides I’m an optimist and I can remember that he’s born under the money tree and everything will be fine REALLY and honestly WHO CARES so long as we’ve got the basics which we always WILL in which case find the joy in the details and who gives a shit about holidays to Bora Bora or other crap that his mother aspired to………. Still, feeling either slightly disconnected or the echo of old disconnection and triggery and sensitive on both sides. Ow.
– ghosts of my mother in law. Not the amazing brilliant stuff either, mostly the crap. *sigh* Okay, so the amazing brilliant stuff is probably there just as much but I probably just don’t credit to her… Hmmmm. #bing
– little lad. He is so skinny and pale and sickly in the Dickensian sense. Not robust. Mothers of the world don’t give me any crap about how *hard* it is to have robust thriving energetic healthy kids. I know it is hard, but it’s a better kind of hard to have. Trust me. Be grateful. Yeah yeah yeah this is our journey to travel for some weird ass fucking cosmological karmic reason or some crap I just wish it wasn’t sometimes.
(But don’t worry, my ACTUAL belief underneath the resentment and grief is that he wouldn’t actually have been born AT ALL unless he felt safe coming to the world as he is with all the whatever crap that’s playing out in the physical, and what a gift we have been given because can you imagine the world without him? What a ridiculously reduced place. It would be so much less great without him here. Trust me on that point too. Really, I know that. See also, point one about tired and feeling hungover and gross which leaves one vulnerable to the It’s Not Fair and Why Him and Why Me yada yada yada.)
– life. It gets in the way of my projects and sometimes I wish I did not have a family or job or other stuff (great stuff, love stuff) but my projects are feeling neglected and how to I put my project care into my day? I just do not know. I do keep going doing little itty bits here and there but….. *sigh* progress. It is slow.
Okay.
THE GOODS
– gardening a bit (even with the accompanying strains of my faithful friend You’re So Lazy You Let It Get So Out Of Control Fail Fail Fail)
– vegie swap (even with the accompanying strains of my faithful friend You’ve Offended Everyone Nobody Is Going To Like You Shame Shame Shame)
– nearly nearly almost almost about to get the rest of MY money back from Kafka-esque bureaucracy maybe pretty please fingers crossed they’ve promised and promised I really hope this comes off cos I’ve gone and got my hopes up here.
– tom ka gai that was pretty good even though I didn’t have any lemongrass
– ummmmmm…. the days are getting longer down here and the daffodils are starting to bloom?
Struggling to identify goods. I know there were, like, A GAZILLION more, but I think I need to go sleep some more to get my happy eyes back.
Seeya slater
xox
Hello, Chickeneers!
Just here to say how relieved I feel to know that other people react to loud neighbors. I have this persistent internal story about how a Good Person with Some Attainment would be So Much More Relaxed about Screamy Spice and the other Loud Neighbors.
The neighbors are bad enough. Why pile on extra pain in the form of a story about how bad I am for disliking the noise? Bleaargh.
Cheers to friends and partner yoga. 🙂 That was fun.
Oh chicken! How glad I am to see you!
Friday was yesterday.
But today is MY friday, so:
This week the hard: icky IGUANA-filled paperwork. I swear the iguanas were on top of other iguanas. I could barely see my desk.
Some financial hoopjumpery that I could have done better.
Tired. Just. Tired.
This week the good:
NEW IDEA HOPPITYHOPHOP! I am SO excited that I’m using extra exclamation points. !
http://bodyofpleasure.com. yay.
Clients!
Getting iguanas done.
Not stiflingly hot weather.
Seeing good people.
It’s already late Saturday. Just getting to the chicken.
The hard:
Strange icky mold growing in the back of my closet. I’m freaked and Adman thinks I’m exaggerating – ugh.
Sad, last day of classes and won’t be able to see new friend Carmen very much anymore.
The Good:
Signed up for coaching course in Oct. yay!
Great last week of classes – got to dance all day for two days.
Loving the yoga (the non-sucky kind) and the dancin of the shiva.
Am realizing how very helpful Friday Chickening is….
Thank you, Havi 🙂
The Hard:
The comparative suffering thing that goes on. And gossip. Argh!!!
Losing my entire hard drive. Dead and gone. Forever.
The Good:
Finding a totally hilarious Monty Python satire that sends up comparative suffering. Four Yorkshiremen. Brilliant. On YouTube.
My new laptop, and discovering ways to reconstruct my information. Not having to worry about whether to delete old crap–it’s gone! A fresh computer start, YAY!
The generosity of people who re-sent data that I had lost. Very kind and helpful and deeply appreciated.
A good friend suggested I check out your blog. So glad I did! Thanks for this. Tonight I needed to compare the normalcy and reality of My Real Life with someone else’s.
This week for me . . .
The Hard:
Summer stomach flu hit the household
My two kids and I adjusting to living with my partner and her son
Putting an offer on a house and then realizing it’s the wrong house!
No response whatsoever to my new Training
The Good:
Nobody died from the flu
Realizing this mixed family will never look like the Brady Bunch!
