Lost in Transition

If you were to ask my friend -B. She'd tell you that I'm a lister. She'd tell you how much she mocked me when we were in graduate school for drawing out the seating chart for my wedding reception for only 38 people during every lecture until I had the thing memorized. Then I'd move on to making the dreaded to do list. 

As a grown up, you are usually tasked with taking care of the place which you live. You make your bathroom dirty, you clean it up. You need dishes so you wash them. Gone are the days when Mom or Dad or an older brother or sister do them for you. If you live in a pigsty, that's a conscious decision you make to do other things rather than those day-to-day items. (Or if you're MacTroll you've trained yourself not to notice them.)

I have three household chores that I hate. 1) Washing the kitchen floor, 2) vacuuming stairs and 3) vacuuming out my car. I hate them because these are the three items where, even if I did them every day -- they'd still be dirty by the next day. They're repetitive. And, of course, someone somewhere along the way said that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again expecting a different result. 

Now that I'm not at work, the house is my job. Every day I run the dishwasher. Every day I do some laundry. Currently, I'm working on my forever project of whitewashing my dog-eared fence. I also still have a list of pictures and curtains to hang. Among other projects that I just can't seem to knock out. 

You want to know when I do them? When I'm pissed off at something. Like so angry I could hit something. Instead of taking up boxing or spousal abuse, I take my hammer and drill and start hanging things. Sure, picture hanging when angry skews the science of it, but it's done and it's not gonna fall off the wall. 

I've skipped corners where I could to prevent the neverending to do list. I planted perennials. I put in decorative concrete rather than a deck to have less to stain, but there's just so much that is the same day in and day out. And so much that never gets done. 

It depresses me. In PR, you prepare for an event. You do stages 1-334. Then it's over and you move on to the next thing. In editing, the publication or story eventually gets published and you move on doing the same thing over again, but in the end you have a forever completed project. 

But how much purpose can my life have if I'm just doing the same things over and over and over again, and for some reason, still hopeful that they'll have a different result.

I miss a list with check marks. I think this is why I like organizing the family group. Each event has a beginning a middle and an end. 

I miss endings.

Sure, now the sun comes out

I'm looking out my bedroom window to the south, and there's this pretty strip of sunset shining on the soon to be ampitheater. 

Anyway, MacTroll's flight back from NYC got canceled this morning. He got rebooked on one leaving at 6:25 p.m. ET. And, of course, he called at 7 p.m. before we headed up to bathtime to announce that it looks like he'll make it to Chicago (plane is gonna be late taking off due to mechanical issues) but that he'll have to spend the night in Chicago. 

So, my single parenthood has an extension. 

Big SWAT team presence down on campus today due to an armed robbery. I was at McDo's with Quigs and Mom when Mom got the call. Today was the first day that X-man and I have socialized in 60 hours. And I think it wore him out. He was in bed at 7:30 p.m. with no struggles. While we were looking at his baby books (his current favorite bedtime stories) he had his head resting on my leg. Nothing like a little time at the play area with Speed Racer cars and good friends. 

We also went to the library today and we stayed too long. They were having the last of Baby Fest, which I knew in the back of my head was going on because, well, because I'm the scheduling lady at CARE, but I had forgotten. When I see baby, I don't generally think of X-man any more. But he got invited in by my friend Ms. Ginny who I used to work with at the Douglass Branch Library. And truthfully, once they opened the little person's door, I don't think there was anything anyone could have done to keep him out. 

We did see his friends Xavier and Ezekiel. They're getting ready to move to Europe for a while, and I think D is a bit annoyed that things are taking so slow to get them there. But she's doing a great job living in transition. Speaking of transition experts, big hugs to Quigs for enduring the real estate market from hell. 

Okay, I think I'm going to see if my Ugly Betty is available... I watched my Grey's, and I don't care what people say. I love Meredith, because I identify with her whole set of neuroses... I know. It's sad. Mock away.