Dating in The Real World Isn't a Movie...

I've dated my share of men in my life, or at least went on my share of dates.  I can tell you in the movies it looks a hell of a lot more fun than it is in real life.  I know a lot of people who talk about first dates and how exciting they are.  I always dread them.  It's not because I don't want to meet the person it's just that usually they have these preconceived notions about how I should or should not be or look and they often lie like there is no tomorrow about things that don't impress me at all.  I'm not your average girl.  I don't get impressed by flashy apartments and money.  I don't fall for just a pretty face and I sure as hell don't play games.  Do you know how many men I've met, text, talked with and gone on dates with that say they want a woman that doesn't play games?  That rarely is the case though.  I even had one guy tell me I was too accessible that I needed to be busy sometimes when he asked me out.  Call me crazy but if you're dating someone aren't you suppose to put them first?  I'm not making up plans to impress a guy.  I have a great social life I don't need to make anything up, I've just always believed when you're dating someone you put them first on the plans list.  I'm also no barbie doll.  I am a real live flesh and blood woman who will treat her man like a king.  I will wantonly fix him food, get him drinks, rub his back, be flirtatious, and see to everything I can to make him happy.  When I'm in a relationship that is what makes me happy.  My requirements to make me happy are very small.  I simply want someone to show me affection and to be honest with me.  Yes I've dated my share of good guys and I've dated my share of jack asses, but I've always treated them just a little better than I think for the most part a lot of them treated me.  Sound stuck up, yeah it does I suppose.  A lot of them left me feeling like I was good enough to use, good enough to have as a friend but not good enough to date or even take to dinner.  I guess I make one hell of a buddy you could say. So it's hard for me when I do find a good man to even consider it.  I'm use to being left on the sidelines while the hunt for the woman who will play the games, drive their guy crazy (not in a good way) and have their barbie doll bodies that they think will make them happy.  Most of these types of women will take the mans check and leave him cold.  Sorry but I've known my share of barbies and I only know a couple that bend in any form.  It's a rare and precious find when you find a barbie that likes to play fair.  So I'm not into games and dating these days is hard if you're one of the players out there on the field.  I'm always happy for my friends when they find a match that works.   Dating in the real world though isn't a movie and in my world if it were it wouldn't be romantic in the slightest...

Games People Play....

Who would have thought I'd live to see 2013.  So many I knew in the past year didn't.  2012 was a year for loss and yet a year for growth.  Of all things I know though one thing is for certain as I go into this new year I have never been more sure of who I am and how I want to live my life.  I have never had a clearer view of what my purpose is and what my values are.  There are parts of my life that I place on a shelf as if to allow people to check it out and read it's layers and yes there are parts I keep under lock and key only allowing some to view.  I believe that is the same of all people and I'm not sure any one person ever truly really knows someone.  I like to think that no one can ever stun or shock me at this point, that I've seen it all, but inevitably someone shocks me, stuns me or lets me down so badly that I am not sure how to move past it.  I do though because I have come to understand that people are human and they make mistakes.  They make bad decisions and they say things that may be hurtful without any knowledge that they are doing so.  A few examples from my past year would be a person I admired a lot and wanted for a friend left me feeling cold and used.  I somehow doubt that person had any idea they were doing it but in the end I couldn't handle it.  Perhaps I should have been able to read it and move past it but the timing and my hormones were off. Another left me sad with a comment on the size of someones ass.  Personally I don't know why that persons ass has grown to three times it's once time size but having dealt with my own health issues and weight issues this year it was hurtful but wasn't meant to be I know.  Then there are people who get off on drama.  I hate drama of any kind, but there are some out there that are drawn to it, live it and I believe need it to survive.  I try to avoid those people because life comes with enough of it's own curve balls without people helping it along.  It's going to prove I believe to be a very interesting year.  I'm hopeful to have my health and waistline and mental all back in good shape.  I'm hoping to move forward in growth of spirit and soul.  I have a wonderful set of friends and family and I know that with every set back I have I will find the strength to move past it.  I was sitting and thinking earlier about a group of friends and a conversation we had years ago.  In that conversation we all told what our worst fears were.  I said mine was growing old alone.  Well I may not have a husband or a 24/7 partner and I may or may not have that in the future but I am not alone.  I have my family.  I have my friends and I foremost have my faith that God never leaves my side.  So as people do things that make you angry or hurt your feelings I ask that you think about it before you let it get to you.  Ask yourself if they really meant to be mean or hurtful or if they just unwittingly did something without thinking.  I've found most often they are doing it without knowing and if that is the case one should be able to find it in their heart to move past it.  Sure maybe you should talk to them about it if it bothers you a lot; however, most things are not worth the lost time, fights, hurt or pain.  So lets not look for the games that people play but as the old adage goes look for the bright side.  Well that is enough of me for now.  God Bless you all and welcome to 2013.  The Mayans were definitely wrong for most of us. 