Putting an offer on another house and knowing it’s the Right One
Reading your reminder that I don’t have to worry so much.
Thanks so much.
Karina
So so much has been going on. What a good time to Chicken!
The Hard (there’s a lot, and it’s in no particular order):
-The worst wave of depression ever. Unhealthy coping skills.
-Depression means lethargy to me. Haven’t been cleaning up after myself, like, at all. Now my roommate is coming back, and I’m in super-cleaning-panic mode, because I’m embarrassed at my own mess, and I don’t want any more Judgment Monsters (I have plenty all by myself).
-My roommate’s dog is old, and smelly, and lonely so he likes to hang around me a lot. He freaks out at fireworks, which some neighbors have been setting off at 1 AM for no evident reason, which makes him bark a lot. I feel compassion for him, but he’s still not my favorite animal.
-Oh yeah, almost forgot about the relationship meltdown! *Bitter laugh* After a long period of introspection, I was planning on ending my long-distance relationship this week, in person. In a twist of fate usually reserved for bad sitcoms, he found out that I was going to do this via an e-mail meant for someone else. When he called me to confront me, I was unprepared. I handled it badly. You could say that I’ve handled the majority of our recent relationship badly. Now I don’t know if he’ll ever speak to me again. I don’t know if I want him to. I don’t like the lingering feeling that he might hate me forever though. I ended it, and I don’t regret it, but I’m still missing What Was and What Could Have Been. And I’m having a hard time letting myself have my feelings because I Brought This Pain On Myself So It Doesn’t Really Count As Pain, Or As Something That Other People Should Feel Sorry For You About.
-I have a tickle in my throat.
-Insomnia AND oversleeping. You’d think my body would pick one or the other. Not sure if it’s a depression thing or it’s unrelated.
-Mysterious pain and numbness in my thigh. Turns out it’s sciatica. Freaking out about being 24 and having ANOTHER “old lady disease”. Judgment and frustration about having no money to get massage to treat the pain.
-Oh, money. And the not having of it. Still trying to absorb the lessons in the last few blogposts. Right now I have less than $100. Not sure when I’m getting more. Not sure how to pay rent.
-On a related note, I don’t know what’s happening with school and financial aid right now. If I need to find a job. Soonest I can find out is the 15th.
-Due to all this, I am having a hard time not believing that I’m a failure at pretty much everything. Objectively I know that it’s not true, but sometimes it just feels like it.
The Good:
+I now have a plan for the whole school thing. I have an appointment with the person I need to talk to. I don’t have to panic because even though they might not be my preference, I do have possibilities.
+My cat just came to the bed for cuddles. I love my Pumpkin cat.
+I got all the dirty dishes out of my room today. Success!
+I reached out and asked for help about my depression. My appointment isn’t as soon as I’d like, but I have one.
+Finally got a Pinterest account. So much fun! I can make collages any time I want without magazines. Which is good because I don’t really get any magazines.
+Going on a fun little trip next weekend. It’s a training for the Real Food Challenge. Going with a friend of mine, and everything is paid for by the college. Yay!
+Ice cream I wanted was on sale today. Huzzah!
+Got a lot of compliments on my red sundress last week. Planning on wearing it tomorrow. And I’m actually going out, down to a Buddhist event 90 mins away. So people will see my cuteness. A boy might even see me cuteness. Tee hee!
+I’ve been enjoying some good nostalgia via Radio Free Roscoe, pop-punk, and re-reading some old books and fanfics.
The hard:
– 6 hours drive on Friday and 6 hours drive back today to go to sister-in-law’s wedding with a pretty unbearable guy.
– Too many “toos”: too much talking, too many people, music at wedding too loud, too much driving…
– Overwhelm because of tiredness because of above and because of – and this is the hardest:
– Husband has to be off to oh-so-damn-unsafe place on Tuesday for 6 f…ing weeks.
– Dreading the 6 weeks that he will be away.
– Crying because of all the above.
The good:
– Seeing some of my husband’s relative that I really like.
– Getting to speak lots of French.
– Time with friends.
– Love
Let’s hear it for Chicken Amnesty – hooray!
Ok, the week.
The Hard
-while doing lots of internal work around safety and what it means to me and how I can experience more of it, what should happen but that one of our less mentally stable library regulars should nearly get in a fight, and the police get called. Irony. Yay.
-had a meltdown that involved scarfing chicken nuggets followed by a delightful spree of self loathing. Such fun.
The Good.
-said mentally unstable regular hasn’t been seen at the library since we called the cops last Saturday.
-new A/C system installed at the house, with a monthly payment I am reasonable satisfied with. Certainly better than paying to have old a/c fixed every month.
-some lovely and productive time to myself. Such a huge fan of this.
-a day at the beach. this. was. awesome. There needs to be an entry in the Book of Me about going to the beach. seriously. And one of the best parts was realizing that it isn’t only the natural beauty of it that feeds my soul (although, yes, that) but that jumping up and down in the heavy surf is play. Simple, unstructured, natural play. Love.
I hope y’all have a lovely week. 🙂