Acceptance

B had refused to go to work yesterday, so I had him join me in the office in the late afternoon, then join me, M, E, and K at DuClaw in Arundel Mills for dinner last night. I think he saw that it's better to just keep moving forward, even if it's just in the space you can see in the headlights. We had a good time at dinner, anyway, laughing and carrying on. And then M took me home and put me in the shower and let me do a few shells in Sweet Pea before tucking me in:

And now I've made it to a bright, brisk Friday.

I got up, got dressed, went to the S residence to take care of the four-legged children, got to the office and called mom, got some coffee at Panera (I'm at the point where I bring in six quarters and a dime and have a lucky penny in my pocket the rest of the day. I should get myself a gift card for next week...$7.95 then no more getting up an hour early for the S kids) and am settled in with my oatmeal and a glass of water.

Tonight, I intend to go to the grocery store. Tomorrow, we are supposed to visit his mother and grandmother, and Sunday we are going to visit my family. Then another week. And another. The days will get longer, and warmer. Some things will change, others will stay the same. There is going to be hurt. And happiness, too, if you look for it. If you let it in. So that's life..it goes on.

The Sixth Minute

For the first five minutes, I was fine. Surprisingly, suspiciously fine. Then I went downstairs, put on my pink boxing gloves, and whaled. And wailed.

Kubler-Ross' first two stages, in six minutes.

Unfair doesn't begin describe it. Days on end, weeks of radiation to kill it in the prostate. The unsteadiness, being off-balance, seemed like a side effect, some minor thing to deal with in exchange for life.

Not brain cancer.

Then the third stage:

I want him to live! I want to hear him calling me and my cousins by our pet names. I want to see him hold my babies. Just that long? I'll stop taking my pill now. I'll buy a baby. I'll steal one! Just that much, please?? Maybe it can be taken care of, really easily. Right? That one thing???

But I know better... me, the quick study. I know there is no real bargaining power, that I have to play the card in my hand, that we all do. So I stubbornly cling to the fourth stage, because I don't want to get to the fifth and final. I don't want to accept it.

I hear that when he found out, Granddad just went right back to his jigsaw puzzle. He's so moderate, so mild. So good. Seriously, the best person I know. Gentle and kind and quiet and loving and happy and accepting. I've only ever seen him angry once. I don't like to admit it was at me.

But I'm lucky, I think. Out of his five daughters, the one most like him is my mother. And I get to be that close to him, when I sit with her. I get to feel his love when she speaks. When she's quiet, she's closest to him. I hope my generation is the only one those traits skip. I hope to find out soon.

Ouch!

I'm actually more sore and achy all over today than I was Saturday or Sunday, and I'm padding around the office in black cashmere socks 'cuz wearing shoes hurts my foot. I'm a bit cranky and headachy even after some Advil, and hubby is in training for his new position this week, so I can't call him and whine. I called E and fussed a bit instead, and he was a very sweet substitute. I think I'll soak in the tub when I get home this evening.

Tomorrow, I have a meeting in Rosedale around 2pm, and I already told the boss I'm going to work from home the rest of the day tomorrow. The rest of the week at work shouldn't be too bad. I hope.

Starting Wednesday, I'll be stopping by C's in the mornings to love on the four-legged kids, doing walks and food and meds. And maybe to dive into her cookbook stash! OH! And I can make copies of the crochet patterns in the gorgeous new book she got when we had our Saturday quality time of crepes and yarn and coffee.

For some good news, Mom sent me a text yesterday to let me know Chanson en Crochet is done, and I'm trucking right along on my Sweet Pea shawl, though it's not as wide as I may have liked. I'll post pix of Sweet Pea soon, and Chanson next week; I'll have to get it from mom this coming weekend. I'm thinking of doing Cupcake next, but we'll see... I need to get back to knitting!

Je pense que j'ai cassé mon pied

I had a decent evening: learned my mom figured out how to text-message (mon dieu!), decided to get a pizza rather than cooking (a rare event, I assure you), stayed up late watching The Decent (yikes!), went to bed VERY late.

I had a decent morning: slept through most of it (got up around 11:30), had my requisite omlette, and toast with fig jam, emailed some farms to see whether we can buy into a CSA (community supported agriculture, to get a share of a local farm's produce), made dough for pita bread, started the laundry, started to watch Two Days in Paris (J'adore Julie Delpy) ... aaaaaand then I slipped on the stairs, my foot hitting the corner of the wall (preventing me from going any further, but taking the brunt of the momentum.

Je pense que j'ai cassé mon pied.



This is what it looked like about an hour ago, purplish and swollen.


It looks worse now.


I'm heading off "Patient First" talk.

So I've been laid up in the corner of my bedroom, in the chaise, foot elevated and iced, laptop on my lap, watching my movie and being lorded over. I think the hubby enjoys my being temporarily dependent... he even had to carry me to the wc. But the bright side of this is that he got to partake in bread making, seeing I couldn't get back downstairs to punch down, divide, ball, roll out and bake the pitas. He did a great job, though: the house has a wonderful warm buttery smell (which I don't get, since there is no butter involved!) and the pitas look good, seem to have the pocket in the middle, and judging from the sample he brought me, are quite yummy.

He's doing that, and I'm sitting here staring at my foot and the pack of ice sitting on top of it.


It looks like someone put a golf ball under my skin.


I think I need a pedi.


And I should probably hem my jeans, since I think it was the cuff I slipped on.


C'est la vie.

