Someday ---

Someday I need to do a blog on the womanhood of God, the theology of yes, and what fractals have to do with anything.  But for today, I need to just say that I REALLY dislike people who invest their creative talents in computer viruses.  Last night, someone released a trojan into the cable internet network of my provider and infected every machine that was plugged into the network in Colorado Springs.  I know this because (I couldn't get through last night due to a 45+ minute wait at the tech line) I called this morning before 5 am and that's what the tech told me. 

She also asked me if people in Colorado Springs don't sleep.  Apparently the lines were jammed until after 2 am with unhappy persons, and then I was on the line with her at 4:45.  As a matter of fact, no, we don't sleep.  And now all the sleep deprived and unhappy people who have time in the middle of the night to contemplate the deep things of life, will be focusing all our collective energy on wishing ill to the person who deprived us of the internet (an insomniacs best friend!) 

As it turned out, I was forced to work Sudoku in the wee dark hours.  I completed 7 puzzles before the sun came up.  and if that won't make you crazy, I don't know what will.  Unless maybe it's the quanitity of coffee I've consumed today.  Not that I'm wired or anything, but everyone around me seems to be moving really really slow.

Happily, the t-one line at work is much safer than the cable I pay such outrageous fees for at home.  So I have been able to check my email, check my bank account (yes, I still feel a compulsive need to do that every morning), email my sons' teachers just in case, (although, to my knowledge, Tucker hasn't bitten anyone today), and now I'm blogging. 

Oh, I'm also working.  I am much much much happier in my job now that I'm figuring out what and how to do things.  There's still room for improvement, but we hired a wonderful woman, a retired Navy Chief with 23 years of experience cracking the whip and keeping things organized.  A kindred obsessive compulsive neurotic.  Life is good. 

PS - I also emailed all the television stations in town and asked them to please have their news team call and harass the cable company to find out when and how they are gonna fix it.  I figure that's an excellent use of my time. 

God Says Yes To Me

Kaylin Haught

I asked God if it was okay to be melodramatic
and she said yes
I asked her if it was okay to be short
and she said it sure is
I asked her if I could wear nail polish
or not wear nail polish
and she said honey
she calls me that sometimes
she said you can do just exactly
what you want to
Thanks God I said
And is it even okay if I don't paragraph
my letters
Sweetcakes God said
who knows where she picked that up
what I'm telling you is
Yes Yes Yes

Isn't that wonderful?  Have a happy happy Wednesday ...

Happy Little Life

Michael made it safely and happily to and from school yesterday.  I had a good day at work.  I made a decent dinner last night, and I went to bed early because I fell asleep while Tucker was reading to me ... a story about Pumpkins from the sky.  I was having a good dream until about 4 am when the snake showed up.  I hate snakes in real life and hate snakes in my dreams.  (ew)  But that didn't leave me much that I felt a need to write about. 

And aren't you glad that I don't have some angsty thing going on that I have to work out here?

Life is good. 

A Rolling Start ...

Michael is off to a great day at school.  I had one last remaining worry because he will have a different bus and driver in the afternoon and I was afraid he'd have difficulty finding where he needed to go, but Mr Ernie came by this morning and introduced himself to me and Michael.  Michael now knows who to look for this afternoon, and more important, Mr Ernie knows what Michael looks like and will be watching for him. 

There are not many things left to worry about.  I'll probably find something.  But at this point, I'll have to really work at it.   

The Eagles have Flown ...

After more than two months of solitude, my home erupted with sound, stuff, and people on August 11 when my parents and kids arrived.  For more than two weeks, we did the tourist thing, did the family thing, and did the conversation that we haven't had but needed to thing. 

It was the best, most positive visit I may have ever had with Mom and Dad.  I received affirmation that I have desperately wanted and resigned myself to never receiving.  I had the opportunity to do things that I've always imagined wistfully.  And it was just plain old good.  They left this morning at 5:30 and I was unbelievably sad to see them go. 

