We finally got a consult at the Autism Center at Seattle Children’s Hospital today. It’s near the UW so Mom and Dad tagged along in case we were going to make a stop at the bookstore. (Unfortunately, we didn’t.) Thankfully, Mom drove because the streets likely would have confounded me. I can drive around the towns in my area just fine but Seattle is psycho. It also feels positively claustrophobic because of the tall buildings.
The appointment was good and I now have some more people who are focused on making sure Daniel has what he needs to succeed and grow, but traffic on the way home was crazy and I definitely now understand why I don’t make the effort to take Daniel down there to do stuff on a weekend!
Looking out my window… sunny now though it was raining earlier and we’ve had a few days of good rain. Weather.Com says it’s 50F and I believe them.
I am thinking… about my Doodle assignment this week.
I am thankful… for classes I like this quarter.
One of my favorite things… when my sports teams win. My Giants beat San Diego and I’m hoping my Niners can beat Arizona.
I am wearing… a grey heather long-sleeved shirt and jeans. Church clothes this morning were a blue-grey long-sleeved shirt, black slacks, and black flats.
I am listening to… classical music on a DISH Network channel
I am hoping… Daniel’s appointment with the Autism Center at Seattle Children’s Hospital this week goes well. We’ve been waiting for this appointment for a very long time. (The waiting list for an appointment is over a year long.)
I am learning… about email best practices.
In my kitchen… coq au vin is cooking.
In the school room… Daniel continues to love school.
Baseball take #1. Kind of bummed that Matt Cain is retiring but it sounds like it’s for the best. He’s got some injuries and he’s had a really good run with the Giants.
School take #1. My CDSP class on church finance is fascinating and has led to some interesting conversations with my Vestry. I may end up as the church treasurer at some point in the next 10 years so I’m glad I’m learning about fund accounting.
Divorce-related take. I’ve largely kept the divorce off of this blog because I don’t want to air my dirty laundry. However, the final judgment has just been submitted to both attorneys for signatures. Please pray we can get everything signed off in the next week or so and also pray for Jon’s heart and my heart as this is a very painful process for both of us.
School take #2. My other three classes are going well. I want to immerse myself completely in Sage50 for my Microcomputer Accounting II class and play but I need to be diligent and finish things up for my Electronic Communications class in the next day or so.
Looking out my window… dark. It was in the high 70’s today. We’ve got 92% of the sun obscured up here so it should be interesting tomorrow.
I am thinking… about the political situation in this country.
I am thankful… that many people clicked on the links I shared in my Quick Takes this past week. I know not everyone agrees with my viewpoint on this blog, so I was really thankful that people did read what I shared.
One of my favorite things… lamb gyros. I just found a local source so I’m really happy.
I am wearing… jammies. Church clothes were a black patterned top, black slacks, my black cardigan, and black flats. Regular clothes were my blue-green fitted tee and black capris.
I am creating… notes on my Business English book. Woo.
I am watching… the news.
I am hoping… the next 2.5 weeks until kiddo goes back to school goes quickly. He’s chomping at the bit and he really does like having the scheduled time he has in the classroom.
I am learning… how my Sacred Ordinary Days planner works.
In my kitchen… pork roast, corn, potatoes, and salad for dinner with pie and ice cream for dessert.
In the school room… waiting for kiddo to get his school supply list in the mail.
I am thinking… about Charlottesville, my own privilege, and the need to speak out and say, as a white woman, that the neo-Nazi crap going on there is abhorrent.
I am thankful… for last night. My youngest cousin called to let us know that she and her mom had just bought her wedding dress and she was coming up to show it to my grandmother. When we were taking the pictures with her and grandma (who was miraculously alert and smiling), we discovered that the portrait of my late grandfather in his Navy uniform was photobombing them. We had a good laugh and got teary because we miss him and photobombing them is totally something he would have enjoyed doing. (My cousin and I were beloved by him so she’s ecstatic that he was there in spirit last night.)
One of my favorite things… sleep. I’m not getting enough of it.
I am wearing… my blue-green fitted tee and jeans. Church clothes were the tee with black slacks, my black cardigan, and my black flats.
I am creating… my last two reports and journals for my Interpersonal Communications class.
I am listening to… the Andante movement of Beethoven’s Piano Sonata in D Major Op. 28.
I am hoping… what I just ate and drank will get my blood sugar to where it needs to be and I won’t feel so hypoglycemic.
I am learning… the fingers that are least painful to prick with my glucometer. I am also trying to get a baseline for what “normal” should feel like.
In my kitchen… just noshed on some Chinese pork.
In the school room… class ends for me this week (4 chapters to outline for the quiz, 2 reports, and 2 journals due on Wednesday) and then I get to spend some time outlining the Business English textbook so I can test out of the class.
Closing Notes: My priest made an interesting point this morning. She commented that it is an example of white privilege that she was able to step away from the Internet and all the coverage of Charlottesville to go help at a community event raising money for the local theater. For many people, the presence of the jerks in Charlottesville is not something that they can escape. I have friends whose relatives were in concentration camps, whose family members perished, and for whom the neo-Nazi presence was a reminder that there are people there who want to kill them and their children for being Jewish or of Jewish extraction.
