So in my head, I know these doom and gloom feelings are related to the shorter days and the normal self-reflection state I go into toward the year's end.

What have I accomplished this year? Why am I still floundering and not closer to any of my goals? I start dreading the end of the year like it's more than just a calendar position. It takes on a whole new being of it's own. Once January arrives, even though we're still in the middle of winter, I already sense the coming of fresh and new, of spring and brighter, longer days.

Ironic that the holidays fall in the middle of the worst part of the cycle for me, since I love the holidays and all the family related gatherings and celebrations. Maybe this is universal and always has been, thus the placement of the celebrations in the middle of the worst part of the cycle - to force gaiety and happiness when it's needed the most?

And maybe some of it is self-inflicted. I feel taken advantage of by people I love. I find myself feeling as if I am nothing more to them than a provider of things. It makes me feel distanced. I recognize this as my feelings and maybe not how things necessarily are...but a good friend of mine recently said "feelings are just feelings....they aren't right or wrong". I can't help that I feel this way...but it really colors my reactions to everyday situations.

I feel like I lack stability. I've always loved change and flexibility, but always as long as I feel grounded. I don't feel grounded lately, I don't seem to have much to hold onto - nothing is permanent - I rent my house, I am a contractor vs. regular employee...so on and so forth. I don't have much that grounds me.

I'm sure of nothing else at the moment except that tomorrow I will feel better. I always feel better tomorrow. It's the dark that gets me. Every. Single. Stinkin. Time.

AFTER I agree to a year long contract with DirecTV and the installation guy showed up yesterday - TODAY the Verizon folks come a-knockin' to tell me FiOS (my long awaited DREAM) is available in my area now.

WTF?

Ugh.

Friday started pretty slow - no plans - no where to go - quiet evening home with kids and movies.

Saturday up early for the weekend cleaning binge, which was a little more involved since the new satellite TV service will be installed....I've given up on Comcast...and still waiting for FiOS. Installers always mean poking around the corners we try to ignore - and the kids room has corners that become the habitat for everything-I-don't-know-where-it-goes-mom (aka I'm too lazy to put it away). George had to attend a funeral service for a friend of his youth who passed away a week or so ago, and while he was gone I get the call about another friend of ours who had a stroke. They don't have the numbers for this guy's kids - I do - so I have to make those calls. Luckily, I was able to reach all of his family and get them there...and while he is still numb on his left side, and he still has some bleeding in his brain...they feel like they're getting it under control and that he'll make it. A close call for sure...and a warning to all of us, his friends, about some of our lifestyle choices.

George said someone once said to him "You spend the first half of your life doing all sorts of stupid things trying to end it, and the second half doing everything you can to save it."

I think it's time I realized I'm in the second half.

Saturday evening we went to a friends' house for dinner. She made a Mexican clam dip and tacos with all the fixings. Every taco I have eaten in my life has come from a box or taco bell. She filled the raw shells with a meat/potato mixture and then fried them in a pan! I was shocked! It tasted ok, but it was hard to fill (with the extras, cheese, salsa, etc) since the shells were closed with a toothpick before she fried them. I loved the clam dip the best...then again...anything with sour cream, cilantro and green chillies works for me. The whole meal though, did not agree with me at all and we ended up leaving early. It's not the spices, it's the fried.

Damned second half.

It was an easy and pleasant Sunday. We finally made the roast we were going to make on Saturday, made some beef stock to freeze, did a trial run baking xmas cookies, continued cleaning, did our 'before the week starts' laundry...and headed out to another friends' house to watch the Cowboys BEAT the Eagles - ooh rah!

In the very exciting - SECOND HALF - no less. :)

Thank you, Congress. THANK YOU!

I avoided the urge to impulse buy the Motorola Droid today when it went on sale at the Verizon store at 6am.

It wasn't easy.

I woke up at 5:30 and thankfully, I was extremely tired. It may have been what saved me. By the time I was fully awake and coherent, I had to take a few conference calls.

Still, I plotted and strategized (ew! hate when work buzz words find their way into my regular vocabulary) on how I could get to the store, do all the necessary contract agreements, rearrange my plan structure, activate the phone and bring it home with me...before my next slew of calls.

There isn't a lot more to it. I want that phone.