2012

As I count down and look back on the year I guess the thing that comes to the foremost inner thoughts in my mind is that I am just happy that I’m still among the living.  It seems we have lost so many to this year that will be known as 2012.  It will be known as a year when school children lost their lives to a terrible shooting, when a president who was not so popular but the known went back into office and when we watched a president cry on television.  It will be known as a year of last as in there will not be in my lifetime again a date such as 12/12/12.  This year will be known for so many things by so many.  I lost an uncle.  I have cousins who’ve lost their husbands, schoolmates who blessed us with their presence this time last year that we shall never enjoy their company in this life again, and children that lost their parents and parents that lost their children.  It was a year when a beautiful voice, Whitney Houston, went silent and the New Year Count down king, Dick Clark, took his final count.  No one has to wonder who shot JR, but one has to wonder at the great talents laid to rest in Andy Griffith, Sherman Hemsley, Richard Dawson, Donna Summers, Kitty Wells and of course Andy Williams. It was a year the world was thought to end just because some Mayan got tired of making a calendar that went well beyond his life expectancy.  It’s been a year when I’ve seen the Christmas spirit very much so alive in the giving nature and in the decorations that are all around us.  All years have great meaning to them for we have lived them.  We have loved in them and cried in them. We have welcomed new life and laid life to rest.  We have made new friends and lost friends to stupid ignorance.  I have faced my troubles in 2012, but I have lived through them to this point. I know there is still a week left so no one’s guaranteed a new year.  Of all the things in this year I know though I have been assured over and over that I have been blessed by good friends like Joe, Vincent, Karen, Jackie, Ida and Chris who’ve stood the test of time over and over.  I have renewed friendships from days gone by. I have welcomed new friends with open arms like Melissa, Bean, Joe L, Dalia and Stephanie.  I have been reminded what a wonderful brother I have in Ritchie and how lucky I am to have had two loving parents such as my mom and dad.  My mom and dad celebrated fifty years of marriage in this year of 2012.  There are so many things to be grateful for even within the sorrows that befell us. There were babies born, such as the one to my cousin Anna, Ms. Holly.  There is another baby that may or may not bless us with his presence before 2013 for my cousin Matt and his wife Tracy.  Life is definitely a balancing act of good and bad and we must somehow learn to live in the middle for our own sanity.  It would be easy I think at this time of year to get depressed and fall into a black cloud of pity and pain.  It’s a season where we miss so many people that have gone on.  I know I’ve been a little melancholy myself as my friend Rob was here visiting this time last year and I feel him everywhere around me.    What I would want is for each of you to hold onto each other.  Find a way to make this the best Christmas you can with the best memories you can because who knows if you will get the chance again next year.   2012 epic in its own right. 

Sometimes One Simply Wants to Scream….