Things are changing dramatically around here again.  My Aunt and Uncle (we call them Mimi and Pappa) who are the main reason I moved here to Colorado Springs, are leaving.  They have spent much of their time travelling since I arrived and I knew that would be the case.  Even though they are in their 70's (celebrated their 50 year wedding anniversary yesterday) they aren't the stay at home and use the rocking chair kind of people.  They've been relatively settled here for the past six or seven years helping my cousin, Eliza, homeschool her children.  But the kids have done well and Mimi says it's time to hand off that task to the next teacher. 

So they've given me their bookshelf, and their table, promised to give me their bistro set and offered other things if I wanted or had room for them, and will be moving to Israel as soon as their home here sells.  It's been on the market for several weeks and they have it priced to go, so I don't think that will be long.  Maybe ... end of September?  And the days have picked up speed. 

Oh, yes, the landscape is changing. 

Michael and Tucker have settled nicely into their home routine.  Both are enjoying school (although I don't think Tucker can spell audience yet and we practiced that word every day for a week, he kept saying that he can't imagine ever needing to use that word in real life and I'm thinking ... just wait til you figure out what an audience you HAVE,) and Michael's special bus service starts tomorrow.  My job is looking better and better, it will be challenging, but not in a way that is outside my scope of ability.  (I don't think.)  And I still love my home.

There's always something else to be thinking about, always something else to adjust to, but in the midst of all the changes happy and sad, it's more obvious to me than ever that this is a good moment to stop and breathe.  This is a good moment to take a mental snapshot of my life and savor all the rich color.  This is a good moment. 

PS _ A lot of the new features Xanga has offered lately I feel are "nice, but I probably won't use that much ..."  The message feature is a whole different animal.  I LOVE this.  If I would like to make a personal comment, or if you have something to say that you'd like to keep just between US without all of Xanga (or at least the part who read my comments section) reading it, you can send me a private message.  We have needed this for a LONG time. 

And those of you who have customized your look and feel beyond the basic Xanga format, please be aware that the message feature doesn't automatically appear on your site. (hint hint)  But what a lovely thing to have a way to pass notes as opposed to raising our hand and announcing ourselves to the world!

Looking Better

okay, I've been there a whole week and a half and things are looking much much better at work. Some of the issues that I thought would drive me nuts - well, they still might, but I'm finding my way to handle it.

One of the things I was most upset about was the seeming lack of organization and underwhelming performance on a project that I walked into the middle of. If I'm going to do something, I want to do it right, or I don't want to waste my time. Yesterday, I saw several decisions made that I believe are going to alleviate some of this, up to and including a decision to put me right smack dab in the middle. I'm not a project manager, but I play one in a certain daydream I've had running for years, and I know that I can bring things to a level I'm comfortable with.

I talked with my boss because I still haven't heard anything from the bus company about Michael's transportation being scheduled. He told me not to stress on it. What we've worked out is that until the bus situation is resolved, I will come into the office from 9-2 and then I will work from home to finish whatever is on the task list for the day (and he made me promise not to exceed 8 hours a day on AF assignments.)

I turned in my first assigment yesterday. We are working on answers to questions from the foundation that may or may not be on the verge of funding us to the tune of $5 million. And I was assigned to write a section of our reply. Everyone in the office stopped by to encourage me. Some of our people are fellows at another non-profit with very impressive initials behind their names. And the message from all of them was, "look we ALL do it. We work and work and work and we turn it in and then he comes back and tells us all the ways we need to do it over again."

So when I turned it in I put ROUGH DRAFT in the subject line, and again in the body to signal that I was willing to rework whatever he needed redone. Last night he sent me the email response to my work ...

"Terry well done
Can you complete a similar rundown for _______"

My next issue will be to have him spell my name right ...

There is a book out there, my best friend read it last year and I tried to but I'd checked it out from the library and I didn't make it far before I ran out of time, The World is Flat, by Thomas Freidman. My boss is in that book. He's not a huge section of the book, but he is in there. And that's kind of cool.

Happy Friday to you all. I'm gonna get started on the similar rundown for _____

MWAH!

Moving On -

Most of the things that were so frustrating to me last week all resolved themselves yesterday. I had two large events at work that brought closure and wrapped up the loose ends of the things that were all wrong on Friday. I met with Michael's teachers and the staff at his school to set up support for him and to get him access to a bus.

