Fewer Wars, More Life

Before I moved to Chicago, I was a frequent player of the Mafia Wars game on Facebook. I played the game faithfully every single day, using as much power as the game makers would give me without having to pay for it myself. My usage began tapering off when I moved to Chicago and since I started spending time with P, I haven't played Mafia Wars a single time. Sometimes I wonder what's happening in the game, as I have some friends who play it. But I don't wonder enough to return to it.

Life isn't perfect in Chicago, but in many ways, it is so much better than life in Dallas.

Today I saw a woman reading a newspaper on the bus. That is a rare event in itself in this day and age of the smartphone, but she was wearing red leather gloves. This would not have been unusual in Chicago, except that today's temperature was ninety degrees. I wondered if she has a germ aversion.

Sometimes Life Seems to Throw Only Lemons

I've been feeling sorry for myself for the last few months. Sure, I'm in love, with someone who is fun and engaging and smart and curious and sexy--everything a girl like me could want, and so much more than I thought I had a right to hope for. On the less than bright side, I am in love with a person I believe to have a very serious personal issue, one that I won't delineate here. The big question is how much I can/should handle in the name of love. I don't know the answer to this yet, but tomorrow, I'm talking to some people experienced with this issue to learn more and begin to find my answer.

Positive thoughts are always welcome.

Oh, and happy f'ing new year. Bah, humbug.

Then and Now

I would hate for this to become a blog about dating, but for the moment, that's the new (or long-forgotten) experience in my life. Today's topic: alone time. Flash back to pre-September 2011, when I was a single girl in a new (to me) city I love, unencumbered (except for the dog) and doing what I wanted, when I wanted. More specifically ...

Before TB (The Boy): I worked, and did stuff with friends whenever I wanted, punctuated by long stretches of time alone, which I filled with walks with the dog, HGTV marathons, putting my apartment in order and dreaming up design scenarios, reading the New York Times or a book cover-to-cover, and just taking care of everyday responsibilities.

After TB: I work, spend large chunks of time with TB trying new (to us) restaurants or repeatedly haunting our favorites (Ghareeb Nawaz!), hanging with his friends and family at gatherings and games and engaging in other boy-girl kinds of things. Every now and again, I experience a few hours of time alone, doing what I'm doing now--catching up on the internet and writing about the ideas bubbling up in my head. (Unfortunately, today's alone time is coming at the expense of work, on a weekday morning.) Despite having moved nearly a month ago now, there are still unpacked boxes in my condo, the IKEA cabinets remain incomplete, and I haven't even hung the art that remains stacked in the entryway--a situation that would have been unthinkable before TB.

Please understand: I love spending time with TB and am pretty crazy about him. He is interesting, smart and sexy and--most importantly--kind and loving, not just to me, but to all creatures, canine and otherwise. For so many years where I wondered what it would be like to be in a real relationship, like those my friends had, with someone who actually lived in the same city and was comfortable with that kind of thing. I still marvel a bit when immediately after a long stretch of time together, he asks about spending more time together. So, it's all good.

But ... I worry about how to carve out space, whether temporal or mental, in which to stretch and grow and touch base with who I am individually. I would think that does not necessarily require alone time, that it is possible to stretch and grow while in each others' presence. But we are both prolific talkers and I find that my brain requires a certain amount of silence for peak pondering. He has been very willing to give me that silent time when required for work, and I'm sure he would do it for other stuff, too, but so far, I haven't asked for that when we are together.

I don't mean to make this sound like a bigger deal than it is. I find it interesting to think about these new to me experiences which are probably old hat to the rest of the population. Maybe I'll even talk about this with TB, because he is an old hand at long-term relationships and undoubtedly has thoughts about how to navigate these waters.

This is a new one for me.