So I thought I would take a moment and do an update on my health and where I’m at and what I’m thinking.  It’s easy I think to come to an opinion on what you would do with a certain medical condition if you’ve never been faced with it.  I mean I know I was pretty adamant about what I thought I would do when faced with certain choices until today when I actually was.  It’s not that I plan on having a baby because I’m not really sure that would be wise at my age.  It’s just that right now it’s my choice and I’m not sure how I feel about the choice being so completely taken away from me.  I had a biopsy done last week of my cervix.  Nothing life threatening for the moment there but they don’t want to take the chance of it turning into something life threatening so the doctor is recommending that I have a hysterectomy.  I have mild dysplasia going on and some benign places on my cervix.  I asked what probably seemed like a million questions to the doctor. I need to be sure I have all the facts before I decide.  So my decision is I’d like to try the L. E. E. P. procedure one more time before I go to such a radical choice as having the hysterectomy.  This procedure takes a blade made of electricity and cuts out all the bad spots.  Then in six months you repeat the test and see if there are any new places.  The problem is though that the last one I had done they took so much of my cervix they are not sure they can go with this option for me so I have to go in Monday and have an ultrasound done to see for certain.  If it can be done it’s been scheduled for the 17^Th of December.  So we’ll see.  Work has been great about working with me where they can.  I’m hoping they can do the L. E. E. P. again but if they can’t then I will have to decide how long to wait and if I can afford to wait to have they hysterectomy and then I also have to decide on what course of hormone therapy to have after it.  It’s stressful so it really wasn’t a surprise between that and other life stress and work stress that the doctors also put me on medicines to help with stress levels.    So in a nut shell this is pretty much where I’m at.  Doctor appointments are killing me.  The cure is worse than the disease.  Whatever line you want to use after over a year of dealing with this I sometimes simply want to scream!

Time Takes It's Toll...

Time takes its toll on everything.  I grew up in a trailer park.  I never felt any less or more than anyone else though.  I know the astigmatism associated with trailer parks but back in the day there were actually some very nice people that lived in there.  They didn’t fit the “trailer park trash” scenario.  Oh, don’t get me wrong I knew a few, hell I know a few people now that live in very nice houses I would classify as trailer park trash because of their behaviors and the association with the title.  Yeah I know judge not. 

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Some of them have earned my feelings on this though, trust me, eh or don’t.   I have some very fond memories of growing up on the Sandpoint Road in that little trailer park.  Playing for hours outside doing cops and robbers or going to the open field they had and playing baseball.  I got beamed with the ball more than once in my lifetime.  It was fun though and all the neighbors sort of watched out for each other and for all the children.  We actually knew who our neighbors were.  They would come and sit in lawn chairs and talk with us on many occasions. The memories are good ones but there is an old saying and in this case that you can’t ever go home appear to be spot on. A lot of those old neighbors I knew are long gone.  They are a distant memory.  There are still however a couple of their trailers standing yet in that park.  It’s funny as I write this how vivid the memories of how it looked and how I felt at that time are coming back in a mass flood to my mind.  It brings a tear because they are days that are gone forever except in my memory.  I drove through that park the other day for a trip down memory lane and it’s nothing like it was when I lived there. The beauty that it did have has faded and it now lives up to the expectations people have of trailer parks.  It’s dirty and dingy and to tell you the truth I could not help but wonder why the city had not shut it down.  I took a few photos that I’ll share here of what it looks like now.  Perhaps someday down the line I will take pictures of what it once looked like.  Time though does take its toll on everything.  The human body, the human spirit and all things material bend to its will.  How it is the song says it?  To everything there is a season and a time.  Ah, I believe life has its seasons as well.  In our childhood we are living in our springtime.  In our twenties and thirties we have our summer. 

 Our fall comes with our forties and fifties which lead into the cold winter of the sixties and seventies.  If you’re lucky you see past that time. It’s amazing to me how many people watch the seasons change every year and can’t see that it’s just earths own metaphor for their own lives.  So yes time takes its toll on everything and we have nothing we can do but sit back and weather the storm. We seek shelter in the love and companionship of our friends and family.  We learn life lessons too late sometimes and in other cases we relish the knowledge when it saves us from traveling down an abandoned road again. Life is what we make of it.  There are things that are beyond our control, but for the most part our happiness and our wellness is in our own control.  The park that I once lived in didn’t have to be allowed to decay and become what it is today.  It was lack of caring and lack of pride perhaps.  It saddens me to see it the way it is; however, the memories are always with me.  They are and always will be forever in my mind. 

