Just A Thought...

Gratitude

2012-01-28T22:19:00.000-05:00

You know, when I think about it, it seems so unreal that in just a few months after having to leave my home with nothing but our personal stuff and a pile of books, God has provided Grace and I with an apartment that we can afford, all the furniture that we need, a fully stocked kitchen, plus lots of room for all those wonderful books. In the summer, we had a lawnmower to keep our lawn neat

In My Dreams...

2012-01-20T12:29:00.000-05:00

I had a strange dream last night. It's a recurring one, and while the details change, the theme is always the same. In last night's dream, I was walking down a country road on a warm summer afternoon. I was alone, and trying to get somewhere on time. There was something wrong with one of my legs, and I was walking with a painful limp. Every step was a struggle, and I knew I had ten miles to go

Love hurts - and cat love hurts a lot.

2012-01-11T15:23:00.004-05:00

Jean-Luc is a pain. Seriously. He is beautiful, glossy grey and silky soft. He is also intelligent, affectionate, funny, curious, and active. And he is a pain. At just under a year old, he has energy to spare. Because he is an indoor cat, he spends an inordinate amount of time racing up stairs and leaping off of furniture. He has impressive tooth/claw skills. I have the scars to prove it.

The Gratitude of the Beloved

2012-01-05T14:29:00.000-05:00

Jean-Luc got out this morning. That's not so unusual. Jean-Luc is an indoor cat, with aspirations that lean towards arctic explorer. It is easy for him to imagine himself plodding through the frozen tundra, exploring the icy nooks and crannies of our little neighbourhood, especially when he is sitting on a warm window ledge in the sun, looking out at the world. Once the frost starts building

Good-bye, 2011. Hello, 2012.

2011-12-31T13:35:00.000-05:00

At this very moment, bloggers all over the world are busy crafting wise and interesting blog entries to tie up and toss out 2011, welcoming in 2012 with all its mysterious and unknown glory. Who am I, to buck the trend? I have to admit, this time of year doesn't call me to look forward much. I don't do resolutions. The last time I did, I resolved to be more authentic, less of a people pleaser,

Almost done...

2011-12-21T14:45:00.001-05:00

The semester is almost done. I am one concluding paragraph away from finishing my history research paper, and hence this semester. And I am stuck. A friend asked me earlier to day if I was ready for Christmas. He knows about some of the things that have been going on in my life, so when I stumbled over my answer, he understood. I realized that it is entirely possible that when I do finish

Grief & Mourning - Back to Job's friends

2011-12-14T19:57:00.001-05:00

Remember Job's friends? Eliphaz, Bildad and Zophar? It's been a while since the first entry on these guys, so here's a reminder of an unspeakably cool moment in their lives. "When they saw him from a distance, they could hardly recognize him; they began to weep aloud, and they tore their robes and sprinkled dust on their heads. Then they sat on the ground with him for seven days and seven

Grief and Mourning - A Story

2011-12-06T09:48:00.001-05:00

The trip to Cornwall went much better than I thought it would. My niece was brilliant in her role as Jasmine in the play, Aladin, and while I did feel weepy at the end, I really enjoyed the energy, skill and sheer fun of the show. Afterwards, I went to my sister's and spent some quality time chatting with her. We had a lot to talk about, and it felt good to talk with someone who was literally

Going to Cornwall

2011-12-03T09:34:00.001-05:00

I'm going to Cornwall today, for the first time since my Mum's memorial in October. My niece is in a community theater production of Aladin, in which she will no doubt be brilliant. Grace and I are heading in to see the 1:00pm show. I woke up this morning filled with anxiety. I thought it was because I had had a rough night, physically, and was concerned about having to deal with a busy day

Grief and Mourning, a couple of guys who really tried...

2011-11-30T12:32:00.000-05:00

Today I am going to go all Biblical on you. Now, if you aren't the kind of person who reacts to that with "Woot! High-5!!", I'm going to ask you to bear with me. There are a few people in the Bible who have something to teach us about reaching out to people who are mourning. The funny thing is, these guys usually don't get good press in the average sermon or devotional. The Bible is full of

Call me crazy, but...

2011-11-28T11:01:00.004-05:00

So, I knew that at some point in this series, I would begin to regret having started it. Who knew it would be less than a week into it? On Friday, I had a majorly difficult day, which led to thoughts somewhere along the line of, "What the frik have I done? Why on earth did this blog series ever make sense? Am I crazy? Of course I'm crazy. The real question is, WHY THE HECK DO I WANT TO

On Grief & Mourning - Feeling Better

2011-11-23T12:24:00.000-05:00

This morning, I woke up to the sound of a large vehicle outside my bedroom window. My first thought was, "Man alive, I hope that's a confused garbage truck." Turns out, it was a snowplow. Yeah, that was behind door #2. So the world is covered with snow. And today, or more specifically, this morning, I am feeling better. Actually, after my post last night, I felt better. Then Madison, who is

