chatter

Karen from Maine was in town visiting Carroll who lives 35 minutes from me. Colleen from Eau Claire with friends near by planned a trip down so it is time for a mini March Mommy Get together.

Last year it was just Carroll, Karen and I but this year I needed to bring Hollace (she was in Fort Wayne last year at that time) and Hollace needed to bring her art stuff.

I felt especially quiet for the most part just listening to everyone talk. I didn’t really have anything to contribute to the conversation and when I wanted to chime in, I couldn’t find a place to jump in.

Hollace and Shannon (Carroll’s daughter) hit it off. They both draw a lot and had that in common. My iPad was used extensively by the girls. I am sure Carroll is thrilled that now her daughter wants an expensive tech toy.

All in all, it was a nice gathering.

The other day I seen a sign at a car wash (where I look for their constantly changing witty signs) that hit close to home for me. It said, “Just because people don’t understand you, doesn’t mean you are artist”. I feel like I hid behind that statement a bit.

All I want to do is sit around and do nothing or think or introspect or just hang around the house. I don’t want to be in charge. With me in charge, we go nowhere, do nothing, sit around.

I need someone to plan the itinerary. Someone to say this is what we are doing and where we are going. I won’t want to go or do it of course but it won’t be up to me and it might even be fun, get us out, do something, experience something.

I feel like the rest of the world is out doing something on a beautiful Sunday and those who aren’t are doing important things that need to get done around the house. I am doing neither. Earlier today I sat in a chair in the front yard wishing someone would just wave a magic wand and clean up my yard and house. I was wishing I wasn’t so cheap that I would hire a landscaper to lush up the yard, make it look nice. I don’t want to do it.

Recently there was a “What the Duck” cartoon that was me to a tee.

I hate perfect weather days, there is intense pressure to go out and play and I don’t want to. I am jealous of dedicated writers who spend all their time writing. Of course they need to experience life to draw upon that writing but whatever.

I really want to make time a project of some sort. Or write about it. Or just manage it. Today is Saturday and as usual I let the precious day go by.

I am perfectly happy as a homebody even if we live in a dump of a house, I have it set up like I like it with everything I need to be happy. Well of course as happy as I can be in a dump. Lately living in this crappy little house is bothering me knowing that (of course) everyone else lives in a nicer house. It started on Monday morning when I was picturing people getting ready for work in their nice house. If I don’t compare with everyone then I am ok with the house I guess.

Ok, somehow my post on time turned into house hate. Back on track sorta. Because I don’t want to leave and the kid doesn’t want to leave but really needs to, I decided to take the train to Liberyville to do another installment of the neighborhood walks (hmmm, maybe it is these walks that are making me hate my house and neighborhood, didn’t think of that). I picked Libertyville because they were having a festival this weekend.

The train left at 2:51 which really messed with how I dealt with time today. It felt like I just got up and now it is time to leave the house for a couple hours that wouldn’t bring us back until 6:00. The whole day is shot!

My plan originally sounded good but because of the train schedule we would have to hang around and walk for 2.5 hours. About 30 minutes did it as far as the festival so it was off to walk around the neighborhoods of large rich people houses (yeah, that helps the house hate I have going). It was sticky out and eventually with an hour to go, we went to the library to cool off. Hollace and I both constantly commenting the 45 minutes we sat there (until they closed) that our faces were still red. None of us Ward’s take heat well which usually manifest itself as a red face with very little exertion.

While we were walking about Libertyville Days a morbidly obese man with man boobs the likes I have never seen. Seriously he had C cup boobs–they were not shaped like typical man fat. As I walk past him, I swore he said, “hi skinny”. I know I am “skinnier” then he was but I highly doubt he meant it literally, I took it as him being sarcastic and was slightly disturbed the rest of the time there.

Once home, I finished my library book before it disappeared from my iPad and pretty much felt like I wasted the rest of my Saturday. Reading books and watching movies are considered a waste of time to me.

One of the reasons I think I am a homebody and am kicking myself when I waste my time is because I want to be an artist, with it consuming all that time. Instead of doing art I am spending 1:30 every week night watching The Dick Van Dyke Show, Mary Tyler Moore Show and  Bob Newhart show (the latter which I don’t really like but is turning into a comfort show). I have become a master of saving all this time to make art but instead I waste it. I don’t want to leave the house because I need it to do it but I don’t.

Speaking of art and my iPad. Hollace is really cranking out the art on the iPad. She is using the iPad they way I want, as a creation tool as opposed to a consumption one like I only do. Maybe tomorrow I will work up a work of art.

I have a feeling tomorrow, time will go the same. At 2:30 I want to go see a special showing of the Broadway play, Company with Neil Patrick Harris and Steven Colbert that is playing at a select number of movie theaters.

