Today's 7 Bits of Grace

1. Publishers, and the delightful books they send me for review! It can get overwhelming, but the piles are a beauteous bounty. And yeah, I know. This isn't the first time I've been grateful for them. Occasionally everyone has re-runs.

2. The outlet of art. I'm fortunate I can blow off proverbial steam in writing, especially, but I also plan to indulge my love of creating in other ways in the near future.

3. Spring break!!! No grad school classes for me this week.

4. A family day scheduled for Good Friday. No idea what we'll do, but I'm sure we'll find us some fun.

5. Lay's potato chips! Nothing goes better with my daily turkey sandwich, though I'm *supposed* to be eating carrots instead...

6. Friends. And green beer.

7. Antacids. And sleep.

The zen of sleeping in

Didn't make UUC services this morning, as we were out late last night par-taying it up for St. Paddy's Day. My best galpal from college and her beau came along with us to see comedian (a loose term, as it turns out) Colin Quinn perform locally. After that, as it was a holiday and all, we went to our local microbrew restaurant for a few "samples." Several plastic glasses, much loud, live music and loud namings of anatomical parts later, we realized how late it really was (an astounding 1:00 a.m.) and had to head home. Luckily, for us the drive was short. Unluckily for galpal 'n beau, not so short.

Anyhoo, I'm upright and dressed today, but with a pounding headache starting at the base of my skull. Tra la!

So, nothing of a truly spiritual nature to talk about today. Spirits, yes, but not so much spiritual, unless you count the wisdom found at the bottom of a glass. At times that's not to be underestimated, I'll grant you that, but for today I'm just nursing my exhaustion and looking forward to a good nap.

Hopefully you can find some inspiration in that, though God knows what it would be. Good times, good friends, bad stand-up comedy. Green beer, interesting Irish-inspired headgear and lots of laughs. It's a good thing.

Hangin' in

" The horizon leans forward, offering you space to place new steps of change."

- Maya Angelou


A thought occurred to me today. They tend to do that sometimes. I realized I've been saying "hang in there" to a lot of people lately, friends or acquaintances having difficulties with a wide variety of things, dragging them down. It's my form of counseling, my attempt to enforce my hope the person will find strength when he or she needs it, so they can cope with difficult times. It's a catch-all phrase most of us use from time to time, a sort of shoring up, letting the person know we care.

A lot of life is made up of hanging in there, basically waiting out tough times and hoping better things are right around the corner. Much like the time we spend waiting, whether in line or at the doctor's office, whatever, this "hanging in there" time is a sort of dead time, a time of suspension.

It also occurred to me, what a waste this time can be. It's stagnant and unmoving as we resort to some sort of primal hibernation instinct, a self-protecting reflex designed to prevent us from any more harm while we work out what's first and foremost on our minds.

What I do when I'm faced with a big life challenge like this is journal about it. I like to look at things from a variety of perspectives, taking the different sides of myself into account and commenting to my core, my "higher self" as it's so commonly called, talking things out until I feel I have a better idea what's going on. Often when you really dig into things solutions will occur to you, or sometimes just temporary patches that will make things feel a little better and allow you to move on.

We all have those dead times in our lives, whole weeks and months, sometimes years when we're static, making little or no forward progress whatsoever. The evil in that is it's time you can't get back, no matter how much you may wish it. We know the best thing to do is to get unstuck and move forward, but that's so much easier said than done. For the time that is gone, that we can't get back, the important thing is to figure out the lesson and move forward as positively as you can. But while you're stuck, it's equally important to work hard to dislodge yourself, moving out of the rut as best you can and as quickly as possible.

Maybe I should change my "hang in there" phrase to something more like, "write on!" or "talk it through." It occurs to me now that telling someone to essentially stay in place, hoping life will step in and move them forward may not be the best idea after all. Getting them unstuck is much more crucial, helping them through the rough patch until they can find a new grip on things.

Funny how sometimes the most common, everyday things we say suddenly become epiphanies when we really stop to think about them. That's another step toward the goal of the life that's lived, rather than the life spent waiting around for something to happen. And I'm not some guru, not some perfect person (ask my husband, he'll tell you...), but I have found becoming more conscious of every little thing can lead to a whole lot of bigger ones.

So, don't necessarily just hang in there when life gets tough. That's my advice. Write it out, talk it out, think it through, whatever's your style. And keep moving forward.