I haven't written much about my dating life on this blog. For those not in the know, it has mostly involved long-distance relationships--when there was a relationship--over the last several years. In a surprising twist for me, lately I've been spending time with someone who also lives in Chicago. It has been fun, but also a little challenging to balance the significant chunk of time we spend seeing each other with meeting my obligations in the rest of life. I find myself feeling sleepy more often than not and constantly scrambling to make early morning appointments after yet another night in which I planned to get a full night of sleep, but instead hung out with him until it was too late to do so.

I know--this is like saying I have a problem in that my wallet is too small to hold all the gold bars in my possession. But it's something I am struggling with, no matter how sweet the struggle. :)

So, I'm reaching out to you for ideas. The obvious one is: have some self-control, make a plan on how much time is reasonable to spend together, and stick to it. But I'm hoping for something more creative and fun, I guess. Thoughts?

What an odd experience . . .

I have spent the better part of this holiday weekend reading the blog of a new friend. He is actually a friend of an old friend, with whom I became reacquainted upon moving to Chicago. At first, we only saw each other every few weeks for our gang's trivia outing, but lately there have been a few outings on our own or with non-trivia people . . . a Cubs game, soccer-watching, etc. Just friends.

One night at trivia, the guys were showing me some videos this friend had made--funny ones. Somehow, in that process I stumbled upon his blog--the personal one (he also has written a sportsy one from time to time). I read a little bit of it when I first found it, mostly the posts about our trivia gang, and their adventures before I joined the reindeer games. Obviously, he wrote the blog knowing anyone might read it, and he acknowledges from time to time in his posts that his friends ARE reading it. But I have felt a little funny about reading it. I'm not sure why.

The blog is deeply honest, like him (at least, in my experience of him so far). But it feels a bit like drinking from a firehose of information without going to the work of getting to know him and learning these stories one by one. I want to stop reading, but it's like a book I can't put down . . . he is a very good writer. I almost feel as if I should let him know about my blog, in the way of a "fair exchange." But somehow I think he wouldn't find it as riveting as I have found his.

Anyway, an odd experience . . . 

How quickly a day can change

Yesterday started out on such a nice note and then quickly went south in the afternoon.

I did not work out. But I did walk 1.9 miles home from a therapy appointment, so I think that counts. I find it interesting that when I am anxious, which I have been since yesterday afternoon, I can channel the nervous energy in good ways, like walking and finally tidying up my apartment post-party.

But I am exhausted because I did not sleep well last night due to this anxiety. Without getting into that, I will say I think there must be a special place in hell (if there is a hell) for those who intentionally, recklessly or knowingly cause others fear and pain. I am feeling lots of that right now. But I am taking steps to deal with it, hoping to survive the emotional storm.

Picking up the pen

For the last several days, I have had blog posts rolling around in my head. It took me until today to remember the login for this blog, but I felt determined to write. I am happy to live in this town, near my family. But I still have so much work to do on me. Because I want so much more and I need to make changes to have it.

I want to be physically fit again. So tomorrow, I will work out. The first day of many, but it's a start.

I want to be mentally healthy, to keep the depression in check and be at my best in all areas of my life. So tomorrow, I will see a therapist for the first time since moving. She may or may not be the right one, but I won't know until I go.

And I want to recapture the approach to work that got me where I am today--approaching my work with vigor and organization and humor. That starts tomorrow, too.

Baby steps. But steps, nonetheless.

A new year, a new life

I now live in Chicago, the life change I have dreamed about for many years. It is truly all I had hoped for. The dogs are happy with their new lifestyle that doesn't involve climbing stairs and offers lots of new places to explore on our weekend outings. I am happy with so many more opportunities for walking and a social life that is so much more active, with time spent with friends both old and new. My work situation is infinitely better--I no longer dread going to the office every morning and feel truly welcome and embraced by my colleagues in my new office. And, not least of all, I love having family nearby and being able to visit them whenever I want.

I could not ask for more. In fact, my eyes fill with tears when I think about how lucky and grateful I am that this change was finally possible. I have miles more to go in my personal growth, but now I feel more like a supple, budding sprout and less like a brown, dying twig about to crack.