Enough rambling for now. I should go to bed so I don’t feel inclined to sleeping away all that free time. Maybe I will set an alarm to make an iPad painting.

BTW, this blog entry was on my to do list so today wasn’t a total wash out.

I am trying to explain to RAW why his sucky defeatist attitude isn’t the way to go and I can’t. So out of frustration I leave the room and turn on the music loud (I guess that is the teenager in me if I have one left in me that is).

My approach to a problem is to research it and figure out a way to fix it. His is to wallow in self pity and whine that it is going to be horrible like this forever, whats the use.

I can’t deal with that attitude and I can’t articulate to him short of saying don’t be so negative. It is too ingrained in him.

Sure, he wants to know how to do that but that is where I am stuck, it is a state of mind. I have it and he doesn’t. Anything I would suggest, he won’t give a chance–automatically discounting how dumb it is. And God forbid they don’t work, I will never hear the end of it. He is so not open minded about a lot of things.

As you can see here, I can’t even articulate what is going on here in writing either. Instead of wallowing in that fact, I am now going to see what I can do to improve this part of me. And I will probably research/figure out a way for him to change his attitude and show him that with a better mind set, things can be better even when they aren’t.

Yes, shit happens, but it is how you deal with it that matters. That reminds me of an article I think I read a few months ago. I need find that and print it out to mister close minded, to see if I can chisel that in this thick skull. I am now off to figure out what that was that I read.

I feel better, still can’t articulate worth a shit but feel more in control of my destiny. I can’t change him but I can change how I deal with his attitude. Thanks for listening.

I really am pathetic. I decided to vent about what I do best, wasting time when I seen my last blog entry. It appears word for word what I was going to write about now. Only I can’t figure out how to sit in this lounger with my wireless keyboard and iPad. I do recall doing it well last time, now I am all awkward and so.

This weekend was really summery and yet Hollace and I (RAW is in Indiana this weekend) hunkered down and stayed inside the whole time. Really, seriously normal people don’t do that do they? No they embrace the weather and go out in it, play. I had two activities on my to do list with Hollace in mind. One is play tennis and the other was bake bread (again with the hunker down thing). We did neither. It isn’t Hollace’s fault because I lead the charge here but I can’t seem to drag myself to do anything. I am overly conscious of time to the point of not wanting to take the time out to do it. I need an attitude adjustment concerning how I deal with time.

There were several other things on my list I wanted to do this weekend I didn’t do either but I did one thing that wasn’t on the list and that was clean the tub. Of all the household chores that one for some reason gets neglected. I just close the curtain and forget about it. Oh, I just remembered I didn’t put the mat back in the tub and Hollace is taking a shower right now. Hope she doesn’t slip.

Hollace has too much free time. I started reading an article today about kids and how they really need free time for innovation. Hollace doesn’t have that problem and she is pretty innovative. Yet I still feel guilty that I don’t push her more for anything. I let her slide on everything. I guess it is my lack of initiative leaking on her. So what do I do about it?

I started sketching out Hollace’s summer schedule. I just don’t know how to get more people in it. It isn’t bad enough she is an only child, she is probably a lonely one or about to be once school is out. She is exactly like me in a lot of ways.

What do I need to do to get more initiative and do stuff. I need to start acting on all those things I need to do. I want to paint the bathroom, why not just do it instead of writing it on a list to do. JUST DO IT!

As soon as Hollace gets out of the shower, maybe we will go play tennis. It isn’t too late. Then tonight I will sign her up for lessons and put that schedule in action.

Here I sit wanting to ponder life but really don’t have the focus to do so. last night I almost wanted to in a superficial way but totally forgetting about it until I looked at my blog entry. When I went back to mention my original intention I had absolutely no intention to really going back and writing about it.

right now I am sitting on our little patio watching the wind whip the sun/wind screen RAW installed with the screen gazebo. It lost it’s tie to hold it down on the right side so now it whips madly, so much so, that I can’t sit in the lounge chair next to it or be constantly attacked by it.

I am reading a library book on the iPad that just came up today. A week after I decided not to start another library book because of the pressure to finish it quickly before it self deleted with no option to renew it without waiting the month or two before it is your turn again. Who wants to wait that long to finish the end of a book? Anyway, this book came up and it sounded alright so I checked it out anyway and started reading it. I was not expecting any profound use of my supposedly magical precious time, also known as my day off with no one else home.

