Snow, Gardens and Monday

Koko just LOVES being outdoors now in the new house. She refuses to come in a lot of times!

Here's a look at the wrought iron dragon flies Mary Beth and Jon gave me for my birthday. Didn't want to put them up at the old house since we were selling it and then winter hit (see photo below!) so we just got them up today. I love them!

A photo of the two inches of snow we got...Fort Smith got tons of snow...a record of like 14.5" !

Dirt Therapy should be taught in grad school. Good for the soul!

Steve with the tiller working out the new vegetable garden. He is loving it.

Arkansas being as it is has shown us the full range of weather over the last week. I will post some photos later to go with this, but it has been bizarre to say the least. Last week, Steve was using the tiller to break up the ground for a new vegetable garden. I had the top down on the car most days last week. Then Saturday and Sunday it snowed. A lot. We got the least amount in our area, but Fayetteville got about 14 inches!!! We only got 2-3 inches, but the roads were never bad here in Van Buren. It's true what they say about Arkansas...if you don't like the weather today just stick around until tomorrow.
Steve is very excited about his future vegetable garden. He has carefully planned it all, added fertilizer and lime and getting it all ready for planting. Of course, he has to wait for the last snow of the year!!! I'm excited about the vegetables, but even more for planting some flowers around the house. There wasn't much here and I know I won't begin to complete it all this year. But I will try!
And Monday. What do you say about Monday? I've been taking my allergy medicine at night and sleeping better recently. Last night, however, I could NOT get to sleep and saw the clock at 2,3,4 and 5. Of course, I was snoozing pretty good when it was time to get up!! Then I went into the bathroom and saw my allergy medicine on the counter...I forgot to take it! Got dressed and took off for work only to discover I had left my gorgeous salad at home in the refrigerator!! I also left my memory stick in my laptop on my desk. ARGH!

I arrive at staffing to hear everyone complaining about last night's passage of the healthcare bill. I've looked at it and while I may not agree with every point, I am not worried. Do people really think that we haven't been paying for other's insurance already? I just think we needed change and that is what we are getting. May not be perfect, but maybe it is a start. I trust our president. Heaven help us all if we cannot do that. One girl remarked that "life as we have known it is over." Really? Another said she actually cried when she heard the news. Not sure what I'm missing here. I was glad when staffing was over.
Back to back clients and no lunch, of course, to break it up. A difficult grandparent...shouldn't that be an oxymoron??? Finished up this afternoon just in time for a visit by our director of mental health. Apparently the young man that will not be named, that hit me in the jaw a few years ago causing numerous surgeries, well, his parents discovered I am working for the agency that he does work for with supervision. She had "concerns." Are you kidding me? SHE had concerns? Does she really think that I would make a point to run into him? At least my director was understanding!!
Then I got out to my car just in time to catch most of the 5:30 traffic leaving Fort Smith and checked my voicemail. One message was from my previous employer that shall NOT be named stating I had marked an incorrect date on a document in January and needed to come by and fix it. I know I HAVE to do that, but really....are you kidding me???? The state of mind I was in during January, it is surprising that there were not tons of errors!
Then, for a little more disruption in my lovely afternoon, I stopped at Walmart on the way home.
Enough said. Monday go away.