Saving Green

This month's "green" issue of Domino magazine inspired me to think a bit about my own green efforts. I don't believe in being a green militant or a green pusher, but I DO believe that little efforts add up. Some of our green changes are:

• We installed a programmable thermostat in our house
• We've replaced all of the light bulbs in our house with energy efficient bulbs
• We don't keep lights on in unoccupied rooms
• We use cloth napkins at meals, rather than paper towels
• We generally use cloths to clean, rather than paper towels
• The paper towels we do use are from recycled paper
• My husband doesn't leave the water running while shaving (Thanks, honey!)
• We don't leave the water running while brushing our teeth
• I got my mom to stop doing that, too (Thanks, Mom!!)
• We harvest rainwater to water our plants
• We only wash full loads in our dishwasher and clothes washer
• I hang a lot of my clothes to dry
• We use environmentally friendly dishwashing powder and laundry detergent
• We drink filtered tap water
• I drink from a glass at work
• I drive a small, fuel-efficient car
• I have a reusable bag in my car for spur of the moment shopping
• We use reusable grocery bags (four of them have thus far been enough)
• I buy free-trade, organic coffee
• I buy free-range, hormone- and antibiotic- free meats whenever possible
• I often buy organic produce
• In the summer, we get a good deal produce from local farmers
• We use an old-fashioned rotary lawnmower
• We recycle at home and at work
• We keep trash to a minimum
• I subscribe to my local Freecycle group

None of these efforts are really big ones, and none have compromised our lifestyle, but add them together and they really reduce our household footprint. Consider what you can do!

Mental Health Day

Today’s catastrophe was discovered when I pulled into the parking garage at work, turned off my car, looked at my keys, and realized I left my house key in the bloody front door. I left work around 11am, after dealing with a work-related catastrophe, and declared a semi-mental health day: I packed up my folders and laptop and went back home.

Those who work in close proximity to me know when I’m scrubbing my desk with Clorox wipes, things aren’t going well. As soon as I got home, I scrubbed my oven. But it must have been cathartic, because I settled in with Fantasia then Fantasia 2000 and now March of the Penguins… lovely comforting background noises and images.
I spent the majority of my afternoon prepping for a meeting with my pharmaceutical client. (I hope I’ll have it tomorrow; we are supposed to have inclement weather starting this evening.) Now, I need to get up to speed on my newspaper client. The fun never ends!

My roses got all droopy so I took them home last night and lopped their little heads off and am thinking I might dump them in the bath this evening, then update my Ravelry blog and crochet a bit. Bonne nuit!

Proof of Life

This morning, I made an amazing discovery:
My tulip bulbs are sprouting!

Okay, it's not the clearest picture, but I'm no photographer. And if that's what you are focusing on, you are missing the point! Matt and I planted these bulbs two autumns ago, and I was pretty sure nothing was going to come of them. And I HATED waiting for something to happen. But lo and behold, that first spring we had tulips, and the year after that... more tulips! I still have a bit of childlike wonder about the idea of planting a seed (or in this case, a bulb, but you know what I mean) and having life come from it. I must, considering that when I went out to warm up my car this morning, I felt compelled to come back out in the cold weather with my poopy little Kodak EasyShare and snap away at tiny green buds.

(Post Script: Matt has announced he wants a better camera for our birthday [which is on the same day], so by mid-April, let's see if I'm posting better pictures.)

Guests for Dinner

Last night, we had another couple over for dinner. I stopped at Whole Foods (I love Whole Foods!) and picked up some groceries, then stopped at Bin 604 (which I also love) for a bottle of Chardonnay and another of Pinot Noir. We had salmon baked in foil, saffron rice, and roasted broccoli, then sat around the table for another four hours talking and laughing, the girls drinking wine and the men drinking scotch. I had forgotten to pick up a dessert, but thank goodness we had a really good brownie mix handy. Between the four of us, we ate the entire pan!

Our guests left at about a quarter after one in the morning... I'm glad I cleaned the kitchen as I was cooking, because we were SO ready to get in bed, and it was nice to have nothing to do but run the dishwasher this morning.

Happy Valentine's Day!

It was a wonderful Valentine's Day. Matt sent three dozen roses and a box of chocolates to my office. The bouquet took up a third of my desk! He got home before me and made a simple pasta dinner, with wine. We had a little alone time and then spent hours under the covers, talking about our years together and our future and baby names and the state of the world, and then we fed each other the chocolate-covered strawberries I had purchased from Yia Yia's the day before, and showered and crawled back in bed for the night.

I always thought of Valentine's Day as a cheesy hallmark holiday, but I actually appreciated it this year, as a reminder to stop and smell the roses (all 36 of 'em), and appreciate those you love.

Welcome to my life...

I had a MySpace page for a while, but just didn't LIKE it. So I deleted it and am starting over... and I guess I should start with an "about me," right?

I am close to my family and a bit of a home-body. I prefer intimate groups to large crowds. I love animals. I am sometimes a bit suspicious of people, yet try to give everyone the benefit of the doubt. I tend to get along best with the very young or very old.

I spend my weekdays working as a Project Manager at an ad agency, and my weekends being spoiled by my husband, who makes the loveliest eggs without fail or complaint every Saturday and takes me to breakfast every Sunday.

I adore going on dates with my husband, especially to nice restaurants. I like the idea of living simply, but you wouldn’t know it from looking in my closet. I like to cook, and am trying to bake more. I read nearly everything I get my hands on, and I love movies. I barely every watch television.

Craft-wise, I love trying new things. I’ve explored personal essays, drawing, painting, jewelry-making, cross-stitching, crocheting and most recently, knitting. I like the idea of needlework for several reasons, perhaps most so because it is a practical (often wearable!) art, something I can take pride in in a tangible way.

I’ve had trouble sleeping for as long as I remember, and I worry about the state of the world. A lot. So I try to do what I can to make it a better place. One stitch at a time, right?