i don’t even want to look

I don’t even want to look at how long it has been since my last blog post.  I’ve been mentally away.  I’ve been busy, but not busy with anything exciting.  Life has just been, well, life. Not all bad, mostly good with sprinkles of sad.  I’ve been dodging depression and at the risk of tempting the fates, winning.  I’m still taking my medication for depression and likely always will, but I still get “episodes” and I’ve felt one pulling at my shirt tails for weeks now.  Monday I felt a lift of sorts though, and I think it’s gone off to go bother someone else for a while.

My intention to write everyday obviously went by the wayside.  I can’t even remember why.  I just wrote a (not so great) blog post yesterday on my other, anonymous blog and it felt good to write there again just as it is feeling good to write here again.  Hopefully I haven’t lost you as a reader.  So at the risk of being all over the place, I’ll try to catch you up on what’s been happening.

1.  I found out that my brother separated from his wife (they have four children) but that they are back together again working things out.  I am happy for them.  Marriage is hard work, no doubt about it.

2.  I found out my grandpa’s lung cancer went into remission only to be told about a week and a half later that he has brain cancer.  This is difficult news.  On Monday he was told that he might have Valley Fever and they’ll do a couple of tests to determine what’s happening in his lungs.  I hope it’s not lung cancer returned.  But I also hope it’s not Valley Fever.  What do you hope for in a situation like this?  I suppose just health.  I hope for health.

3.  Some strained relationships have been healed which is good.  Always good.

4.  My dad came out for a visit which was very nice.  He got to go to the Experience Music Project museum over in Seattle for the day and I made a killer pot roast with mashed potatoes and gravy and sauteed green beans.  So. Delicious.  My dad told me that my pot roast rivaled my grandma’s pot roast.  It made me almost cry then and it makes me cry to think about it now.  That’s the highest compliment I could get.  And I never in a million years thought a compliment to my cooking would make my heart swell.  But there you go.

You want the recipe?  It’s super easy and very, very good:

Heat oven to 350

Heat some oil (I always us Olive – and not extra virgin, but the full meal deal) in a cast iron dutch oven on your stove top.  Once hot, quickly brown all sides of a salt and peppered roast.  Remove from heat.

In a separate bowl, combine 12 oz water, 1 cup red wine (of which the alcohol will evaporate while cooking), 1 packet dried onion soup mix and 1 can cream of mushroom soup.  Mix well.

Pour mixture over roast.  Salt and pepper again, adding garlic powder if you are so inclined.

Cover and bake for 4 hours.  (You’re going for that moist, stringy, pulls-away-from-itself roast beef.) I’m usually cooking a 2 pound(ish) size roast.

You can use the liquid from the cooked roast for gravy – I mix equal parts liquid from gravy (strained) and beef broth with a touch of flour whisked in.

And I’m not telling you the secret mashed potatoes recipe.  Let’s just say there’s cream cheese involved.

Let’s see, what else?

Oh!

5.  I’ve finally gotten connected with an organization that feeds homebound people.  I’ve been wanting to volunteer for a while now and started calling around in earnest about a month ago, maybe more, trying to get connected to food banks and no one returned my calls.  I realized I would probably have to get connected to a church that was heavily involved in community outreach as face to face helps a lot in these instances so….

6. I joined an Episcopal church about five minutes away from my house that I am very much enjoying.  Episcopalians are my kind of people.  My heart felt like it found a home my first Sunday there.  The liturgy felt like an anchor.  And for someone who always feels like she has one foot on planet earth and one foot not quite here, that’s important.

7.  I’ve read a few books: No Time to Wave Goodbye by Jacquelyn Mitchard, a couple more Nora Roberts, Jesus by Marcus Borg, some Flannery O’Connor short stories.  Books I’ve got waiting for me:  The Heretic’s Daughter (slooooooooow), The Brother’s K, and another Elaine Pagels.

8.  I haven’t been knitting.  I just haven’t felt like it, though I can feel the tug back, thank goodness.  I never finished my Oblique and now it’s cold out.  Hopefully I can work on it some more here coming up.

9.  I think my dog, Boo, has dementia.  I’m not being flip.  I really think that she sometimes gets lost in her own home.  I’ll be in the great room and I’ll hear scratchscratchscratch.  I’ll get up to figure out which dog is making that sound and why and I’ll find Boo in front of the workout room door or the craft room door at the very end of the hallway, scratching and then waiting with her cute little ears perked and her head angled, waiting to be let in.  I shake my head and call out to her from behind and she’ll get all excited and jump up and down at the door, scratching again, waiting to be let in, never turning around.  I have to crawl toward her and gently tap her on the back for her to realize I’ve been behind her the entire time.  Always it scares her, no matter how gently I do it, so sure is she that I am in that room.  When she went back there looking for me?  She had to walk right past me.

10. My jewelry has been selling nicely at the store my friends opened earlier this year.  I’ve had no expectations, so it’s nice to get a check once in a while, knowing that someone liked what I created.

11.  My friends took me to see the musical Wicked in Seattle.  It was my birthday present from March – they knew the musical was coming and gave me a card letting me know what was to come.  One of the best birthday presents I’ve ever received.  The musical was unbelievable.