But I have had a lifelong habit of not thinking things through when it comes to finances. I have been a slave to instant gratification, much to the chagrin of my parents. They dutifully raised me to be cautious, plan, save...gave me an entire skill set (damn, did it again) of how to do these things right.

Once I flew the nest, however, I left it all behind. I moved to the United States and did my duty as a citizen to boost the economy. OH BOY did I boost the economy. When I wanted it, I got it...and I wanted everything...and I wanted it all RIGHT NOW.

In my weak defense, it was just amazing to me, all the excess, all the choices! Where I grew up overseas, my choices were limited to a few local shops and the nearest PX or Commissary. The Sears and JC Penny catalogues were like Christmas. But then I moved here...and there was just so much to choose from - why choose?

And then...reality. I owed more on 50 kinds of shampoos and stupid things I threw away than a new car. I owed more than the deposit on a starter home. And I had little to show for it.

It took me over 15 years to pay off that debt.

I drug out the old skill set - it was a hard lesson.

I still fight that battle almost every day. Even though I am in a much better financial situation than I have ever been in the past, with a lucrative job and more than enough, today I won. I did not succumb.

But I won today only by consoling myself that I can still have it...I'm just going to have to wait for it and make sure it's really what I want. Force myself to read user reviews post launch and make sure it's everything I want it to be.

So I haven't blogged in months and figured this Writer's Block feature would be as good a start as any to try to get back in the swing of things....that said...what a hard question!

If I could relive one hour of my life so far, I'm not sure I could pick one. My goal would be to see some family members who aren't here anymore and just get a chance to tell them one more time how much I love and appreciate them. With families in 2 countries, there was never a one hour timeframe where I was with them all.

First, I'd love an hour with my American grandfather - he passed away when I was only 13 and apart from when I was a baby, we never lived in the same place so the time I had with him was limited to start with....but time with him was quality. I have wonderful memories of him getting home from work late when we were visiting, and eating ice cream (always stired until it was melted)...or sitting in his lap while he told me stories. He never read to me...everything he knew he had memorized. Poems, short stories, essays, articles, word for word...in his head. From this I learned how powerful and precious words are and can be. He taught me how to play blackjack - and in it the valuable lesson about gambling...I was winning...big time...but he fueled my greed and had me keep playing until I lost everything. At the end he cautioned me that the pendulum always, ALWAYS swings both ways and that easy come is always easy go. The only real winning is in hard work.

Next, I'd love more time with my Japanese grandmother and grandfather. I wish I could have gotten to know them better - even when I was fluent in Japanese, I was too young to have the kind of conversation I'd love to have with them today. So for my hour, I'd love to have been a little older again in my teens, but with the same fluency of my younger days...and just get them to talk to me for the whole hour about - well - everything. I'd want to make sure they knew that I always felt so loved by them...and in that I learned confidence.

I don't know that I'd pick an hour where I'd do something differently. I'm not sure any decision I've made to this day has been that impacted by any one decision - at least not any I'm willing to change. If I never married the big A-hole, I wouldn't have my kids. If I didn't choose to stay in the States when my family went back overseas, I'd never have met my current friends or the big A-hole, etc.

And since I considered for a moment wishing I had spent more time with my Aunt Jackie before she died in April, I realize I take too many things for granted. It doesn't do me any good to wish I'd spent more time with her, I could have. I didn't. From this I have learned that I spend too much time thinking about things rather than doing them. I need to do more.

Traditionally I chronicle the birth stories of my kids on their birthdays.

Since I've detailed them out a few years in a row, this year I think I'll just recap the last year and add a few comments about my hopes for their futures.

So my dearest Jacob...some thoughts for you today as you celebrate the beginning of your 12th year.

This year was marked as your year of overcoming. I watched you face the challenges you've had socially and physically and conquer them. You no longer were the whipping boy of your peer group and you emerged a leader. You conquered fears of water, balance and physical control and became an adept swimmer, a kid who could race down the hill on a scooter top speed and finally one who can ride a bike!

From this I hope you have learned that there are no insurmountable obstacles or events, that you control your environment and yourself. I hope you take from this a more adventurous spirit that is willing to try and learn new things. I don't want you to be hindered by my over-protective nature. I want you to recognize that failure is only a learning experience and never permanent. I want you to realize that in failure is opportunity, and thus it should never be feared but embraced. You will fail. But it will serve to make the success that follows ever more sweet.

