Would that I could calm the thoughts in my head

I know its mostly that I've done all that I can for as long as I fee able...

Letting go or holding on...  I'm prepared to live with either option now.  The difficulty is that I won't let go if there's something to hold on to and I don't want to keep holding on if there isn't. 

Why don't I know which is true?  I suspect that it's the latter but hope for the former and need to know how the other person in this feels. 

Sadly though I'm talking to the internet.  There are no answers to life's questions out here.  Only a vast open forum to express the thoughts that consume me. At least I'm aware of that much.  I can 'google' the specs on a car, the price of any number of widgets, volumes of useless trivia on so called people of interest, but there's no wikipedia entry on which path to choose or what's in another persons head.

I've been on my own more in my life that not, but committed to someone else more than not all the same.  (ever the conundrum...  yeah... that's me).

I refuse to be defined by negative space.  I've spent many hours, days, weeks, months, years defining myself so that when I look in the mirror I not only recognize the face looking back but also respect the person I see. 

It's easy to say what something isn't  I'm not young, tall, breathtakingly beautiful, not too old just yet, or hideous...  I'm not cold and bitter... I don't remember being innocently naive... my life just wasn't conducive for that..

So on the surface I'm just as tall as when I stopped growing, I'm about as old as anyone else born when I was, I'm starting to look my age for that matter...  I'm tired.  I'm still cautiously optimistic, determined, hard working, willing to compromise, not interested in being a door mat (wait that's negative space.... damn) anyway  I'm me.  Just me.  Ever the fool, or ever hopeful, or just too stupid to read the writing on the wall.  Ah but that leads to the introspective thoughts that devour my soul.

When I uncover aspects of my personality that I didn't love, like, or respect - I set out on yet another journey to change.  I like to think I'm who I want to be now.  I know I'm flawed...  some aspects just need a time place to be okay, others need monitored and controlled.  I clean when I'm stressed...  inside and out... See it's not an option to 'think' I am who I want to be... I need to be, to know and to be satisfied with me.

Right now I look in the mirror and I see that I've got some work to do.  I need to find peace and calm.  I need to find out who I've become lately... mostly because I keep seeing the shadow of who I used to be and and it's all too clear it's a shadow and not a reflection.  So who am I now and is she strong enough to get through this?  (gonna have to be cause I'm not done raising my kids). 

God help me this I've got to stop marking time and live my life.  I'm pretty sure where I am is not what I want my kids to remember when I'm gone. 

2011

Looking back and standing still... looking forward and what should be filled hope is rather just filled with...  a feeling I'm still trying to define.

I'm not afraid of the year to come.  I could laugh and say it's the end of the world as we know it...  the dawn of the galactic equinox...  or just 2012...  I don't know.  It's another year in a life that never seems to make much sense. 

Still, I use the last day of each year to take stock of my life and figure out what lessons I should have learned.

2011 began with an aching heart... it appears to be ending the same way.  I'd wanted to greet the new year with love and hope... it wasn't to be though and I watched the clock turn alone. I don't know what I'll be doing at midnight this year.

Looking back...

I managed to survive a rough year at work, got promoted even (that was a huge ugly secret though so eh, whatever).  I gave my all and I'm not foolish enough to believe it really matters in the big scheme of things.   I earned a pay check, paid my bills, didn't sleep near enough and have learned to smile brightly when people make fun of my work ethic.  Call me a fool if you like...  *bright smile*

I turned forty in 2011 too... no big to do about it, bought my own gift, nibbled on a cake but since I was on a mission to lose the weight I gained pregnant with Zachy...  it was only a nibble.  I lost all the baby weight anyway.  Not everyone gets a party for their birthday and well... I've had worse, right? Still breathing in and out, no excuse to complain.

Over the summer learned to ride a bike.  Logged somewhere in the neighborhood of 500 miles too.  Loved it, miss it, spring will be here soon and I'll be back out there, helmet in place.

If fitbit can be trusted, I walked over a thousand miles this past year... that's all the way home to Denver... Ran a few miles too.  Bought my first pair of running shoes even.  One of them is missing right now, if I feel like being honest.  Perhaps I should find it by day's end as it was a sobering experience to spend that much on a pair of shoes. 

I drove to Texas twice... once to see my niece and nephew graduate from high school and then two months later to retrieve Calvin who spend the rest of summer with his newly graduated cousins. He turned 18 just days before he left and missed my birthday while he was gone...All good there though. He had a good summer.

Wished Todd and Neil well as they moved to San Francisco together. Got to see a few old friends that I've not seen much since 2006 at their going away party. 

I bought a new car. (double the gas mileage of the jeep, half the interior space, but I'm still thinking it was a good idea).  She's two months mine tomorrow. 

I got to go to Thanksgiving and Christmas at the in-laws and that was nice.  Probably more delusion on my part than reality...  hurts to imagine I only get to pretend to be someone's wife for holidays.  I'm married all the time and darned honest about it... but the experience of sitting by my husband at a family dinner... twice in a year and not once the year before.  Forward progress or foolish notion... I just don't know.

The kids are all healthy and two are gainfully employed, tax paying citizens...  Calvin is a senior in high school, Emily is a sophomore... Zachy is Zachy. I'm well aware how lucky I am to have my kids.  They are my true life's work. 