I haven't decided yet if the blog will continue in this or another form. Now I feel like I have a greater interest in actually living life away from my computer, and it's easy to stay in touch with you through-the-blog friends via Facebook and other methods because we're friends in real life.

I wish you all the sweetest of new years in 2011, filled with love and laughter and all the stuff of which your dreams are made.

The road not traveled

Today an old college friend invited me to have dinner with him and his daughter. He had planned to make my farewell party but couldn't, so he suggested that we get together for dinner before my move.  I was a little surprised, but also pleased, to learn he would be bringing his daughter, as he is a single dad and understandably is very protective of the time he is able to spend with her.

They arrived at the restaurant just before me, saw me drive into the parking lot and waited out front for me to walk from my car. Seeing the two of them standing together in front of the restaurant tugged at my heart unexpectedly. For just a moment, it felt like a glimpse of the path I thought my life would take, but didn't--one with a handsome husband and a child with whom I would share my Saturday nights. For the most part, the life I lead is so different from that that I don't find myself wondering "what if" because I don't even know what that would look like--seeing my married friends with their families doesn't have the same effect, perhaps because they are already a complete family. But this was different. In that moment in which I walked toward my single friend and his daughter, I could suddenly imagine what it might have been like for me.

I love the freedom that being single has afforded me. It gave me the opportunity to see places I never would have seen and the freedom to move to a different state without considering anyone else's schedule or needs. But tonight, I could not have been more surprised to find that I dearly wished I had had just a little time to experience a walk down that other path.

Planning A New Life

I have been bogged down for several weeks now with planning the mundane details of home remodeling, packing up 23 years of life in Texas and coordinating my new apartment in Chicago. But now that much of my work in those areas is complete, I finally had a moment to catch my breath and think about the deeper question: once I get there, how will I make sure life is different?

I ask this because I realize that geography isn't everything. While I think it will be nice not to drive by "Welcome home, George and Laura" signs on my way to work and to live in a city that has culture out the wazoo, I want my daily life to be structured so as to help me become the person I want to be. So far, that means: (1) quality time with dogs, in the form of walks; (2) quality time for me, in the form of working out regularly to lose weight and be more healthy and making an effort to reconnect with old friends and meet new ones, too; and (3) last but not least, recapturing my organized self at work, which lets me operate at my best.

I have fifteen hours of road trip in which to think about this. I am really looking forward to it!

The Valley of the Shadow

My dog Kip came into my life in September 1996. He was my first dog of my very own, and the first dog I had since my childhood pet, Lady, died when I was in eighth grade. I had intended to get a dog ever since graduating from law school two years earlier, but had never found the timing to be just right. It was only when a dear friend from law school was killed that September that I asked myself, "What are you waiting for?"

I answered that question by going to the Houston SPCA in search of a beagle. While scanning the cages without finding one, a golden-colored puppy who looked like a tiny lion without a mane caught my eye. I asked the SPCA staff to let me get to know him by playing with him in a room reserved for that purpose, but I'm pretty sure Kip had my heart even before those minutes in which he frolicked about, showing me the same mischievous spirit he has today. Nothing would have stopped me from bringing Kip home with me after that.

During our fourteen years together, Kip and I have weathered many storms--job changes, a fire at my house from which firemen rescued him and the death of my father when Kip was just a puppy. Kip went home to Illinois with me for one of my last Christmases with my Dad and I cherish the memory of them spending time together, of my Dad telling me that whenever I left his house that holiday, Kip waited in the room closest to the front door for my return. Over the years, I have shed more tears in Kip's golden fur than it would be possible to measure, and the comfort, delight and unconditional love Kip has given me add up to so much more than I have ever given him.

So tonight is hard. Tomorrow I will find out if Kip's blood test shows it is cancer or another serious illness that has caused his weight loss. He is fourteen and I think he has had a good life. I have been preparing myself for moments like this for the last few years, knowing that my time with him is finite. But nothing could have prepared me for the fear and despair I am feeling tonight. I don't want to lose my Kip, when ever it happens. He is my heart.