I have watched with ever growing admiration your maturity and kindness to others. I was so proud of you when you used your allowance to buy bike parts to fix the bikes of your friends whose parents couldn't afford new ones, and getting enough parts together to build a bike for the boy who never had one...all while you still didn't know how to ride one yet yourself. You knew from your own longing what it meant to have and ride a bike, and you fulfilled this wish for others at your own expense. I am so proud of you when I see you helping the younger kids in the neighborhood master skills it took you a while to learn, ever so patient and helpful. I am so proud of you when you sacrifice for others because you recognize how good it feels to do that.

I hope you never lose sight of who you are and how much you can do for others as well as for yourself. When I think of you I am filled with such pride. I don't take much credit for the person you are becoming...I know this is your nature and your own good sense. You've become who you are despite everything that conspired against you, fate, fortune and less than the best of circumstances. I don't know how I ever got so lucky to have you for my son, but I am grateful. It is truly my honor to know you and my privilege to be your mom.

And I couldn't, even if I tried, fully express how very much I love you.

Happiest of Birthday wishes to you (even though I did all the work)!

Love, Mommy

Hello, old friend.

I know I've neglected you quite a bit. I'm truly sorry. It is nice to find you here for me though, waiting. It's nice to know you're always here when I need you most. Empty white text box, my best friend. No judgements, no expectations.

I worry that I suffer from mental illness. Sometimes I feel so desperately alone and off-kilter. I don't know why I make some of the choices I do. I regret many decisions I've made. I feel like I've made so many mistakes and I don't have a clue where to start to fix them.

I'll be back.

There is a family story that involves me, at a wedding, intoxicated, dancing wildly alone in the middle of a dance floor to everyone's amusement. I know it's true, because there are pictures documenting the event. It could have been any number of days in my youth or past...

Except I was 2. It was at my aunt Jackie's wedding. No one told my mom the punch was spiked and she fed me bottle after bottle of the stuff.

Even though it was somewhat embarassing to hear the recount of that night's events at many a family gathering for years to come...my aunt always told the story in only the way she could, with grandeur and finesse...and a wink to the side to let you know it was ok.

I wanted to grow up and be just like aunt Jackie. She was smart. She remembered everything (I think she memorized the Trivia Pursuit game) and always seemed so put together. I admired her ability to connect and relate to people. A long time ago she shared with me that she used to like to write, so I used to share some of my early drafts of writing with her. She was a good critic.

When she had read something I'd written she'd always tell me that I got my talent for writing from her. Before I'd settled into the field of technical writing (to pay the bills) she used to encourage me to start writing my "great American novel". "But," she'd say, "when you use me as a character, make me more exciting!" Today I don't honestly know that I could. I don't think there are enough words to capture the essence of her life and who she was. She could be unconventional, but traditional. She was tough but compassionate. She was strong, determined but so very funny and full of life.

I don't think it ever felt real to me that she got sick. I don't think I ever believed that this was a battle she could lose. It just isn't possible to be that full of life and be sick. I listened to the updates I got from my family and just thought it couldn't possibly be that bad. I simply refused to accept that this could be final. It was just so surreal. I never believed she would die, I didn't think there was a force strong enough to take her.

Tonight I attended a Celebration of Life event held to honor her memory. My whole family was there, parents, siblings, cousins, uncles, aunts...usually we are always for a reunion or happy occasion. Even at funerals we'd end up laughing because of something my aunt would do or say. I kept waiting to see her somewhere, telling a story...waving her arms around excitedly...planning something mischievous...that twinkle in her bright blue eyes. Not too long after we got there, her grandson Henry arrived. As he burst into the room he exclaimed in the most sing songy, innocent way only a young child can....

"TJ, where are you???"

That seemed to sum it up for me. I was looking for her tonight too. I suspect I'll still be looking for her for a long time. I'll miss you, aunt Jackie. You were one of a kind. The best kind.

puranetto, of course.

Jake is cleaning the house. Well, 11 year old boy kind of cleaning the house, but at it nonetheless. He tidied up all the rooms. He swept floors and porches. He's dusted furniture and wiped down counters. He is in the kitchen doing the dishes. He already did his own chores early this morning, without so much as a reminder, in fact, before I even woke up he took the trash out and poop scooped the yard.

This is not good. Not good at all.

