Hurt the Ones You're With, Part 2

So, tonight I told Neal to shut up at the table. We were talking about my plan for putting some trellis panels across the back of the house and he said he liked it then proceeded to pick apart every single thing about it.

I won't go into detail, but basically my husband is not able to visualize anything he hasn't already done before or that he has been shown.

After several minutes of this, I told him that it would be fine, so he didn't need to say anything else, and of course, he kept on. So I told him to shut up. Actually I think I told him a couple of times. But, he did.

The bad thing is...I don't even feel bad about saying it. After a point, you just get fed up with the crap that people dish out.

Hurt the Ones You're With

I said something to my daughter Anne this evening that really upset her. I did apologize for hurting her feelings because I wasn't intentionally trying to do it, but it was how I felt and I felt like I needed to say it.

In spite of being upset with me, she cooked an awesome dinner of breakfast for us...scrambled eggs, sausage, gravy, biscuits, sliced tomatoes and very delicious fruit salad. She didn't eat with us because she said she wasn't very hungry, but I suspect it was because she didn't feel that charitable towards me. Oh well....

The difficult part of this is that I have never recovered from my shock and sadness over the problems that she has had. At the root is my heartbreak over losing the daughter I thought I had. This person who took her place is a little like her, but not the same and I still can't adjust to it.

I know it sounds dramatic to say heartbreak, when my daughter is still here, walking around and breathing, when so many others have lost loved ones, but I am not being overly dramatic. At one point, while I was wondering, for the thousandth time, why I was so sad and why I was having such a difficult time dealing with it, I realized that it was because my heart had been broken. And that is the only way to describe what I felt...just absolute, complete sadness and feelings of loss.

So, yeah, she isn't the only one with issues...I have plenty. And, sometimes, the not so nice things I feel come out. But, hopefully she knows that I really never intend to say anything mean. My observations are, after all, my observations, and if it upsets her to hear it, then I guess either she'll have to grow thicker skin or I'll have to not be very honest with her.

On other home fronts, Neal took his mom to the doctor today for some bloodwork. She was so weak that he said she could barely lift up her foot to step on the curb. She is in very, very bad shape. I really don't know how she even makes it from day to day.

I think Anne and Sarah plan to go see her tomorrow. Sarah is actually going to call early in the morning and see if she can take her to her hair appointment at 9:00. In her shape, she shouldn't be driving, but I'm sure she doesn't want to give up her independence.

I heard a report on the radio this afternoon that talked about results from studies on Alzheimers patients. All of the things that we have heard that is good, like keeping mentally active, etc. apparently don't really show significant results.

Drat....I was really counting on getting my master's degree in middle age to stave off a few years of dementia!

Getting Nervous

I'm getting nervous because so far I haven't heard anything from Rachel about whether or not her boyfriend Jason has heard from the company he interviewed with last week. He felt pretty good about it but he was one of three they were considering.

I so much want him to get this job and be able to relocate to VA before Rachel goes to Africa. I'm really hoping I'll hear something good tomorrow. They told him they would let him know soon.....

Sunday Morning

I was getting ready to go to church but I was running behind, so I decided to stay home. Sarah was getting ready, but when I decided to stay home, she decided to stay home too. She's been working on a paper and I have been doing household chores; laundry, dishes and I am organizing my cd's to put them in the boxes I bought from Ikea.

So, all of my lesson plans are done. Yesterday. Almost a first for me, but I spent hours working on them. I made some flannelboard activities to use and laminated them...it took a long time. But, I'll have them the next time I do the same activity.

Yesterday I posted some views from houses on Ocracoke. Today I will post a couple of other photos. One is the exterior of my favorite Ocracoke house that is for sale. Prices have really gone down quite a bit, but they are still too expensive to do anything other than dream. Oh well.



I love the cedar shakes; to me this says beach, although I think I would put some grey stain on the railing. It has 3 bedrooms and 2 1/2 baths and 9' ceilings. I would love to live here. It is on the market for $595,000. Yes, more than half a million.

Here are a couple of other rooms.



The living room. I would hardly even change anything.



The master bedroom. Yes, I would paint it white or some equally appealing light color. I have had enough of wood colored walls to do me forever.


And lastly, the bathroom off of the master bedroom. I'd paint that too. I can only imagine how many hours I'd sit there in that tub. Ahhh...bliss.

Saturday Morning

I think Saturday mornings are the times I most think about living on Ocracoke. I'd like to wake up and sip my coffee while looking at this view:


Or even this view:



And, I'd even take this one:

But I guess that part of where you live is a state of mind, and right now, my mind is on Ocracoke, in the state of NC....

Unemployed

Not me, Neal. After he got home from his doctor's appt. today the temp agency called and told him that his working time had expired and he was not to report on Monday.

