My mother is considering selling her townhouse and moving out-of-state. She wants to get a better grip on her finances, which I admire, but she simultaneously wants to avoid a family situation that is upsetting her.

I understand the powerful draw of ‘starting over’ in a new place, meeting all new people, trying to build new routines for your day. But, I also know that you’re stuck with who you are at the fundamental levels. You might be farther away from certain toxic people, but you can’t simply move away from your memories and personality. You’re still you,  just in a different place.

I’m going to make an effort to buy a new shirt every week or two for the next couple of months in order to improve my wardrobe slightly. I have no plans to become fashionable, but it would be nice to have more than a half dozen shirts that are appropriate for wearing in public, heh.

The majority of pants I threw out had holes in the thighs. That’s a problem I wish I didn’t have. It’s a problem I know I could do something about if I really focused. I’m so good at making excuses though. Going out to dinner with my husband gives us quality time together away from the slew of electronic devices we’d be drawn to at home. Cook at home is often stressful and unfulfilling because the kitchen is usually a mass of empty 12-pack cartons, dirty dishes, and ancient leftovers. Going to the gym on a regular basis would mean spending less time with family and friends. See? I’m great at excuses. I have lots more, trust me.

Balance is not something I excel at when it comes to my health. I need to find an approach that isn’t all-or-nothing.

I was doing a bit of cleaning this morning and ran across an old CD with this photo of my grandma on it. When I was in college I took a photoshop class and we had to do a restoration of an old picture. I chose the one above. Would you believe it used to have water spots and creases through it?

Anyway, it was a lot of fun restoring the photo. She was so beautiful when she was young! I wish I had been able to get to know her better. I think I would appreciate her a lot more now, as an adult. If I could go back to when she was 50yrs old or so, and have dinner with her, I bet I’d learn a lot about her life. I know it wasn’t an easy one.

It’s like you are in a boat. You’ve got this one oar over here and it’s just rowing and rowing and rowing, you know, furiously fueled by everyone else’s expectations. And that’s never gonna stop. But, it’s kind of got you going around in circles, cause if you want to move forward, then you also have to row with the oar that represents how you see yourself.

Sometimes I feel like I’m only equipped with an oar and a half. I don’t always have a very clear vision of who I am, or who I believe I could become if I worked at it. The internet can make it so easy to hide this truth – I can edit and photoshop the current moment, and, to some extent, delete the past.

It’s not the same as having two oars.

What does my complex have that yours probably doesn’t?

1. 102.9 Lite FM is piped through the hallways during the daytime. Yes, just the daytime. It is turned off every night around 8pm or so.
2. A ‘Take-a-book/Leave-a-book’ bookcase full of old treasures. Today I scored a 6th edition (from 1961) copy of 500 Recipes by Request: From Mother Anderson’s Famous Dutch Kitchens. Awesome. *grin*
3. A pretty good sized group of women does a Tai Chi exercise VHS tape together in the lobby some evenings. This ‘community benefit’ is not advertised anywhere. I think it’s a by-invite-only kind of thing. I find it totally adorable.
4. Jigsaw puzzles sometimes appear in the lobby for tenants to put together. I’ve been so tempted to kidnap a few pieces for a couple of days, just to see if anyone notices! I’ve been good though.
5. Cheap laundry!! A wash cycle is $1.00, and a dry cycle is $0.50. An entire load is clean for just $1.50! Around here that’s nearly unheard of!! It’s probably because half the renters can remember back to when it cost $0.25 to wash. At least one person has lived here since the place opened in the early 60′s.

I’m sure I’ve missed a few things, but those are the big ones. I’m really quite glad we moved here. The location isn’t perfect, only having close access to one bus line, but it’s totally homey and cool here. (Is it homey or homy? Google results seem to suggest it is both!? They’re listed as variants of each other… it’s an infinite loop!)

Anyway, it will be soooo nice to have Saturdays off. I’ll be able to see my friend Mara during the day for a change! And I might get to do things with my brother too! And, since I work in retail, having Saturdays off is sort of a big deal – that’s the busiest day of the week, and I don’t have to be there! I can’t remember the last time I regularly had a weekend day off. It was probably a couple of months after I moved up to the Cities in 2000, when I got my first ‘real’ job. Crazy!

Of course, me being me, whenever I have to make a change in my schedule I consider trying to sneak other changes in, hoping I won’t notice them so much. For example, since I’m changing my bedtime anyway, why not make it even earlier so I can read every night? Or, why not start doing sit-ups and eating breakfast each morning? Or packing a lunch instead of spending money at work? Most of my little fantasies of change just get lost in the reality of life, and that’s ok. I can always think about it again next time I make a pattern change.

And this one was taken a week later…

The sad news is that she’s moving to Ohio, 800 miles away from here, at 6am tomorrow morning.  I miss her already! *cry*

While we were there, we got out a game called Zobmondo: Would You Rather…? and went through a few of the cards. Now, I’ve never bothered with the actual game play, so I can’t recommend that, but the question cards are a lot of fun. It’s really interesting to hear what other people would choose! The questions go a bit like this:

Would You Rather…
Spend the evening with a person to whom you’re very sexually attracted but when you’re extremely tired, dirty, and sweaty from a long day of work
-OR-
Just go home and watch TV?

and

Would You Rather…
Have nine lives
-OR-
Three wishes (excluding extra lives, immortality, invincibility, or more wishes)?

It’s fascinating to hear people justify their answers, and to contemplate why I pick what I pick. These types of questions, while often silly and preposterous, help me determine what my values and preferences truly are. It’s easy for me to say something like “Learning is important to me”, but when faced with a question of which I’d rather do: Go to the library to study a subject I like -OR- Go see the new movie I’ve been looking forward to, I’ll often pick the movie! I really enjoy visual stimulation and entertainment. I like fantasy and escapism.

My day to day preferences, and what I may say my priorities are, are often in conflict. This is not a bad thing to discover. It could help me refocus my priorities on things I’ll actually accomplish. Things that are a better fit with my daily preferences. I’ll just have to keep asking myself that question: Would I Rather…?

I know my last post was photos too, but this place won’t turn entirely into a photoblog, I promise. It’s just that I’ve really been wanting to share these and I had to wait until after my sister-in-law got her baby shower gift, since it included framed prints of the first three shots and they were a surprise! The baby shower was tonight, so I finally get to show these off! Whoohoo! (Unfortunately, the shots of the baby I took tonight were all blurry due to low light. I should be taking some more on Thursday during the day though!)

Afterward, we went to Aster Cafe, where we were among the first people to experience the restaurant’s reopening! It was really fun, especially since it was so spur-of-the-moment. It’s not everyday you accidentally stumble into a business’s trial run!

We were in the right place at the right time, I guess. And yes, the blue cheese plate w/honey, pear slices, and walnuts was scrumptious!!