****Warning**** if your expecting a post all about vegetable gardens and fruit stands, stop reading now! Post may contain some bitching and moaning so be forewarned. Oh...there will be some sailor language as well, so cover your ears!***
I was reading some of my regular blogs this week and was struck by the loveliness of summer. There are pictures of toes in sandy beaches and little ones with chocolate ice cream faces smiling and enjoying the true delight of summer days, not a care in sight. There are pictures of beautiful bowls of summer fruits and veggies just waiting to be included in some culinary masterpiece or jams and jellies stacked in tower of sweet delight.
Young mothers wax poetically about the slower pace of summer and the feeling of renewal and refreshment away from the daily carpool grind. Older mothers are delighting in children home from college, family vacations, new grandchildren and celebrating all things Grandma.
My crafting friends are thrilled with summer fabric sales and more sewing time for new projects or creating that fabulous fall wardrobe. Some expound on the joys of discovering a new pattern/technique/hobby. My writing friends celebrate finishing a new manuscript, doing line edits before publication, brainstorming a new series or reading another fabulous book while toes are dug in the sand as the smell of cocoa butter fills the senses.
It all sounds so lovely doesn't it?
It is 1 a.m. on a Friday night and what am I doing?
Flipping out over the fact that my life looks nothing like that and guess what people...it never will!
Now I know that is a dramatic statement, but anyone who reads this blogs knows that I can be a bit of a drama queen at times as I try to figure out where the path of my life is going. And yes right now next to my keyboard is a dark chocolate candy bar with almonds. You know how I feel about dark chocolate when times get tough...hey...don't be judgy! It's my crisis.
I want desperately to dig my feet into a sandy beach somewhere and wile away the hours doing nothing but listening to the hypnotic sound of crashing waves and the therapeutic giggles of little ones creating sand castles of various shapes and sizes.
Of course let's not discuss what would really happen if I was at the beach. After I had suffered severe trauma squeezing my plumpness into a bathing suit, better known as a sausage casing, my skin would look like a broiled lobster and my hot flashes would take on epic proportions. My daughter, who does not sweat, would be seizing from the affects of heat stroke and as for her skin...an alabaster nightmare. My hubby would be bitching about the sand getting into his book and my son would have a rectangle of white skin on his lap where his computer would be and stripes down the sides of his face where the ipod would be plugged in. Talk to his parents...seriously...not happening.
I dream of filling my kitchen with the wonderful aromas of fresh basil and garlic wrapping themselves around the bounty of a summer vegetables picked from right outside my door. Of course if you looked at the parched weed filled earthen patch right out side my door you would understand why this will NOT be happening any time soon...EPIC fail in the green thumb department.
This has been a difficult summer for me. I feel the weight of life not only on my thighs and ass but in my heart and mind. You see I have discovered something recently that has really irritated the crud out of me...I do not lead a normal life. I do not have a typical family. I am not June Cleaver or Julia Childs and Tim Gunn needs to get out of my head and my closet. I am not Debbie Macomber or Nora Roberts.
I am just me and tonight that is just not enough.
I am a 42 year old fat girl who is still trying to figure out what God wants from me and how exactly I am supposed to accomplish whatever that is while trying to keep my temper and my sanity. If it's what I am thinking it is...I am screwed because...seriously...I don't think I can do it. I think this time...God has truly lost his marbles.
My days are spent caring for a 17 year old who in essence is a baby, changing diapers, feeding her, loving her as best I can. I trudge from doctors visit to doctors visit listening to neurologists expound over the damage that a lack of oxygen can cause the brain during a seizure ( I wouldn't know this because I've only bee doing it for 17 years!!!). Dietitians lecture me on calories and g-tube diets, feeding schedules and kidney/liver failure due to lack of hydration. I listen to a husband who works so damn hard to provide for his family wondering how we're going to pay for it all...the therapies, special meds, therapeutic equipment and doctor after doctor not to mention trying to make the bathroom handicap accessible. I look in the mirror and wonder how my body will be strong enough to my 5'6", 102 pound daughter into her bed or her wheelchair as I get older and try not to freak out at the thought of not being able to care for her properly. I look at my introverted son deal with the world through a computer screen and an astronomical IQ and pray for God's plan in his life hoping that it includes his own apartment someday.
Now I look over the edge of that cliff that God has been pushing me toward urging me to trust Him to catch me and all I can think to do is throw up. No way, no how am I jumping...
Sorry not today...because if I do I will look like one of those crash test dummies in the car commercials when I land and that ain't so pretty.
I know that things...that life happens for a reason. It's messy and filled with challenges. I know that worry does not come from God. It's that other a#@&*#! who has decided to put me in his cross hairs tonight and guess what...I fell for it.
I know that this time shall pass...like a freakin kidney stone...with searing pain hopefully followed by great relief and maybe even some joy once again.
I am just me...50% cupcake, 50% mamma/wife, 100% daughter of a KING!
Right now He has a smile on His face and his arms crossed patiently waiting for me to get with the program, knowing that I will eventually jump as He has asked me to...
and the very thought makes me want to stomp my foot and scream and yell some more...(insert two year old fit here)
So I stand on the edge of nowhere not being able to clearly see where I am supposed to be going, having to dig deep to find that mustard seed of faith and believe in His plan...wondering how I am going to take the next step...
yep it's 1 a.m. on a Friday night...Labels: Courtney's World, My Crazy Life