Boring vs. Bored

For a blog my sister is starting, she asked me to write something about a day in my life.  And after writing it all down, I realized something.

I am boring.

That got me thinking.  Being boring is not the same thing as being bored. I am rarely bored.  If I have nothing to do, I read.  Problem solved.  Although, to be honest, I usually read when I should be doing something else.

Writing or talking about reading is boring, not only to other people, but also to myself.

However, in my eternal quest to be a better person, I've decided I need to read less, be interested in all the things I used to do before reading pushed them out of my life, spend more time listening to my children talk about playing video games (talk about boring!), and generally try harder not to let my tiredness lull me into doing things that are easy.  Because, as my last post brought home to me, my time on this earth is limited.  I should use it wisely.

But I've tried to give up reading before and I remember walking aimlessly around the house for hours at a time because I was so bored.  I'm fine with being boring, but I really don't want to be bored.

I can't be the only person that struggles with this: What is comfortable versus what is best.

Anyone have good advice about how to stay strong and suck it up and choose the right?  Cause it would seem I need some.

My Friend

The first time I met Wilhelmina, or Wil, as she prefers to be called, was on a cold day at a beach in Wellington, New Zealand.  She had made cookies for the only friend we had in common: Without a recipe.  Who makes cookies without a recipe?  Only the brilliant.

After that initial meeting, she invited me many times to her home.  We ate dinner with our two families several times.  We had more "sand"wiches than any person should need to consume as we solved the problems of this world while sitting on a beach watching our children frolic in the waves or build their own worlds in the sand.

When I was pregnant with my youngest child, she was the one I wanted to be there with my husband and I during the birth.  Being very pregnant herself, she ran down the hill to the hospital in the middle of the night to be there.

She has mentored and helped more children as their caregiver than I can count, and has been there to relieve the burdens of more friends than she realizes.  Her husband and four daughters love her dearly.  As do I.

She recently lost the fight with four kinds of cancer, and her family can't make ends meet without her.  Please click on the link below and give what you can to help this wonderful woman's husband and children.  The woman I consider a sister.

For Wil

Surprise!

Isn't that a beautiful cover?  And did you notice the third name down?  That's me.  So, after years of trying to be published again, it's finally happening!

This is a compilation of four novellas, all put together for your reading enjoyment.  The theme of each story is "marriage of convenience".  I don't know about you, but I love those types of stories.  In real life, marriages of convenience probably aren't all that romantic, but in fiction, they're great.

If you're interested in reading these four stories, you'll be able to around March 2017, just in time for Mother's Day (It'd make a great gift.  Not-so-subtle-hint).  Hooray for Mother's Day Anthologies!

Sad Face Emoji

This is what my youngest son looks like every morning before I take him to school (This isn't a picture of him. I'm just using this image as an object lesson. Sort of.).   Bless his sad little heart.  Every morning, I hold him on my lap, which is getting too small to hold him, and ask what's wrong.

This is where things get murky.  He says: He just wants to be home with me.  He feels like he should be home.  He wants to be homeschooled.  He doesn't have a best friend to play with at school.  School isn't fun anymore.  And he says it all with those eyes that look sad enough to get me to agree to anything as long as he stops giving me those eyes!

I want to know what to do.  I've talked to him about why he's feeling this way.  I've asked him question after question to try and understand what the root of the problem is.  We've prayed together before school.  I've tried giving him advice, making a plan for the day, bribing him with treats.  I don't know what else to do!

So, any advice?  Any suggestions?  All input would be welcome.  As for today... I'm picking him up early from school because I'm a sucker.

I Expect You To Read This

I was listening to a podcast while jogging this morning.  (That sentence sounds really impressive unless you know how slowly I jog.  You know those sloths in the movie Zootopia?  Me.)  And in this podcast, they were talking about the force that expectations have on us; the expectations we have of ourselves and the expectations others have for us.  The hosts did their research, and interviewed scientists who also did their research.  They spoke to a blind man who doesn't live like a blind man because no one told him he had to.  And I got to thinking about how expectations have changed the way I live.

First of all, I would never have gone out for student council in school without the expectation that I live up to my siblings' reputations.  I probably wouldn't be a jogger if my sisters hadn't expected me to go with them.  My nose would never be without a book in front of it if society didn't expect me to take care of my kids.  Actually, society's expectations don't have much to do with it, it's mostly my husband's and my parents' expectations of me that get me to put the books down for a bit.

When I was younger, the expectation was that I was "the talented" kid.  People, mostly my family, expected me to sing and dance and write and play piano and do things they all could do, too, but because I was "the talented one" I got all the praise for it.

But what about my own expectations?  What do I expect myself to do?

That's where the questions got harder because the things I expect myself to do are hard.  I expect myself to exercise regularly, and eat the way I'm supposed to, and get dressed every day, and take care of my house and family in a manner that I'm proud of.  This time of year, I expect myself to make use of the free produce people give me, so I bottle and make fruit leather and zucchini bread, and all sorts of things that I technically don't have to do.  I expect myself to go to church, and manage money wisely, and write every day, and try to help people, if I can. That's to say nothing of teaching my children how to be responsible, faithful adults when they get to that point in their lives, and making sure my husband knows he's the best husband on the planet.

I mostly do okay living up to the expectations other have of me, and I mostly do okay living up to the expectations I have of myself, but when I fail, it feels devastating. It feels like I'm not enough, that what I do isn't enough, and that who I am isn't enough.

So, yeah.  Expectations have a big hold on me.  Think about what expectations encourage you to do.

Welcome Home

Last month, my husband and I did the most grown-up thing we have ever done, and probably ever will do (aside from having kids, of course).  We bought a house.

Eek!  We bought a house!  (Yes, that is what happens in my head every time I say those words.  They are repeated with exclamation points, and squealed in a high-pitched voice that I can't duplicate outside my thoughts.)

And to welcome anyone that comes to said house, my husband bought Hopeful.

                                    

Cute, right?

Hopeful sits in his own little window overlooking the front porch.  

                                 

Can you see him in there?

So far, I've had three people either startled or laughing as I open the front door because they've just noticed the penguin checking them out.  What can I say?  Hopeful is a bit of a voyeur.

I'm hopeful that when the kids say goodbye to any future dates that may drop them off at the doorstep that there is a Hopeful voyeur watching everything they do.  And I'm hopeful they know that right behind that cute penguin is a dad polishing his rifles.  

I wish I could say I was kidding.

Taste the Sunshine

I look forward to this time of year.  It's fruit leather time!  As a kid, my grandma would pick and pick and pick apricots and then spend days blending them all up, adding dashes of sugar and lemon juice, then letting the sun dry it all out.  The taste was quintessential summer - tart and sweet and sunshine.  The fact that it stuck to teeth and tongue and cheeks didn't hurt either.

This year, I didn't have apricots enough to make leather, but I did have plums.  Never made plum anything before.  Turns out, tiny plums take a loooong time to pit.  Tiny plums are not sweet.  But add a dash of honey and some time in a dehydrator that my husband surprised me with, and ta-dah!  Fruit leather!

I sincerely hope that many of you get to eat something that brings back childhood summers.  Soon.