For people of color, they are reminded every day of their lower status in America and quite a few people have commented that if the protesters with tiki torches had been African-American, the National Guard would have been called in to quell the protest. Others have offered equivocations that the Antifa and BLM are as bad as the neo-Nazis and that’s utter bullshit. First of all, most of the Antifa just want to go cause mayhem — seriously, even anarchists disavow association with them. Secondly, BLM is largely peaceful but white people are incredibly threatened by them marching that law enforcement tends to go overboard. The neo-Nazis in Charlottesville look like a bunch of frat boys in their khakis and polo shirts — they haven’t experienced a day of persecution in their lives!
White people need to speak up and condemn these acts. Yes, crap does happen where African-Americans yell epithets at white folks — I experienced it living in Columbus, Ohio. However, I didn’t take it as personally as I could have because I knew that there was a lot of hurt and anger behind it that spans generations and that they were dealing with things that I would never experience. I have never had a landlord refuse to rent to me because of the color of my skin, I never had to attend a school that was sub-par because of the neighborhood in which it was located, and while my dad’s family fled persecution in Ireland in the 19th century and weren’t allowed into the States (long story), my ancestors were never considered mere pieces of property.
White people enjoy a very privileged status in this country and we need to use that privilege to SPEAK UP when there is injustice being committed. If a friend lost a family member or had a tragedy happen, you would speak up. Guess what? There are a number of communities in this country whose lives and well-being are threatened by the men marching in Charlottesville and WE NEED TO SAY SOMETHING.
July 19th was my 17th blogiversary and it passed quietly because of school and things in my personal life. As a way of ignoring the crappy health news I got today, here are are some ways my life has changed since I started blogging on July 19, 2000.
I’ve come full-circle in terms of relationships. When I started this blog, I was dating Jon. Then we went through our long engagement, marriage, a short separation, and now divorce. It’s a painful realization in a lot of ways but it also provides me with a record of the good times that I can look back upon eventually.
I have lived in five states. I had spent my life in California and was living with my parents over the summer before my senior year of college. Since then, I have lived in: Ohio, Minnesota, Montana, California (again), and now Washington. I’m glad to have had these experiences in seeing how people across the country live.
I am no longer vegetarian. I added meat back into my diet in December 2000 and while I don’t eat a lot of it, I have not given it up again except for Lenten purposes.
I have stopped coding largely by hand. For the first year, I coded by hand and then went to Livejournal, two iterations of Greymatter, Movable Type, back to Greymatter, b2, and then WordPress 12ish years ago. It’s good to know how to do some of it still so I can fix sidebars but I’d have to learn PHP to be able to create my own themes.
I’m Episcopalian again. At the time I started blogging, I was attending my Episcopal church at home and then attending an evangelical church at school. Eventually, I attended an LCMS church, went ELCA for 10 years, AALC for three years, and then became Episcopalian again.
I’m missing a body part or two. I gave up my gallbladder in 2005 and there is less liver than there was originally due to scar tissue from the gallbladder issues.
Looking out my window… dark. It’s late at night and I’m blogging out my brain. It’s supposed to be in the low 70’s today.
I am thinking… about things in one of my relationships.
I am thankful… Daniel’s fever is (likely) gone and the trip to Urgent Care wasn’t bad.
One of my favorite things… sleep. I’m probably out of luck tonight though.
I am wearing… black fitted tee from Old Navy and navy blue/white striped pajama bottoms from Target.
I am creating… this post.
I am listening to… one of my favorite piano pieces.
I am hoping… to get to sleep soon after I post this.
I am learning… balance. I’m in a static situation at the moment though there is a great deal of fluctuation within that situation. It’s a weird paradox.
In my kitchen… figuring out what to cook for myself. I’m thinking something from The Lemon Bowl? We made a couple of her recipes for Father’s Day and they’re worth repeating.
Shared Quote… From CarouselConductor, a poster in one of the subreddits I frequent:
Loss. Whether a death, estrangement, or any other kind.
Losing someone leaves a hole. This hole is in the shape of the person who is gone. It has ragged, bleeding edges that hurt with every movement. It’s hard to even consider this void, because even looking at it brings pain. All you can do is hope that something fills it in, because it’s too wide. Too deep. Too open.
And then time passes. You remember the person, talk about them, the good times, the bad. The bleeding edges are still painful, but somehow, you can approach them a little closer. It’s tender, but the bleeding has been slowed. The void is keenly felt, and you wonder what it will take for it to just go away.
More time passes. It’s not so bad, when you look at the hole, now. You might be wondering when it will fill in. If you get too close, you can still see the echo of the person who left the hole. Peering into it might still be too much, and nothing moves the same way anymore. But the bleeding has stopped and the pain isn’t there every time you move.
As even more time goes by, you start to realize that things feel different, but that raging pain is more of a distant ache, now. If you look at the hole, you find that the edges are scarred over. The void is still there. The shape of what made it is still recognizable. And then you realize that the hole is there, and it will always be there.
The topography of what makes you, you, has changed.
The ragged edges have healed over and you find that in that thing you thought was a bottomless pit of pain, there is now a well of memories. It’s up to you if you visit for a time, or simply walk on by.
Give yourself time for the hole to heal. And it will heal, regardless of abstracts like forgiveness, regrets, blame, or anger. Even if it doesn’t seem like it.
Please seek help when dealing with the trauma of loss. No one should go through grief alone.
Closing Notes: My kickboxing class was cancelled for the fall and they emailed me today to let me know that I have priority enrollment for a yoga class they are adding.
*facepalm*
My mom laughed at me when I told her, commenting that it’s another form of stress management. I looked at her and replied that I have a deep need to punch and kick things and they just took away my ability to do this!!!!
*goes off to sulk and find a local kickboxing class*