Today's 7 Bits of Grace

1. Whipping the younger of our two dogs into a frenzy is not only fun, but damn funny. It doesn't matter what you say so long as you say it in a really, really excited voice. Lia seldom fails to entertain (save when she craps on the floor).

2. Sunny and 55 degrees today! After a long winter that was just what the doctor ordered.

3. Brownies, glorious brownies.

4. A health club membership, to counteract the effects of # 3. Well, only if I haul ass OVER there. But I know it's there. That's the good part.

Right?

5. Dress pants with just enough spandex in them so the dryer doesn't shrink them as much as it might otherwise. (See # 4)

6. Writing in my journal, and the release that gives.

7. An interview with a Booker Prize winner! I can't complain. (Well, maybe I won't go that far.)

Thursday? GACK!, and recalling a dream

I would have sworn it was just Sunday yesterday, the day I go for my latest dose of UUC. I planned to post here immediately after that, but life, dear reader, most decidedly got in my way. It can be such a bitch that way.

Anyhoo, too busy now to really update you much, but I did want to report this wild dream I had, mostly so I can remember it.

I dreamed I was married to Michael Jordan, yes the former basketball player. Michael and I were in the basement dungeon (?) of our palatial home when I realized we had both a tiger and a lion running through the place. The beasts were threatening our pets and children, so I knew something had to be done. Michael jumped up, grabbed the beasts, and somehow locked them in a closet. Now, that was resourceful and all, but I somehow didn't trust a wooden door to keep us all safe. So I gathered up all the children and our pets and started up the stairs to get out of the house, while Michael kept that closet door closed. He's so selfless that way!

Then I realized our cats had had kittens (for the record, we own two MALE cats in real life - two neutered male cats) and these were running all over the place. I had to grab every one of them. I was scared to death they'd be eaten! So I eventually did get them, and headed up the stairs to safety, though I did still worry about Michael.

Then I woke up, to my real life husband shaking my shoulder saying, "Oh my God, it's 7:30! Wake up!"

Fun to have a weird ass dream I can actually remember. Usually they go POOF as soon as I wake up. This was one of those groggy, fall back asleep and dream dreams, and I was able to recall it this time around.

That's it for now. Will return with more thoughts spiritual, and another list of 7, when I can.

Today's 7 Bits of Grace

1. Banana pancakes - mmmm....

2. Sleeping in a little later than normal is a good thing.

3. The sun peeked out for a while today after a snow shower that amounted to nothing.

4. I'm meeting friends tonight at Borders!

5. They have coffee at Borders.

6. I have lots of homework, but a lot of it is reading. :-)

7. We're starting to talk about summer vacation plans here, and we may get to go east again - Hurrah! Or, if not east, perhaps west as far as California. But I wouldn't bank on that.

Sundays... BLECH.

" The feeling of Sunday is the same everywhere, heavy, melancholy, standing still."

- Jean Rhys


My question today is why do Sundays tend to feel so awful? I don't have a job I dread going to on Mondays or anything. That would explain some of it, but I love working in a library. What bibliophile wouldn't? So why does the last day of the week leave me feeling so melancholic? I can't quite get my head around that, even if it does seem like a fairly universal thing, dreading Sundays.

Sundays are usually pretty good days here, especially lately. Paul and I have gotten into the routine of going to breakfast and then to UUC services on Sunday mornings, sometimes hitting a bookstore after, sometimes going to Starbuck's. It's not like we have nothing to look forward to at the end of the week. I do usually have homework to do on Sundays, but I don't hate that, either. It's library school, after all. It doesn't (usually) suck.

So why do Sundays leave me with that feeling of dread in the pit of my stomach? They just feel so sad to me, so lacking in hope, no matter what the actual state of my day is. They're like one long string of grey days, unremittingly dismal.

It could partially be the weather, and the fact this has been a loooooong, dragged out season of cold and snow. The good news is today we set the clocks ahead, giving us more daylight hours in the evening, shortening those seemingly endless nights to something a little more manageable. I'm hoping as things warm up I'll perk up a little on Sundays, and as the days grow longer things will seem more positive.

I'll be back either later today or tomorrow to report on this week's UUC message. In the meantime, hope all's well with you and yours.

Now I'm off to do homework. The homework that doesn't suck, in case you were wondering.