It means he wants something. He wants something really really bad. Judging by the herculean effort he is making to impress me, I have have a feeling it means this will be something EXPENSIVE.

The last time he bargained chores out with me, it meant a TV.

That he's doing it on his own BEFORE he talks to me? I'm scared.

I'm trying to think of all the magazines or books or websites he's been to the last month to guess what this monumental expense request is going to be. Any takers?

*****************************************

conversation with Hannah while she's brushing my hair

H: Mommy, you should cut your hair up to here (taps shoulders) you have too much split ends.
M: Yep. Plan on it. Soon.
H: Don't you wish you were a mermaid?
M: Not today Hannah, why?
H: Mermaids don't get split ends.
M: Huh?
H: It's true, mommy, didn't you ever see a mermaid's hair?
M: No, did you?
M: In fact, did you ever see a Mermaid?
H: No, but I know they are real.
M: How?
H: Because someone had to see one, it's crazy to just make up an idea about a fish person. Plus they found jewels at the bottom of the ocean that they KNOW comes from mermaid people.
M: Who's they?
H: *rolls eyes and spins mom's chair around to look directly at mommy* THEY are The People Who Know Everything. I am done with this conversation with you mommy. Brush your own hair.

I never heard this song before but it was on the hitlist playlist 3 times TODAY.

( Hinder – Without You )

I haven't eaten since Thursday and I haven't slept in close to 48 hours. Not for lack of trying. I can't keep anything down and while I'm so tired and I ache everywhere, sleep eludes me.

I feel ashamed for reasons I can't share but know they are valid reasons to feel shame, and failure...and I am not being hard on myself. I've actually excused myself for far too long for things that are inexcusable by any "good" standard.

I think one of the reasons why I work so much is because...only at work am I successful and good and accomplished.

My personal and family lives are a mess. And it's me and how I act/react to situations and people beneath me and around me, It's about behaviors I'm willing to tolerate and condone that I shouldn't. It's about how I act/react in certain scenarios.

But my Type A persona works doubly hard to make up for all of it so no one is wounded. I fix things. Sometimes I wonder if I intentionally let them break so I can be the fixer. Sometimes I wonder if I'm actually fixing anything.

Today I think not. And worse, I feel broken too.

Holiday - not for me
Inauguration
Horrible day - personal and professional
Horrible long day - professional
Even more horrible and more long day - personal and professional

Today I'd like to crawl into a hole. I don't want to look at anyone or do anything. I wish I could just disappear. And here is the cheese for my whine. I feel unloved and unlovable. And lost. And lonely.

...to get into better shape. I went to my friends Dan & Billie's 22nd anniversary party last night and danced more than half the night. Today, I ache everywhere. Someone should have reminded me during the cha cha slide that hopping was not going to feel good the next day. At all.

Stolen from a nephew's myspace because I have nothing I feel like writing about....even though I have lots I COULD write about - truthfully, it's just frustrating to keep thinking about it (for posterity, Jake's school issue, heavy workload).

( Random MEME Stuff )

Dream interpretations anyone?

I'm on some kind of ride, at Disney or something like that. Slow and through lots of scenery. I'm playing with my necklace and the small gold piece holding the charm to the chain pops off and lands in the prop/scenery. I'm not with George, I'm with Denny...

( read on )

And then my cell phone starts ringing and I wake up. What a wierd dream! What does it MEAN?

So I'd resolved to post everyday, at least something, and work just got in the way.

It's been a crazy hectic work week after a one week shutdown. I had a project that should have launched tomorrow, but because of a few last minute changes to the hard coding of the application, will have to be pushed out one week.

It's rough, because we still need to make deadlines for this quarter which ends in 3 weeks, for another project.

But...I am grateful to be working and I do love my job.

I have a house full again, my niece has moved in and we took in another friend who was left without a place for awhile. We've bunked the kids together in our upstairs middle bedroom to give the niece her own room (the kids were sleeping in the same room always anyway - they fight like cats and dogs but never like to be away from each other)...and we fixed up part of our basement to make room for the friend. I never mind when we have additional people living with us, it's always short term and I always like to think that in the event I was ever in their shoes, I'd also have somewhere to go.

I'm in the mood for an totally self-indulgent purchase. Of what, I don't know yet but I know it won't happen for about a month. :)

Hmmm...( Sunday, Sunday )