Philosophies and Observations

I was poking around my Blogger archives when I finally decided to start posting again, and found a couple items in the Draft state that were going on over a year old now. One was a bit current-events-related and a bit past its sell-by date, so I deleted that one. The other made for an interesting observation.

It was more of a philosophical question and how I would answer it. I'm not going to post it; my observation is that my answer now isn’t what my answer would have been then. It's funny to think that ideas I subscribed to so heavily (or so strongly TOLD MYSELF I subscribed to) are so easily questioned when my world view changed.

I used to subscribe very heavily to the following philosophies (and no, neither one of these was the question - nice try :-):

• Everything in this world ends. Every. Thing. Worrying about how it will end is counterproductive. The smart thing is to enjoy what you have, when you have it, and quit worrying about how things will unfold
• You are in control of your own happiness. For the things in life you aren’t in control of, you have control over how you deal with them, and nobody can take that away from you.

Of course, that was before the snow globe got shaken up and everything went all crooked. I guess I never had reason to question them before - seems common-sense, right? Great advice, wonderful wisdom.

Not so easy in practice.

Sort of like everything else in life, right? We know that if we keep eating the Halloween candy, we’re not doing our health any favors. But that mini Mounds bar is soooooo good. We know that we should choose the salad instead of the pizza for lunch because we haven’t seen a real vegetable in three days, but the pizza has bacon on it today and hey - bacon pizza! And then we kick ourselves after the fact.

So, with the events of late, I have become somewhat of a worrier. I used to worry about other folks, that's not the part that's changed, and really, it was more concern than worry. But now I'm worried about my own future. Quite out of character for me, and a bit disconcerting. I know it’s absolutely pointless - half the time, things don’t work out at all like you’d envision, so there’s no sense worrying, and the other half the time, they will, and you’ll have to deal with them THEN, so there’s no sense stressing out NOW.

As a side observation, though, it seems like the volumes of paperwork required for a divorce are designed to bump up the stress level of the average person. Luckily, that part is pretty much done. But I digress...

As for the “in control of my own happiness”? Yes, I still believe in that, but boy have I not been living that lately. Stress makes it easy to see the world through a dark filter, and it’s tough to remember to take that filter off when looking at the rest of the world.

It’s unnerving enough when your world changes out from underneath you, but questioning who you are and what you believe in just adds to the mix and seems to feed a cycle of insecurity. it’s something I need to be aware of, and be careful not to get too far down that path. Right now, the future is both frightening and promising. At least it’s nice to have the balance of the two. Maybe the best philosophy right now is a simple one:

One day at a time.

Taking Back the Blog...

Wow. Well, it's been over a year since I posted. It's time to take back the blog.

So what has Jen been up to since September of last year? 

Funny how so much can change in that amount of time. If you'd told me I'd be where I am today, I'd tell you to quit mixing wine and cold medicine. 

But what's a story without plot twists, right?

The big stuff first… 

Bill and I separated back in August. Some of you know. Apologies to the rest of you who don't. Or didn't. FB was updated, but miraculously, it didn't decide to broadcast it to my entire friends list and twenty third-world countries in the process. 

To head off the questions without going into much detail, it was a mutual decision… we have maintained a solid presence for the kids, and are showing them that they are important, that we are still a family regardless of what happens, and that we are both there for them. All in all, I think things are going as well as they can go - the drama is minimal, and the friends and family we've built over the last 20-odd years are still friends and family to both of us, and I am incredibly thankful for that. 

The end of a series of good chapters… and the rest of the story (stories, now) are yet to be written.

The not-quite-as-big-stuff now…

The kids are getting bigger. This should not come as a surprise. It doesn't. But wow… One's playing trumpet in 5th-grade band and running 5k races with me, the other is having a blast playing soccer and hanging out with the boys (!) in 2nd grade. We're gonna have to watch that one… ;-)

I ran my 3rd half-marathon in May. And I slacked off and haven't run much since. Bad Jen. Still… after three half-marathons, I could be convinced to train for a full one. Yes, I have apparently said this in front of witnesses now. Oooopsie.

And oh-by-the-way, the Run to Remember course in Boston is a GREAT half-marathon… Mostly flat, great scenery (running down Memorial Drive along the Charles to Harvard and back)… just gorgeous. :-)

Still teaching Spinning… although I've slacked off on the music/playlist creation. I'll have to get back on the stick for that.

Started writing again. THAT was a surprise. I was a member of an APA (Amateur Press Association) going on ten years ago, and I got burned out between working, the kids, and all the other stuff. It's been fun to noodle around with stories and poetry again and remember that this geek girl liked English class once too. And I believe it started with a friend who decided to start posting Haikus one day, and an "Artclass" that came about afterward (animated gifs, prose, poetry, and... crayon art??)… see what you started? :-)

And so here we are.

A new chapter. Some revisiting of things I used to do but stopped doing (Taking pictures! And I even baked today! Whee!). Some regrets. Some sadness ahead, but with blank pages in the book that are yet to be written.

It's time to write.

The Unofficial End of Summer...