Update: Kip does not have cancer or any other serious illness. He has some heavy duty arthritis, but there are things we can do to help him with that. I am hugely relieved, but realize more than ever that my beloved Kip and I are operating on borrowed time. For now, though, our time together is truly sweet.

An Announcement

The last of the three doors opened to me this week.  I am transferring to my firm's Chicago office sometime before the end of the year, marking the end of my nearly 23 years in Texas.  I am thrilled and scared and ready for a new phase of my life.

I know I haven't posted here very often lately, but that's partly because all of you who read my blog have become "friends in real life", or at the very least, Facebook.  I would not have had the courage to make this change if not for your encouragement over these last years.  Thank you so much, from the bottom of my heart.

Hi, blog, I've missed you.

Because it's been so darn long since I wrote, I'm going to go pure stream of consciousness on you.  Ready?   Set, go!

So, no official word yet on the potentially state-changing news.  Will keep you posted!  In the meantime, one of my best friends in the office has accepted another job, which makes it even easier to move on if that is what fate has in the cards for me.

In the meantime, I've been in a whirlwind of preparing my house for the possibility that I may sell and leave it (not necessarily in that order).  This is a time-consuming endeavor that brings up all kinds of emotions.  Chief among which is: why didn't I do this sooner so I could enjoy my house while actually living in it for a while!?!?  Seriously.  My potential realtor-to-be solved my bathroom update dilemma in all of five minutes, and it took me only a few days after her visit to find and purchase a new vanity for said bathroom.  What was I waiting for?

One of my house-purging tasks is to get rid of the desktop computer I have not used since moving in 10 years ago.  I finally summoned the courage to turn it on, then realized I had somewhere along the way tossed the only mouse that would work with it (the kind with an old-fashioned round green plug-in rather than a USB).  So my tech-savvy friend was nice enough to borrow a suitable mouse from his work, and I'm back in business!

The key thing I wanted to get from this computer is the backup file that holds the bit of geneaology work I did a decade ago.  I'm having some trouble copying that file from the big old computer, but was happy to discover it on one of the disks (not CD) that I had with the computer.  Now: to find a computer where I can transfer it from that disk to an actual hard drive.  Sigh.

While researching Family Treemaker to find out about how to use this old data (assuming I find a way to copy it onto a device invented in this decade) in a new version of the software, I ran across a Family Treemaker community blog.  The topic at the beginning was how to account for unmarried and childless family members in a family tree.  For some reason, as I was reading that post, I had the most bizarre thought about how ironic it would be if I died just as I was reading that and someone found me with this laptop in hand, with that topic on the screen.  Well, at least they would know instantly how to list me on the family tree.  Dark, I know.

I have this fantasy of beginning life in a new (old) city as a perfectly organized person.  I used to be that person.  Is it possible to go back to being that person?  Perhaps new geography, combined with 2/3 less living space, will help me leap back to that old self.

As is also true regarding the question of whether this post is a harbinger of a more regular posting schedule, time shall tell.

Truth.

This isn't my secret, but it could have been.

Promising News

I heard some promising news today and yesterday.  Should know more next week!  Trying not to get hopes up, which this time last year led to serious heartache.

Please send good vibes my way, dear hearts.  I feel as if I'm waiting for life to begin.

Things are a-brewing, they are.

A recent confluence of events has oddly pointed a big huge arrow to Chicago.  I don't know if it will work out.  If it doesn't, it will be the cruelest joke of the universe ever.  But if it does work out, it could be fabulous.  We'll see.  Right now, I'm curious what will be found behind door number 1, door number 2 and door number 3.  That's all.  Not optimistic, not pessimistic, just curious.  And hopeful.

All good vibes welcome.