He, understandably, is very upset, and he has no idea why they chose not to keep him. He even left his tools there so he has to go back on Monday and get them. He would like to talk to his supervisor just to ask why they chose not to keep him, so maybe it can help him in future jobs.

I feel bad for him. He looks so sad. He was starting to enjoy working there too. I think it is very hard on a guy's masculinity to not be able to keep a job.

Sarah says she is going out after dinner to buy him some ice cream.

All Clear

I saw the doctor today and he said that my hand is doing just fine; the tenderness I have is normal. They gave me some therapeutic putty and exercises, but I am too tired to start on them tonight!

I had to go by the Surgery Center and get a receipt for the payment I made there on my medical spending card b/c I have gotten a letter from First Financial asking for verification of the charge. I am not going to get the account next year because this is the second time that I have had to send in a receipt verifying the charge. If it isn't the doctor or medicine copay amount, they want verfication and it is too much trouble.

So I talked to Rachel and she sounded a bit better. It seems she had a pretty good day and she was meeting a college friend for dinner.

Jason said he had two interviews today, one for 45 minutes and one for 30 minutes. He is one of three people apparently. Oh how I am hoping he gets it.

Ate a nice quiche dinner that Sarah fixed and did a little bit of school work. I am about ready for bed.

The Really Bad Part....

The really bad part of being a parent to a person with resistant depression is wondering if there was something different you could have done when they were little.

I know I was a good parent, but there is always that but...and the "I could haves'; I could have been more patient, I could have this or that. But, really, does anyone really know what to do and I certainly gave her many advantages, and much love and security. But it didn't seem to be enough. She's almost 30 and she is going to have to figure it out, but I hate for her to go through so much pain.

Tomorrow Jason has his next interview for the job and I am terrified that he is not going to get an offer. She needs him to be there so badly, even though she is taking off to Kenya for three months.

I don't like feeling so helpless, but I am. I can talk and listen when she calls, but I can't really help. And that is the bad part.

The Longest Amount of Time That I Have Gone....

Without writing, that is. Just put me in the total slacker category.

So tonight I met Bleasha at Mazatlans to eat dinner. I know we had to have been there for a couple of hours. I feel like I was talking her ear off, but I haven't seen her to visit in a looooong time. She had plenty of news for me too....heard all about some local scandals. Which shall remain unreported.

Bleasha's dad has had a reoccurance of cancer and was to undergo surgery to remove a tumor above his stomach. The doctor was unable to complete the surgery because her dad's condition was too precarious to survive the surgery. So now he has the incision and still has the tumor. He is still on chemo and Bleasha says his spirits are good. She is going to Chattanooga this weekend for a reunion weekend with college friends. She'll have a great trip.

A funny thing happened in school today. One of my students got a boo-boo outside but for some reason he was really upset, so Tracy put a bandaid on the (microscopic) injury. When we came inside, the little girl that he is head over heels in love with said to me, "Mrs. Leonard, I tell Kevin not to cry" (and I am thinking, oh how sweet!). Then she said, "I tell him, if you cry, your parents might think the teachers hit you."

I was pretty much speechless. I just said, "Oh, thank you for helping him." It's not everyday that a student can leave me speechless, but she did.

Festivals, Festivals

Yesterday at work we had the celebration for the award that our Child Nutrition Dept. won. The preschoolers had fun planting vegetable plants in our courtyard garden. We also took a fun hayride around the front of the school after we ate lunch.

Today was the Itty Bitty Kiddie Festival at the fairgrounds in Lexington. I went to help Tami; I offered; she didn't ask anyone else to come. She felt bad b/c we all had to work last Saturday. But, she had to work last Saturday too...

Anyway, we didn't hand out too much information, but we did a little and we made tons of tissue paper butterflies with kids. I had three of my students show up; Phalona, Kevin and Ja'Veon. It was a fun day and a beautiful day; warm but not too bad and breezy. Which made for a challenge holding down the tissue paper while making the butterflies.

Afterwards I went to Lowes and bought two ferns for the front porch. I want to spiff it up a bit, so I also bought a lovely shade of green paint to paint the swing and the wooden porch furniture. Too bad I didn't have the energy to start on the job by the time I got home.

This has been a busy, busy week. By yesterday evening my hand was killing me! I did overuse it this week so I have been trying not to overuse it today. So now I am going to get off of the computer and head to my bed and read for a while.

Work, Work, Work...

Big celebration at school tomorrow. Our Child Nutrition Dept. won a big award so the place is being spruced up. All sorts of dignitaries from Washington, Raleigh and Atlanta (why Atlanta?) are supposed to be there. The preschoolers are planting vegetables in our garden. There is an adorable fruit stand set up in the courtyard.

Earlier rumors were that Michelle Obama could show...not likely! But still...it's fun to think about.