...or so they call Labor Day Weekend, anyway. So school's started once again, and the long, lazy days are getting shorter, and it's time to put the favorite summer things away in the attic. No, not the white pants (hell with the "rules" - I wear those all year round!)... but the things that just make summer what it is:

• The tinny jingle of the ice cream truck (which unfortunately drives too fast down our street)
• Catching grasshoppers with the kids
• Getting grass all over your bare feet after the lawn has been mowed
• The ferocity of the summer rainstorm
• The smell of the air after the rain
• The morning fog over the field when it's that special kind of cold & humid
• Fireflies
• The smell of the pine trees
• Sitting out on the deck with the feet up on the table and a cold drink in hand
• Wearing flip-flops outside the house

So, back in the attic they go until next year... Which is fine. Now I get to take out the Fall stuff:

• The crisp cool air in the morning, and being able to see your breath
• Fair and "Old Home Days" season
• The reds and yellows of the maple trees
• The smell of burning leaves
• The "crunch crunch" of walking through the fallen leaves
• Sweaters(!)
• Apple picking, apple cider, and pumpkin pie

The days are getting shorter, but this is the season I like best... Everything about Fall just seems to have a bit of "spice" to it. Not too hot, not too cold, nature's beauty at its finest, and the beginning of the "hunker down with family and friends" holiday season. Oh, and figuring out what sweater goes with those white pants before I spill cider all over them!

Enjoy the transition, everyone! Have a great holiday weekend!

(Oh, and thanks to a couple folks for reminding me I have a blog! :-)

Being Thankful...

Thanksgiving is one of my favorite holidays: very little of the retail hype that accompanies Christmas (which now starts directly after Halloween, apparently), time spent with loved ones, and reflections on what we're thankful for.

What am I thankful for?

• My family: two incredibly cute kids with very different and wonderful personalities, and a husband who gave up his career to be the stay-at-home-dad.
  
• That the above kids have not yet decided to sing the made-up songs about bodily functions (thanks, Dad!) anywhere other than home and in the car.
• That I can still giggle at goofy songs about bodily functions and sing along with my kids.
• I'm thankful that my mother's health has been good and the cancer hasn't returned.
• That my uncle has a defiant, stubborn streak and is currently doing very well with his chemo.
• That my tumor was benign.
• I'm thankful for my job and the people I work with... don't let this get out, but I really do like my job (shh!).
  
• I'm thankful for my friends: those who've been family to me for many years, and those who've been recent additions to my circle of friends.
• I'm thankful for the opportunity to recently reconnect to many old friends (mostly via Facebook), perhaps even closer to some than we were "back in the day."
• I'm thankful for the basics: a roof over my head, three meals to eat (plus snacks, plus coffee... I'm very thankful for coffee...), clothes to wear, and a vehicle to get me around. The extras are all gravy.
  

So... what are you thankful for?

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone. May you spend it with loved ones and enjoy every minute.

Where were you when...?

Remembering 9/11/01 today...

So... where were you?

I was at work. I forget exactly what I was working on... that's not the important part of the memory, I guess. I was on the phone with a friend's wife when she said, "A plane just hit the World Trade Center." It seemed like a tragic accident at the time. Initially, nobody knew what was going on, and at the time, we (and some of the news outlets) thought that it was a small passenger plane.

Our building isn't known for allowing any type of good radio reception. My manager at the time had a radio in her window office, and was trying to tune in to the news. Reports were totally chaotic. Was it a small, Cessna-sized plane? Was it a passenger jet like some reports were now saying? We pretty much stopped working at that point and tried to get something out of the radio reports. CNN, Fox News, etc. were still speculating on their websites.

They eventually all converged on the news that a passenger jet had hit the WTC and were attempting to figure out why. Then the second plane hit.

I'm sure you all remember the feeling... horrified, unable to do anything except listen. And read. The radio was turned up, and a few of us tried to dig up some web sites that would tell us anything new. CNN, Fox News, ABC News... all the major sites were useless. Slowed to a crawl with everyone trying to access them at once. The only site that would load (mostly) reliably was the Drudge Report (which, to its benefit, is as flash-less as can be). Then the Pentagon was hit. Then another plane was said to have crashed in Pennsylvania... some had speculated that it had been shot down. The full story didn't come out until later.

Not much work went on the rest of that day. Those of us who had friends in NYC tried to make sure they were ok (to my relief, my NYC friends were). We went through our routine after we exhausted the news, but we really didn't get much done. On my way home, a man was outside at the end of his driveway with a home-made sign, saying "Honk if you love our country." I honked. And I cried. He was there every evening for the next week or two doing the same thing.

I got home and hugged Ellen, who was about 9 months old at the time (and thankfully too young to understand what was all over the TV that day).

In the following days, I learned that our company lost one of its own on one of the flights that struck the WTC. I saw him in the hallways, said hi, but never knew him. And never would. I worried that, as a government contractor, we might be a target as well. But most of all, I was determined to do what I could to support our customers and friends in the military, who would most likely be putting their lives on the line in the future as a result of this attack.

The footage on History Channel is hard to watch. But I'm watching. And remembering.

To the victims of 9/11/01, rest in peace. God bless all those who risked their lives at the WTC to try to rescue those they could, those at the Pentagon who did the same, and the heroic passengers of flight 93 who prevented another incident and at the same time showed everyone what heroes really are. Thank you.