Beyond that, I'm really excited to see two of my favorite kids this weekend.  I jokingly refer to them as my mother's "fake grandchildren."  They are her best friend's grandchildren and they visit her for a week each summer, no doubt providing the grandparent experience she is missing due to the childless states of my brother and me.  I've invented a sort of Eloise at the Plaza scenario in which the three of them will take the train into Chicago, meeting me at my hotel.  We'll do some fun things about town, spend the night in a cool hotel and then do more fun things about town the next day.  I hope they have as much fun as I think I will.

The Light Dawns

For the last few weekends, I have imposed a work moratorium.  In doing so, I realized that giving myself the space to do other things or to do nothing at all stimulated my creative juices and also freed my mind to entertain "life thoughts."

In these moments of clarity, I had an epiphany.  I have stuck with my current job due in no small part to feeling that to leave it would be to waste the hard work of my parents, who gave me the foundation that let me later attend law school.  They wanted something more for me, especially my Dad.  He worked his whole life in a job I don't think he ever enjoyed and for which he was far overqualified, only to be laid off when the plant downsized 10 years before he was ready to retire.  But that isn't the epiphany.

It is this: for me, my current job is no different for me than my Dad's job was for him.  I am pretty sure that the feeling of dread in my stomach on Sunday night and each weekday morning, the stings inflicted by a certain jerk in the workplace and other indignities suffered in exchange for a salary are similar to my father's experience.  I realize my job offers many perks my Dad would have really appreciated.  But do those things matter when the psychic pain of achieving them is unbearable, causing severe weight gain, personality changes and thoughts of things even more serious than that?  I don't think so.

Realizing this made me feel free.  I feel free because I know my Dad would never want me to have these feelings or thoughts, no matter how great the vacations.  This isn't what he wanted for me.

So now the question is, what to do?  So begins my quest for a position with challenging and meaningful work, which may or may not require a law degree, and colleagues who are kindhearted human beings.  I'll keep you posted.

Oops

I have not actually restricted my practically dead blog to invited readers only.  Rather, a friend of mine recently began a blog, which is really good.  I decided to post a comment on her blog and realized after I did so that she and her other readers (some of whom are also my friends) would be able to just click on it and find my blog, too.  I have not told many "real life" friends about this blog, and wasn't ready to have my worlds collide in that fashion.

So, I temporarily restricted this blog while I figured out how to delete my comment and confirmed no link-skipping was possible.  That now feels like a lot of trouble for a blog that's practically dead anyway, but there you are.

When is spring coming?

Good things I did for myself today

I'm working on starting new habits and breaking old ones that impede my ability to be who I want to be and do what I want to do. This is what I did so far today that was good:

1. I went to bed at a relatively decent hour (12:15). Not as early as I would like, but an improvement. This will help me be better-rested and accomplish more today.
2. Before going to bed, I read a book rather than surfing the internet. Not for as long as I would like (only about 10 minutes, with net surfing until then), but again, a good start. I believe this will help me fall asleep earlier and bring the pleasure of reading back into my life.
3. When I went to sleep, I shut off my computer and did not leave a movie playing, as has been my habit. I believe the silence will give me more restful sleep.
4. When my alarm went off this morning, I hit snooze only twice and then got up to take the dogs out without logging onto the internet. I lose a lot of time in the morning to getting sucked into checking email, looking at the news, etc., without ever leaving my bed, and I want to get an earlier start.
5. After letting the dogs outside, I began drinking a glass of ice water. The early hydration is supposed to be good for the metabolism; it also helps me wake up and avoid the temptation of returning to bed.
6. While I was writing this post, my iPhone vibrated a number of times, signaling the arrival of new emails. The last few times it did so, I kept writing and didn't stop to check emails. I am concerned that I am being multi-tasked to death, in areas where nothing bad will happen if I attend to the second (or third, fourth and fifth) task later. I am concerned that this over-multitasking leaves me unfocused, unproductive and overwhelmed. So this was a tiny first step toward "one thing at a time."

Not a bad start for the Midnight to 8 am time block! Let us see how the rest of the day plays out.