This weekend I felt I do nothing and live an unusually boring life and dragging my poor daughter along for the boring ride. This was probably brought on with her constant “I am bored” which really is typical for a 12 year old. She wants to do something but didn’t know what. I am suppose to figure that out and before you say, that is her job to do, I do feel I need to show her how to figure it out. How would she know that automatically? Let me clarify. She is really good at entertaining herself at home but we were out visiting friends and family. We were either sitting around, going out to eat, walking around the lake or shopping the mall. We do that all the time when visiting. What else is there to do? At home we do less actually but seriously that there has to be more to an interest existence then this.

I was feeling a little blah about life and the fact that for the most part I am ok with that thinking that everyone else is out there doing something when I got to the part in my book where the author is asking the exact same thing. The profound moment for me was realizing that EVERY one in one way or another feels that way and unless you go rock climbing or jump out of airplanes what else is there? Actually at the mall they had a big rubber band thingy that a kid can bounce around with. Hollace of course didn’t want to do that. Neither of us are adventurous at all. See where our options lie?

The kid is due home here in a few minutes so I feel my time to reflect and try and figure it out is running out and I have now lost my chance for total aloneness. RAW is due home tonight and I told him not to come home until later so i can have the place to myself. And I did. And it went fast. Did I accomplish anything? When I say accomplish I mean creatively not clean the bathroom (which I really need to do badly) or scrub the camper for next week’s tip to camp in Pam’s driveway. I did sketch out what my new webpage should look like but I still need to go in-depth with it and do it. I tried to sketch things out digitally on the iPad but I think real paper will get me farther.

You will have to excuse this whole entry actually. I am just trying to get my thoughts down with no regard to proper grammar and run on sentences. I might go back and try and fix it but probably not. So toodles and farewell for now.

This weekend I sent RAW off for an adventure to God only knows. Since he was still recovering from surgery but mostly because his birthday fell on Easter this year, I told him he should go out and travel the countryside now. I took Friday and Monday off so he could go. He headed for New York state.

Hollace also had Friday off so we went to Ikea. I wanted to get some more small box frames that I love from there. They only had one! I was bummed so I flagged down an Ikea employee who found out those frames are being discontinued but there was a box in another section. I filled up my bag with them. I bought 14. I also bought a blue chair to go with the 2 chair bistro set for the patio.

On Saturday we headed out to Crown Point to see the folks and some quality time with Sherry.

I tried to treat all to a nice dinner (Sherry, mom and a to go box for dad) but eventually they all in some way or another paid me back. Back at Sherry’s later we made plans to go to Ravinia in July so she bought the tickets. Now I have to go check out the artists we are going to see–a group called Five for Fighting and Michelle Branch. Sherry wants to see them, me not so much but I am sure it will still be fun.

I am so indecive when I am down there trying to split my time between the family and Sherry. I don’t want either to feel slighted that I don’t know what to do. It would of been so much easier to stay at Sherry’s for the night but at the last minute decided to go back to mom’s to sleep.

On Sunday, Sherry, Hollace and I went to the mall where I was on a spending spree. I bought a popcorn maker, some clothes and a really cool wallet for more money then I think a wallet should be but I could not resist, it was too cute.

I don’t think the older woman check out lady could fathom it LOL. It was only $48. After she said she thought that it was cute seemed shocked at the price and that there was no sale price then tried to talk me into getting a Carson’s charge to get 25% off.

We went to Red Robins for lunch. While there the hot sunny skies turned dark and a storm approached (exactly when I thought it might).

We got back to CP where we waited the storm out before Hollace and I made our way back home. As soon as we got home, the skies darkened again and another storm hit but we were safely home.

Tomorrow Hollace goes back to school and I have the day to myself. I told RAW he couldn’t come back early LOL. Now is time to review my to do list so I don’t waste that time then go to bed.

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edited to add:
I just remembered why I came here to write about my weekend. It was to talk about my boring never do much life and how it impacts Hollace. I was feeling guilty about that this weekend but now I am tired and don’t really want to write more so I will have to examine that at a later date.

I had to pull out my keyboard here on the iPad to properly reply to someone on FB that messaged me and have 20 minutes until the news so here I am.

It is Thursday night and I am off until Tuesday. Giving RAW a little vacation since he couldn’t get away for his birthday. Right now I believe he is in Erie Pennsylvania. Not sure where he is going. Not sure he knows.

Today I got the cushions for our patio furniture and the hooks for the lights. Now it is time finish off the screen gazebo and relax.

Tomorrow we will probably go to Ikea but on Saturday we are heading to CP to see the folks and Sherry. Will come home on Sunday and Monday will be all mine since H has to go to school (she is off tomorrow). I hope RAW doesn’t get home until late Monday. I want to have the place totally to myself. I should probably start a list of all I want to do.

At work, I am working on my first iPad app. It is an easy one (I learned a lot which is the point)and I plan on doing a more complicated one after this since I still have 55 hours out of 80 that I was allowed.