Stress...

Now there is a word for you.  Stress is something most often I can handle and adjust too.  Everyone has it in their daily lives in some form or another.  When it's inflicted on you personally as if in an attack or your very being though it's a little harder than every day woes.  I know mine isn't near as bad as others though and I try to keep it in perspective.  One day at a time, one breath at a time is all one can do.  I'm a person that is stressed out more by attacks on my family than by myself.  Again I doubt that is out of the norm.  My poor niece and nephew at such young ages probably could write a book about stress and sadness and dismay.  That saddens my heart.  It saddens my heart that my ex-sister-in-law is so completely destroying all bits and pieces of her life.  One day she may find herself all alone with no one and yet she will have no one to blame except the person she sees in the mirror.  I love her, but there are some things one can not tolerate even from those they love.   I will grant you that there are issues that are out of her control, but most of them she's responsible for although you'll probably never hear her admit it.  I won't go into a lot of details.  It's personal family stuff.  I will say it's sad that a woman who is old enough in her life to know better is stirring up crap and basically picking on an eleven year old though.  As for my health it also is causing me grief.  Still not out of the woods, still waiting and wondering but hey it's not gonna get me down.  I have friends and family that support me and love me and I have fun with them. I guess on some levels I can be a needy friend.  I need to feel cared about, but then hey don't we all.  So with the holidays coming here's hoping everyone enjoys good times with family and lots of wonderful food.  I know I plan to make the best of mine.  I plan to continue to act as adult as I can and not look at what I can't change in dismay but in hope that it will get better and we will move forward .  Happy Thanksgiving everyone!  May the upcoming new year bring us all joy.

Foods In My House - Now VS Then....

So I'm back in diet mode and trying to get myself healthy again.  I know when I found out about my cervical cancer last fall I slacked off quiet a bit.  I pulled out some comfort foods and although I tried to still exercise as I could and watch a lot of my foods, I fell short by a long shot.  Now that I'm recovering and getting healthy again I am loving it.  I'm all ready seeing the inches go away and feeling better as I eat healthier.  I'm not saying it's easy because it's not.  Just like any addiction food is something I have to watch.  I have to tell myself in the store when going through certain isles that if I buy it I will eat it and if I eat it I will feel bad emotionally and physically.  Isn't it odd that foods that taste so good often make us feel lousy?  I've learned to stock better foods in my house for me.  Some of the foods you use to find in my house I no longer stock are cookies, ice cream, frozen burritos, cake icing and chocolate milk.  Oh don't worry about me.  I still indulge now and then and I still stock wine in the fridge.  A glass here and there is relaxing.  What might you ask are the foods I've learned to stock to help me feel better about me and help me feel satisfied hunger wise and still lose weight?  OK.  I'll share.  If you're at my house a few of the items you might find include:  low sodium V8 juice, cashews, bananas, apples, peanut butter (oh yeah and I do get the peanut butter and jelly sometimes), cheese, pickles, egg rolls, eggs, , soups, bread (although I rarely eat it toast will do in a pinch if you're hungry), raisin bread, cereals, soy milk, Pringles (yeah I know they are not diet, but I don't eat em much), Dannon Light Fit Greek Yogurt and Jimmy Deans Turkey Griddle French Toast breakfast sandwiches.  I don't go out to eat very often, but when I do I eat what I want.  I think one of the major thing people do wrong when trying to get healthy and diet is they deprive themselves, which sets them up for failure at long term success and I want long term success. It's hard not to turn to comfort foods, but like I said with any addiction you just take it one day at a time and put one foot in front of the other.  It's been a rough couple of years with a lot of loss from Jeff, to Robb, to old friends, and family.  It's also been a couple of years of growing and succeeding on so many levels.  My attitude towards life and people has improved and my days are spent mostly happy and mostly feeling well.  I had a spell yesterday where I didn't feel great, but I pulled through it and ended the day on a positive with friends sitting around a fire listening to stories and laughing.  So tell me what is in your fridge and how do the foods you eat make you feel?