The Taxman Cometh

We got to get our taxes done tomorrow. I don't know why we put this off for so long...we don't even have that much stuff to get together anymore. I hope we don't have to pay...I think it will be close this year.

Got my new camera today. Well, it's not really mine because it is the camera I bought to replace my school camera which I ruined when I dropped it into a puddle at the beach. I tried it out right away by taking pictures of Anne and Bryan cooking dinner. Of course they posed for me.

Well, I don't have that much more to say. I feel kind of tired. I will probably go to bed earlier tonight. The last couple of nights I have gotten to bed closer to 11:00 and I kept yawning all day today. Plus I am out of my regular 12 hour chlortrimeton and the stuff you take more frequently isn't doing enough to kick my allergies. The inside of my nose feels like....well, I was going to say a mine field...things constantly exploding, but I have no idea what that is like, so I'll just say it is feeling extremely allergic.

Gosh, I know why no one reads my blog! It's a good thing I don't expect to have any readers!

You Would Think....

You would think that I could remember to post something every day. I don't know why I forget. I read my blogs every day and I see this one first, so you would think that it would jog my memory. But no.

I have been busy finishing my assessments that should have been done by the end of February and writing the progress reports from said assessments AND having conferences. I had one today and I have one Wednesday AM...then I have several for the next two days.

It's Kindergarten screening time at our school. And I hate it. I hate it because the instrument they use only assesses vocabulary and some letter and number identification. And a little counting. And that is only three of the 50 goals and objectives we work on all year long. So, some of our kids, who are weak in the letter and number area don't look like they have learned anything all year long, when we know they have.

It's frustrating. Oh well.

Now on to my next task. Finishing up with assembling the tax info. We have an appointment on April 14, two days from now, to get them done. Nothing like waiting till the last minute. Only it isn't because the last minute would be Thursday!

Work on Saturday

Yes, today, Saturday, was a work day. It was a make-up day for one of our snow days. But it wasn't that bad. We only had 11 kids...I really thought we would have almost all of them...but we had a good day.

We planted more things in our garden today and just as we were getting ready to go in for lunch, Ms. Mixon came with her class to put their worm farm in the garden. So now our soil should be well-aerated!

My hand continues to improve...it doesn't hurt much now although it is still swollen and I do have limited use, but it is amazing how quickly it is healing! I think I am right on track.

Eating Breyers Mint Chocolate Chip ice cream...and then heading to bed.

A "No Brace" Day

I slept without the brace last night and decided to try going without it today and I think I am really ready to be rid of it. It was actually beginning to hurt me to wear it.

My hand is a little swollen though so I think I need to put an ice pack on it for a little while. The doctor said to let pain and swelling be my guide....hmmmm....that sounds like a good title for a book. Or a blog. Haha.

We have to work tomorrow even though it's Saturday. It's a make-up day from the snow. Then after work I need to hit the portfolio and progress reports really, really hard to get ready for conferences next week. And I need to finish getting tax stuff together.

Nothing like putting it off till the last minute. I guess it's more exciting that way. Or maybe I just work better under pressure.

Really Harder Than It Seems

I thought it would be so easy to write every day. But, it's not. I usually forget.

So, there is also the problem of what to write. There is news...usually not much of that. Health updates...well, there just isn't much to write.

So, I'll start with health updates. My hand has been hurting. Tracy says it is because I am using it more, so I guess she is right.

News. This is big news. Rachel is going to Kenya for the summer for an internship. I hardly know what to say...that is really far away. And such a different culture, but I'm sure it is going to be very interesting to her, and she needs the internships for employment opportunities post grad school. So, it will be interesting to see what her experiences there will be like.

I should be working on school work but I think I am going to go watch Law and Order and then try to do a little bit of schoolwork. I am totally not motivated, and, as I mentioned, my hand does hurt. So that makes me less motivated.

Post Vacation

I guess I could have written drafts for posting while I was at Hunting Island, but I didn't.

I did ruin my school camera by dropping it into a puddle of water, but fortunately I was able to get my pictures off of the card.

Now I need to replace that camera and also I might as well go ahead and buy a waterproof camera since this is the third one I have ruined.

I did have a great time on my trip though. It was so wonderful just to do as I wanted to, when I wanted to without concern for anyone else! The ultimate in relaxation.

My mom called me one night and said that she thought I might be lonely...nothing could have been farther from the truth! I was so happy and content!

New Job!

Not for me but Neal. He starts work on Tuesday at Fletcher Machine shop on Highway 64. The pay is not too good, but at least it is a start.

Got the car packed today for camping...now I have to do laundry and pack. I'll leave in the morning but I'm not trying to get up early to go or anything. It should be 5 1/2 or 6 hours tops. It'll be a nice day to drive.

Here is a photo of the campground; my site won't be this close to the beach. By the time I reserved one, I had to settle for a spot further back in the campground, but that's ok...