12.  I recently got a sewing machine – it’s my Christmas present.  Costco was selling a Brother and then in Oct., they had a $30 coupon so I went ahead and got it early.  I haven’t really worked with it yet.  I’m sure I will in the coming months.  I mostly got it for quick sew jobs and to make drapes and pillow covers and the like. It might be another craft that gets ahold of me though.  Only time will tell.

I’m happy that Autumn has arrived, Winter on its tail.  The weather has turned and my garden has died off and I’m making my house cozy with candles and cooking and baking.  I’m looking forward to Thanksgiving and Christmas and doing our usual traditions: Thanksgiving day we have the Meal, then the next day, Friday, we got to Kuney’s Tree farm and for $25 chop down our Christmas tree. That weekend we decorate the house and trim the tree and watch Lord of the Rings.  Sometime between then and Christmas I watch White Christmas a few times.  And I bake.  Chocolate chip cookies, chocolate covered peanut butter balls, dream bars, and this year – Italian wedding cookies.

Hopefully I’m back writing again and it won’t be two months before another post.

 

vacation

It’s been a while.  Not much going on.  Still trying to get plugged into a volunteer opportunity here which will have to be put on hold because tomorrow we’re heading out of town for a week.  We’re going to the shore.  It should be nice and peaceful.

I finished the back of my sweater and have moved onto the sleeves.  I’m doing the sleeves instead of the front panels because I want to take them with me this week and sleeves are smaller and easier than front panels which include button holes and shaping.

I feel like there should be more to report, but as usual, it’s all just been stuff going on in my head.  Scary place, be glad you can’t peek in. 

Hope you’re enjoying the beginning of autumn.

a day late…a dollar short?

I know that I promised to post pictures yesterday and I didn’t.  I forgot.  Mea culpa.

This weekend I visited my friend at her new store, Spirit Wind West (where my jewelry is on consignment) and bought a couple greeting cards.  This is one of them; I had to frame it and put it in my kitchen:

And here is proof:

mmmmmm, fresh herbs.  Rosemary, Thyme, and Oregano.  (I think).  Actually, I think it’s Sage, Thyme and Oregano.  I should double check.

Homemade, from scratch, tomato/spaghetti sauce.  That is a combination of my fresh grown tomatoes, my fresh grown herbs, and grocery store-bought onion and garlic and olive oil.  But my herbs and my tomatoes.  How awesome is that?

Here’s my Oblique so far.  This is the back.  I’m 31 rows away from being finished with this first piece.  I’m pretty happy with it and I think it’s going to be very comfy for winter.

Obligatory dog shot.

i didn’t lie…

I know I said in my last post that my goal was to write everyday and I have.  But not here.  I decided to write in an alternate location, completely anonymously so that I can write without self-editing everything I say into nothingness because I’m worrying about what everyone is going to think about it all.  So far so good.  I wrote today for 2.5 hours and I have to say, it was incredibly freeing to say what I wanted to say and just let it ride.  One of these days after I’ve found my voice, I’m sure I’ll share freely and not give a rip what anyone else thinks.  Right?  Who knows.

Pictures of the back of my Oblique to come tomorrow.

copycat

So my friend J is vowing to write in her blog everyday as a start toward her ultimate writing goal of eloquence and profundity.  And considering my desire to be a writer, I’m thinking I should make the same goal.  Bad habit to break #1:  stop starting sentences with the word “so.”

I have been struggling lately with feeling like I’m not living up to my potential.  It isn’t because I’m not working outside the home or not bringing in money.  I know that what I do around the house (when I do it) is important and meaningful and I get joy out of it.  I love the evening of the day spent cleaning and doing laundry, looking around at the uncluttered, dust free, shiny home that I made happen, relaxing in front of the television watching a movie or knitting because I worked hard all day and I deserve it.  I’ll tell you that if I had felt that way in my last job I would have stayed as long as they would have had me.  There’s nothing like doing what you do well, knowing it inside and out, and seeing the rewards of a job well done.  And I want to continue taking care of hearth and home but I also feel like I need to be doing something else.  I would love to get a writing gig, as I’ve stated here before on numerous occasions.  I have also stated here on numerous occasions the hurdles of fear I have to sprint over before I’ll ever be able to do that successfully.  Not caring what other people think.  That’s hard for me.  I wish I didn’t give a damn but I do.

I have to break free from the prison of my own making and let, no, make myself do those things of which I am afraid.  I also would like to start volunteering on behalf of the homeless and that scares me too.  Apparently I get scared putting myself out there in any capacity.  I’m very comfortable staying at home, alone, doing my thing here in the privacy and anonymity of my life.   But what I can see down the road if I don’t break out of this comfort zone now is scarier still.  I don’t want to be an old woman afraid to get on a plane, go into the city, drive my car, go to the dentist, the doctor, the grocery store.

Maybe I need to go to therapy.  Hm, maybe not. Maybe I’ll use writing as therapy.  Maybe I’ll write honestly and from my gut and in doing so, I’ll uncover why the hell I’m so afraid and so worried of backlash, negative reviews, and being disowned.  I have a feeling there’s a story in that.