I was upset when I got the bus schedule and realized that in order to get to the bus stop he would have to cross a busy street at a place where there is no traffic light or stop sign for two blocks on either side, and it's on a hill so the people going the fastest - those coming downhill, don't have time to see that there might be a pedestrian trying to cross - PLUS Michael tends to have his head in the clouds and doesn't do a good job of watching for traffic.

BUT - it looks like we are going to get it set up so that Michael will be picked up AT my place and dropped back here in the evening thanks to his Special Needs status. SO - yeah us

Ten Busy Days!

I can't believe it's ten whole days since I posted here. I think I'm in shock over my ... what would you call it?

Maybe I van give you a few highlights of this time though and then we can move on.

The boys are home. They reacted to the new place even better than I imagined they might. Even after more than a week they are still finding new things to exclaim over and telling me how much they like our home.

They started school on Thursday. Tucker says he has the "best 4th grade teacher ever." I have determined that this is because she told them they will be looking at owl pellets this year to find the bones of mice. It wasn't hard to figure out. He has talked about owl poop for four days.

Michael has had a more difficult beginning to his year. But we've found good support at the school, and I think it will be okay.

My parents will be here another week. Mom and I haven't had even one argument. We even went shopping together yesterday, and we made it through the whole thing without me even once being tempted to leave her at the store. I've introduced my dad to Sudoku and he's loving that. He sits out on the deck and works puzzles and seems to be relaxing as much as I can ever remember.

My aunt is having her 50th wedding anniversary next Saturday, so we have friends and family pouring into Colorado Springs for the celebation, I've visited with cousins I hadn't seen in upwards of ten years. I've met their children. Seen them with new spouses. It's been amazing and more of them are coming this week.

(Right now, there are 10 kids and 6 adults at Eliza's house, I have my parents here, and my Aunt has my Aunt Janice at her place - and this is only the warm up!)

I started a new job, and I don't want to jump to conclusions or rush to judgment, but so far its not looking so good.

I have been working on an independent project that has gone worse than anything like it I've ever seen. I am really glad that my communication with my client has been excellent and that he understands exactly what our situation is because this thing has the potential to make me look like the biggest incompetent ever. And I haven't done anything wrong. I have never been so frustrated by people making mistakes on paperwork in my life. And that's as much as I want to say about that.

I received the proofs for my poetry book that will be published by Shadow Poetry and it looks GREAT. i don't have a publication date on that yet. But it will be soon and I'll let you know. Anyone who wants a signed copy will be able to order directly from me. But there is also a website where you can order directly from the publisher.

And that's only the highlights. We've had trips into the mountains, and dinners on the deck, and it's just been BUSY. But I haven't forgotten Xanga. I will be back as things settle down.

Last Night of Naked ...

I talked to my Dad this afternoon.  They are in Amarillo tonight and heading here tomorrow.  The boys will be HOME.  So what am I doing on my last night of solitude?  Well, it just occurred to me all the things I DIDn'T do all summer.  I didn't spend my evenings naked.  I didn't have wild parties.  I didn't get a new tattoo.  I didn't do much of anything to write home about. 

I have such a boring life.

The Boys Are Coming Home ...

I talked with my mom this week after I visited the boys' schools, got their supplies list, and found out about the orientation schedule. And the trip for my parents to bring the boys back has been moved up. They will leave Arkansas tomorrow morning and should be in Colorado Springs by Friday afternoon.

I am busy busy busy these days unpacking the last of the boxes, finishing the last of the housework, and finalizing the actual work that I've been working on.

I have a couple ideas for jobs. I applied online with a company that I'd very much like to work for (in no small part because my friend Laura works for them). I have learned of a couple more openings in different other places. I'll land on my feet. But I can admit here that I'm very disappointed in the way my summer has ended, it's not the way I hoped. And well, it remains to be seen whether anything of the original plan can be resolved. But at this point that seems highly unlikely.

Sigh. I'd rather be looking for work in August than November, so I'm in a better place than I've been for the past two years.

Keep me in your good thoughts. I can use all the prayer, positive energy, and hope I can get.