Task Mode

Today's tasks-take Uncle John to Dr. get him fed and shopped and back in time to meet the lumberjack who is going to chop down my big tree. Somehow I have to go pick up the cat before 6, but I can run do that while the tree is being chopped.

I keep talking about setting boundaries and schedules, but as I mentioned earlier this week, I'm not sure what it is I want. If you don't know what it is you want to achieve, how do you know if you are making progress?

I'm in the ever predictable cycle of angst, messy house and I'll just spiral down, clean the house and then it will be better. Part of the dance involves over scheduling so there is no time to clean the house.

Ahhhhh, the maid is coming on Friday to restore some order and sanity to my world. Time to doctor the dogs, saddle up and head out.

Ok, I m pretending not to know that the constant (so it seems) criticism, or rather the increased criticism is bringing me down. Hell I went shopping at night and snuck some clothes in so that no one could ask me where I got them or how much I paid. There is no good answer to that-today's shirt was on sale for 6.99 but Mom could have gotten it at the goodwill for 50 cents.

I've got to find a balance between shutting down completely and being open and just tryign to shrug it off. Maybe if I actually learned to shrug it off it would work, but how the hell does one learn to shrug things off?

Turning the tide

Sheesh-for someone trying to live the simple life I still bring in an awful lot of stuff. Lately snake cages, an exercise machine and food have been coming in. (No job means cooking for one's self again). Time for some outflow-

So I craigslisted the kayak. That was tough-I've never actually used it-but now that I am not in Dallas I can't find a group to start kayaking with. And realistically, I won't do it alone.

And...the cubicle. It's taking up valuable real estate in the garage, and now that I'm HERE, I can borrow Daddy's truck, and my cousin has a flatbed I could probably borrow. I looked at converting it into a camper-but that is a recipe for an expensive disaster.

Still trying to rehome the dog sulky-maybe I SHOULD get a big old dog and trot it around with my sulky.

Cousin is coming to pick up the mattress and the treadmill on Saturday-so I will have oodles of space and I can start putting up shelves, setting up the snake room.

It's all about letting go of what you don't use to make room for what you will use.

Well shitfire and save the matches.

It's 5:30 am, I need to leave to get the truck soon, the big snake won't load and I 've been up all night bagging snakes and am unpacked. I stink. REALLY.

So, of course, I am blogging instead of packing. I need to settle my thoughts. I may end up paying two burly fire fighters to box my kitchen stuff-they don't care what they do as long as they get paid (I hope). Relax. I can't run willy nilly around throwing things in boxes panicking.

Chill.......

This isn't my vision of well packed, neatly labeled boxes all stacked and waiting to be moved. But it's more like real life I suppose. Shit scattered everywhere cause there is just never enough time to do what I want to and need to do. And ME, sitting on my ass in the middle of the shitstorm, writing about it.

My life isn't ever going to be neatly labeled boxes is it? I think those organizational people on the do it yourself shows are liars, just the way the models in the magazines are liars. REAL LIFE is messy, smelly, and definitely more curvacious. Oh, maybe not REAL LIFE...maybe MY LIFE. Maybe there isn't one real, proper way to do things.

Well, crap, I wish I could have figured that one out a long time ago-would have saved a fortune on psycho drugs. But maybe we don't figure that out until we bash into the wall of the perfect life vs. our own about 10 million times.

Yes-I am one with my clutter, I am at ease with my stink. This is my life people of the world, no Better Homes and Gardens layout OR clutterbusters ready to come in an cluck cluck and then fix me in 30 minutes. How did the Boss put it-"aint no wine from this blood baby....."

Oh crap now I have visions of a nice blue collar man singing-what a time to get hormonal.

What was THAT about?

Ok, I growled about not having and office and was brought up short with surprise. The world is my office-I've traded the corner real estate for the ability to pretty much come and go as I please.....I don't WANT that. But, sometimes I still have these little vestigal greedy urges.

And then there is this huge house I pass on the way home-kind of a wrecked old estate and I think it's really the wrecked part that draws me too it, not the estate thing.

I'm slowly divesting myself of things I can live without. That sad part is, when I moved in October I bet I kept 45% of what I owned and tossed out a lot of really good stuff (to the movers). And I STILL have too much.

I'm on a a bit of a crusade you see. I helped clean out my Uncle's condo when he moved, and it held exactly 20 years of accumulation. I don't want that to be me. He suffers from Parkinsons and it's essential that his surrounding remain neat and simple. Let's just say they were not at the condo and keep it at that. Let's also just say that my house was headed for the same fate, and keep it at that.

Right now I'm fighting the internal battle of the second bedroom. I don't have that many guests, but it is nice to have a bed for them....which means I have a room that gathers STUFF. My office, remember, is the world, so I don't need a room dedicated to it-I actually carry my laptop around to whereever I want to be. But, by the time my lease is up in October, I want a better sense of what I want on a permanent basis.

The other thing that requires more space is my four chihuahuas, cat and four snakes. I don't think we'd be happy with just one room, although we pretty much all stay in the same room all the time anyway.

I think the thing is, as we go through life, we mindlessly expect more as we make more money-but do we really NEED it? Is it worth it? I just don't know, but it is a lot of fun to try to figure out.

I'm hoping the Scotty's simplicity will inspire me and remind me of a time when I literally didn't have a pot to piss in. Maybe that will clear some things up for me.