On Grief and Mourning

2011-11-22T20:19:00.000-05:00

Well, I have to admit, I am not doing well. Yeah, I don't know what "doing well" would be at this point, but whatever it is, I'm pretty sure I'm not doing it. I am overwhelmed. And exhausted. And in too much pain to even try to distract myself from it. I just want to sit and cry. And then lie down and cry. There are a lot of things going on in my life, and I am glad for it all. I love

Blog series - Grief & Mourning

2011-11-19T17:14:00.000-05:00

And it begins. There are a few things that I am hoping will happen with this series. I hope that others will share their experiences with grief and mourning, either in comments on this blog or as guest bloggers. I do not want my voice to be the only one ringing in this space. I have already asked one person to do a guest post. Be warned, you may be next. Don't want to suffer the anxieties of

Grief and Mourning, A Blog Series

2011-11-09T10:11:00.000-05:00

Hello, everyone. It has already been three weeks since Mum's passing, and still it all feels a bit surreal. One thing that continually surprises me is the frequent questions I have about whether or not I am "normal". Am I doing it right? Should I be reacting like this, in this way, at this time? I have to admit, the questions irritate me, mostly because they are all in relation to what other

The Paths of Sorrow

2011-10-31T12:18:00.002-04:00

There is a fatigue that exists beyond the physical, when the mind and heart begin to realize that the pain will not be going away with any speed, that things will not be better tomorrow, or the next day, and maybe not even the day after that. We begin to settle onto the path that is mourning and we walk more slowly because we now understand that there is no rushing off of this road. We may not

My Mother, Myself, Part 2

2011-10-26T10:01:00.000-04:00

In my last post, My Mother, Myself , I wrote about sharing my birthday with my mom, who was in the hospital with cancer. Mum passed away 10 days later. It was quiet and peaceful, a slowing down and stopping. She had been in the hospital for a month. Mum died on Monday, October 17th, we held a memorial get-together for her on Friday, October 21st, at the senior's home where she had volunteered

My Mother, Myself

2011-10-07T16:21:00.000-04:00

Years ago someone gave me a book called, My Mother, Myself. As the title suggests, the book focused on the relationship between mothers and daughters, and how our mothers influence the women we grow up to be. I started reading it, but I don't think I finished it. Thanks to a faith in God, I had already gotten to the point in my life when I was uncomfortable assigning blame for my weaknesses and

Because it's true...

2011-10-02T11:08:00.000-04:00

I was asked today, for the umpteenth time, this question. Now it is time for an answer. The question? Why would a woman assert out loud that only a pathetic, small, weak little man would hit a disabled woman, even though she had been threatened with physical violence if she said it? Because it is true. Refusing to speak the truth, even in the face of threats of physical violence, may

So, maybe I won't be failing history after all!

2011-09-29T11:28:00.000-04:00

There is a lot going on in my life. I am still estranged from my husband. I have just taken over the apartment, and my mother is critically ill with cancer. If you have spent any time reading my blog, you know that it is usually at times like these that I get very quiet here. I'm kind of in that place now. So I'm posting about something almost meaningless compared to what is going on, but

An IC Moment

2011-09-08T13:43:00.000-04:00

Recently I had an experience that typically signified what it is like to be an IC patient in my world. In an effort to try to elimiate some of the pain associated with my IC, I had agreed to a series of treatments that involved instilling medication directly into my bladder. I wrote about it here and here. After the second treatment, I developed a lot of pain, more than the usual amount

September is IC awareness month!

2011-09-04T13:48:00.002-04:00

What? You didn't know that September is IC (interstitial cystitis) awareness month? Of course you didn't. Let's face it, for most of you, I am the only person you know who has IC, and some of you haven't even met me yet. How self-involved is it of me to even write a post about this? I might just have well entitled this blog post, "September is ME awareness month." Egad. But still, IC

Saying Good-bye

2011-08-31T21:04:00.002-04:00

Grace and I went to a wake tonight. We said good-bye to a friend, the best man at my wedding, a father, son, brother, friend, soldier and a wonderful young man. His name was Olivier, and he was one of the sweetest people I know. I haven't written about his death, not because I haven't been thinking about him. On the contrary, I have thought about little else over the past few days. I haven't

Spiders, anyone?

2011-08-31T08:41:00.000-04:00

This was written as a Facebook note on Friday,August 26th. Okay, I am going to admit it. I am feeling quite proud of myself. I posted last night on my Facebook profile that our porch was covered with spiders. The fat, hanging-around-the-porch-light-w/the-bugs type of spiders. At one point, I counted over 25 of them. Grace and I were heading out to put the recycling bin to the curb. We

Living Out-Loud, or TMI?

2011-08-09T10:57:00.002-04:00

I was lying in bed last night trying to keep the cat off my face and thinking about the instillation treatment I had yesterday, when I started to wonder if I am coming too close to the TMI line. (For those of you not familiar with web speak, TMI means too much information.) To be honest, that line has always been a bit blurry for me. I mean, I didn't really get into the details (oh man, the