You gotta love weekends

It is Sunday morning and I have some work to do but am procrastinating (I know, what a shocker) and just decided to be a bit lazy this morning. Realized I haven't posted in over a week, which is very unusual for me. It has been a hectic time recently. As I have mentioned in earlier posts, keeping up with schedules for three different job locations has taken a lot of energy. I've only had one mistake in 6 weeks where I had written in an appointment on the wrong time. I was able to run and meet with the client just in the nick of time! I've really made efforts to not make THAT mistake again!
I've been working 4 days a week at one location (B) and one day a week at location (A) and then working at my private practice every day after 4:30. That gets crazy! Then last week (A) decided I needed to complete a two day training seminar that is required of all of their therapists. The location was out in the wilderness. No joke.
I left Wednesday afternoon, went through Fayetteville and met Gregory on campus. We enjoyed eating together at Panera Bread before I took off for the hills of Arkansas. As I left Fayetteville, the RAIN started. And of course it had gotten dark. I'm not talking about a light sprinkle....I'm talking SERIOUS MONSOON kind of rain. My eyes were so tired by the time I pulled into Harrison that I stopped for a few minutes at Walmart. Walked around for a bit, picked up a couple of magazines and then I was off again. This is where this story becomes like a Stephen King novel. The wind was howling and rain was coming from every direction. I had no idea that there was a tornado warning out for Pocahontas...and they later had one touch down! I could barely see the road because in Arkansas the two lane highways have lines painted when the road is paved and then forever forgotten. No lines. Occasionally I would get behind a random pickup truck that actually helped because I could see where they were going! The lightning was flashing all around me. When the lightning would light up the sky, you could see that there was huge blackness with the lightning very close to the ground. Once I thought I had a policeman following me with his lights going only to realize that it was the lightning.
While driving in a flood that could have prepared Noah for loading the animals in the Ark, I discovered that my left knee was wet. I thought perhaps it was rain on the door from when I had gotten out in Harrison....but no. My car was leaking!!!! Right there on the left corner where the convertible connects to the windshield!!! In three years it had never done that!
I realized the rain was getting harder and started seeing small bits of hail mixed in, so I pulled over at one of the few service stations that was open and had a cover over their gas pumps. And the hail began. Round one anyway. After it started to lighten up, I thought it was time to get back on the incredible journey, but knew I should take advantage of the restroom facilities there first. Anyone that knows me, knows that I am not apprehensive in most situations and usually feel comfortable to tackle almost anything. But as I walked into the convenience store that night, the two men working there were the only people in the place. I have to say that the hair on the back of my neck was standing up and I hurried to get out of there as fast as I could.
More rain. More drips on my leg. More lightning. Was this night ever going to end? As I got closer to Pocahontas, I realized it was beginning to hail again. Round two. I spotted a Citgo station that was closed, but had a nice overhang...with three other vehicles already parked under it. One had a trailer with a motorcycle on it. The owner had been on his motorcycle in the hail and had gotten hit on his lip actually!
Long journey finally ended about 12:30am when I arrived at my hotel. I was both exhausted and wired up, but was able to fall asleep quickly.
I met three other amazing therapists going through the same training. We bonded very quickly and started comparing our stories. That was the best part of the two days!
After much consideration, it has become apparently clear that I need to cut down the confusion in my life to one job and my practice. So, (B) wins out. I'm giving my notice to (A) tomorrow.
On the way home by a different route (I'm NOT stupid!) I realized I would be passing close to mom and dad's house, so I called them and they agreed to meet me at Ryan's Restaurant in Searcy. Talk about a huge buffet! It was so great to visit with them. I think they enjoyed doing something spontaneous too!
Arrived home around 11:00 Friday night and I don't think I've totally recovered yet. It's really hell to be old and your body just doesn't act like it once did!
Today I'm thankful for many things, even in the midst of job craziness....like my Steve, dinner with my favorite son, random new friendships, spontaneous dinner with my folks, a microwave that is installed after three months, a paycheck, texting, cellphones, email and Skype, and today especially I'm thankful for Sundays.

The Desk

You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, 'I have lived through this horror. I can take the next thing that comes along.' You must do the thing you think you cannot do.

Eleanor Roosevelt

Every experience...every time you look at the bad things that happen to you in life...you gain strength, courage and confidence. What I've gone through has not been a real "horror" as in the above quote, but it has smacked my little inner self that I always try to protect. The words really make a lot of sense to me right now. Recently I have not been sure that I could "take" the next thing to come along, but I know that I should and must do the next thing. We all face things that we find difficult to do. It just happens in life. But somehow, we have to not only face them but move through them. Move on forward until it feels like normal again.
Today they brought me a new desk. It's a simple thing really, given the new position I have in a clinical setting. They moved the "beast" out that was consuming my office area and took it out back to shoot it, I think. It was an amazing, huge desk with more little nooks and crannies to stash stuff than you can imagine. The problem is, with office supply junkies like me, I would eventually have it so full that I would likely never be able to even find the staples. So they moved it out. It was a vote of confidence, as I see it. It said that they believe in me, believe in the work that I am doing and believe that I am right where I should be. Today I was there. The desk was a bit of a turning point for me, given the roller coaster ride I've been on recently (with actually now having three different offices in three locations!).

My appointment book is starting to look like something I would imagine they have at Dallas-Fort Worth airport to keep up with the logistics of all of the flights incoming. And it feels like that as I try to keep up with where I'm supposed to be and when and what files and materials am I going to need there. My car is beginning to look like it did when the kids were younger and we might have everything in one day ranging from dropping off and picking up at three different schools, baseball practice, drill team practice, gymnastics or ballet. We could have essentially lived out of our van for several days had we ever been stranded in a snowstorm somewhere. Thank goodness we never had to find out. Between all of the changes of clothes and food/drink boxes, I think we could have lasted.

But someone else brought me a desk today. And tomorrow I will continue to bring in things to build my "nest" so that my new home (or at least one of them) will start to feel like home again. Maybe I will do some good again tomorrow and begin to repair the battered self esteem of someone starting over again at 53. Today was better. Tomorrow I will continue to do the thing that I think that I cannot do. And I will be happier in doing just that.

Rainy Days and Mondays...

It rained some today. And it's Monday. The two should not occur together. Heaven knows it has been difficult enough to get motivated to get up and go to work recently...but a cloudy day and a Monday???
It's funny how things can change in such a quick little moment in time. When it happens, we don't often realize how chapters close, friends quit calling, people forget....so why can't I? It is just so hard sometimes to pick ourselves up when things have not gone as we would like for them to. It seems, when we look around, that some people rarely experience this. But some have had more than their share of sadness and disappointment.
It takes so little to crack an already fragile self esteem, so we should be careful about our words. We never know their impact. I like to think others maybe aren't thinking about how theirs sound to me.
It's just so easy to be kind...especially on a rainy Monday.