I've not attended a funeral this year or wedding... I think the world is still going round out there though it doesn't take much notice of me. 

Now...  it's the last day of 2011...  my mission decided in the writing of this... is to find a shoe...

there's go to be more to life...

We shall see what 2012 has in store for me.  Hope for the best and pray for all that is not.

Holidays/Birthdays

I don't much like holidays anymore.  The always seem to end in the overwhelming feeling of loneliness.

I try to make all Matthew's and the kid's  favorites, I hope for happy times... and somehow in two hours, sometimes less, it's over and the kids and I are alone again.

I've always just wanted a 'normal' life.

Want in one hand...  look at what you've got in the other...  yeah.

Zachy is growing, Emily turned 15 today, Seb and Calvin's birthdays are coming up in the next couple weeks.  It should be happy times.  I need to make them happy days. 

I've had one great birthday in all my life and that was 4 years ago.  Last year's was lousy, and stil I've had worse. (loosing a grandparent on my 13th, loosing so much more on my 8th...)  I dare not hope for a good one.  Perhaps when it's over however I can breathe again.

And so it goes...

Well Christmas and New Years have passed...life carries on.

I am at the same crossroads as before... and for the moment, I don't know if I should take one path or the other but standing here is getting me no where. Then again, I realize there is only one path I can 'choose' otherwise I'm just standing here waiting to see if the crossing guard will ever lift on the other path.

Things are quieter, but not better. 

I'm just single parenting three these days. I don't expect that to change any time soon if ever.  The question remains, what am I holding on to and why?

If I look around everyone else has moved on.  I'm re-learning to cook smaller meals, keep up with everything somewhat, and if it breaks, I know it's up to me to figure out how to fix it. 

Ever hopeful, but probably more just a fool am I.

Thanksgiving

Despite the turmoil of my life...  I have things for which I'm quite thankful.  I have my children, our home, a job that enables me to support all of us...  there are many that have less and and deserve more. 

I cooked a turkey and all the usual side dishes, made a pie, the usual.  Matthew stopped by for lunch but left before pie.

It was lovely and sad all at once.

Christmas will likely be just be and the kids.  I can't manage anymore.  I just can't.  I still hope to spend Christmas with him, but it will not be up to me.  Hoping will not make it so.

All of a sudden....

Not so much.

Long time coming - absolutely.

Man asks, why is this so important now.  It's so important to find some serenity in this life, some peace, because I just cannot go on living in between.

Oh and it's holiday time.... holidays are family time.  If I'm not family enough to join him for dinner then so be it, but then how he is family enough to be invited to our home for dinner? 

He's had it both ways most of this year...  and maybe that works for him, but it's destructive to my self-worth. 

I'm left to wonder - if he gets angry when I ask not to live in limbo - and has either option open to him without fault - what does he expect me to do? 

Pointless drivel

I'm an optimist at heart.  It doesn't suit my life, but I've not managed to squelch my true self.

I've found over time though that being an optimist opens me up to being disappointed more often than not.  Being a pessimist would be ideal on a completely theoretical level - you'd have the unexpected "wow" when life is kind.  Still it's not me and clearly not who I'm meant to be.

I'm an emotional person as well.  I wouldn't change it, joy, love, contentment they are all wonderful emotions that I would never feel if I was just cold and didn't feel anything.  Still, I find that many people do not like me to show my emotions unless they are the happy-go-lucky, life good sort of emotions.

Right now, I'd not say life is good.  I have wonderful children for the most part.  Some should be grown and independent, others are just about there and one is just coming out of babyhood and the sunshine of life.  For the grown children - I love them just as they are... even when they make decisions that I don't agree with.  Mostly because that's what I taught them to do.  I wanted them to find out who they are and be that person rather than who anyone else (including me) thought they should be. They've lived up to just that.  They are all independent thinkers if not independent people. That aspect alone is good even when it brings confusion or frustration.  It's welcome because I willed it to be.

I'm at the same crossroad I've been at for nearly eight months.  It shows no sign of being clearer or kinder.  I've always had the option to move on alone, but if I wanted to share this journey with someone I've got to wait... but I'm not necessarily waiting for them to join me.  I'm waiting for them to decide if they even want to travel this path with me at all. Ever the fool am I.

I don't want to stand looking at the closed door so long that I fail to see the one that is open until it too closes.  I don't want to close a door that leads to what I truly want...

So I wait and I wonder and then I wait so more.  I worry that I'm wasting precious time waiting when I should be living... but it doesn't stop me from waiting or spur me to action... it's just a worry that eats at my soul.  Maybe if I was stronger I'd just choose a path and if no one follows, then it will be as it's meant to be.  Maybe if I wasn't so strong, I'd have done that in the spring to spare myself the agony of the months past.

I'll never be the damsel in distress. My childhood taught me to survive.  I'll never be cold as ice. It's just not my nature.  So maybe I'm just too strong to give anyone the desire to protect me from pain and too weak to protect myself. 

Ever the conundrum... that would be me.

As 2010 draws closer to an end... I need draw up what strength I have to face the year to come...  I have to do it for my kids if not myself. They have lived to long in the shadow of my life's failures.

Come what may...