by jphilo | Aug 24, 2009 | Daily Life
The weather was glorious this morning, and so was my mood. During my walk along the gravel road, I ticked off the blessed unclutteredness of this new week:
- Daughter and a truckload of her belongings and some of Grandma’s old furniture safely deposited at college.
- Daughter’s boyfriend and some of Grandma’s old furniture safely deposited at his apartment.
- Son and some of Grandma’s old furniture safely deposited in his apartment.
- Son’s fiance and some of Grandma;s furniture safely deposited in her apartment.
- Some of Grandma’s old furniture safely deposited at cousin’s house.
- The rest of Grandma’s old furniture put to good use in our house.
- The walls of the guest room are now visible with extra furniture gone.
- The garage stall, full of this and that since Mom’s house sold in March, finally empty again.
- Anne’s bedroom, minus the truckload of stuff she took to college, is now available for house guests.
- Mystery novel compete, edited, and on its way to the publishing house considering it.
- Different Dream website ready to be launched.
- I have uninterrupted work time now that daughter is safely deposited at college, along with a pickup load of her belongings.
- Mother safely tucked away at brother’s house, her finances organized and under control, the last of her keepsakes being distributed to appreciative owners.
Finally, after months of boxes and extra furniture, after weeks of overwhelming projects, I was ready to move on. Feeling light as a feather, I did a little woo-hoo whoop and jigged up the driveway, arranging and rearranging my week’s vast, uncluttered expanses of time and space. When I came around the garage, my happy dance ended. Stacked in front of the kitchen door were three boxes. The books I’d ordered from the publisher had arrived, much sooner than expected. As my vast, uncluttered expanses of space and time evaporated, and I hauled the cartons into the kitchen, I checked off one last blessing:
- We got the shelving unit from Mom’s basement painted and moved into our bedroom on Saturday. Just in the nick of time, I have a place to stack the books.
My feet and heart are dancing again.
by jphilo | Aug 20, 2009 | Daily Life
I don’t want to get all gushy about this, but I think the little Skype chats between the web guy and me have become a bonding experience. These days, we talk almost daily – me with my list of new questions about problems I created while working on the Different Dream website assignments he gives, and the web guy with his ready list of answers and solutions for my missteps. He’s either remarkably patient or a glutton for punishment. I’m not sure which.
Without a doubt, he’s a good teacher because I’m actually starting to understand what I’m doing. And, when I log into the admin dashboard, (Don’t I sound all techie throwing around words like admin dashboard? I know lots more techie lingo, so if you need some, let me know.) I no longer feel like throwing up. If that’s not a sign of progress, I don’t know what is.
And yesterday, an amazing thing happened. I figured out how to do something before the web guy did! Please don’t get the idea I’m bragging and don’t hold your breath waiting for it to happen again. But certainly do take heart. If this old technologically-challenged dog can build a website, become a Skypette, and have a video on YouTube, there’s no limit to what you can do.
With that bit of encouragement, I need to stop blogging and log into the Different Dream website again. I have a lot to do before me and my web guy bond via Skype this afternoon.
The way I’m feeling right now, the first thing on the list will be to throw up. Hmm…am I backsliding already?
by jphilo | Aug 18, 2009 | Daily Life
In the past few days, my personality’s been split wide open. Half of me is this woman who lives on the edge of town, swept into a prairie woman persona due to circumstances beyond my control.
Since Friday this half of me has photographed a late summer fawn down by the bridge and scared up oodles of goldfinches, larks and cardinals during morning walks. Neighbors keep thrusting tomatoes, cabbages, zucchini, and fresh eggs at me, so our kitchen is a frenzy of cooking and freezing fresh veggies. And don’t get me started on the five dozen ears of corn we’ll get from our CSA today, along with who knows what else. Not only that, but Saturday our farmer son took us touring through every livestock barn at the State Fair. Pretty much country, don’t you think?
But the other half of me is taking a a crash course in technology under the tutelage of my web designer guy, who happens to be the same age as the former fourth grade students to whom I once taught long division. Now I wouldn’t want to meet all this technology alone in a dark alley, much less use to promote my book. But the web guy insists I have to learn Skype, Gravatar, Twitter, and how to update my own website. He refuses to let up. My only option is to bear down and deliver the goods, an adventure I thought I gave up after my daughter was born 21 years ago. Pretty much techno-savvy, don’t you think?
So here I am, being pulled apart by my inner warring factions: prairie mamma versus technology woman. By the end of the week, if one of the two doesn’t let up, things could get ugly. But if I can lasso both personalities into one cohesive whole again, my website will be up and the freezer will be stocked for the winter.
But for now, I better get a move on. Prairie mamma’s getting nervous with technology woman on a role writing this blog entry. Time to calm my inner granola crunchy without stifling my emerging techno-wizard. Life is so complicated sometimes.
by jphilo | Aug 16, 2009 | Daily Life
Last night, Hiram and I went pseudo-camping with our small group from church. The real campers hauled out tents and trailers for the whole weekend, even though rain was predicted. The pseudo-campers like us ate supper with the real McCoys and then went home to sleep in our nice, dry beds.
Hiram and I pseudo-camped for the sake of everyone else in our small church group. See, typical authentic camping experiences with the Philos culminate with a flooded tent, large hail, strong winds, a collapsed tent, thunderstorms, tornado warnings or any combination of the above. Considerate people that we are, we pseudo-camped and saved our closest friends from great danger.
This morning, once we knew everyone was safe, we went back out for the camp breakfast and the floating worship service on the deck of a pontoon boat. But the weather was still iffy, and pseudo-campers like me lobbied hard to move the service to the campground gazebo, complete with a leakproof roof. But the real campers carried the day, and we piled onto the pontoon as grey clouds swirled above us and a damp breeze blew around us.
Once we got to the middle of the lake, with the blue herons feeding near the shore, our worship service began. Hiram led the singing, and after he prayed Steve taught a Bible lesson.
Then Rita, who months ago challenged us to step out of our comfort zones and live our faith boldly, asked us to tell how we’d been doing that. So we talked about how God is working in and through the lives of a handful of people, not even enough to pile onto a pontoon boat and sink it.
After church, Hiram and I drove home and talked about how refreshing the worship service had been. No stirring of pseudo-emotions, no showboating of pseudo-holiness, no spouting of behind pseudo-platitudes. Just the stories of an extra-ordinary God at work in ordinary people, which reminded us of a wonderful truth: God loves His people and works through them in amazing ways.
That’s a message of real encouragement and real hope for a couple of pseudo-campers like us. No wonder we were refreshed.
by jphilo | Aug 10, 2009 | Daily Life
In the past few weeks, Hiram and I have made a considerable dent in the piles of furniture and boxes we’ve been storing since Mom broke up housekeeping. The most noticeable progress is in the extra garage stall, now free of the table and chairs Allen took to St. Paul, the bookshelf I painted and moved into my office, and two storage shelves Hiram moved to his shop downstairs. Once he hauls the remaining storage unit up to his office, Anne will be able to park in the garage for a night or two before she goes back to college.
As part of the organizational frenzy, I cleaned and reorganized my office files, nearly filling the recycling bin with old manuscripts and rejection letters. Then, I rewarded myself with new luggage, compliments of my birthday money and sweetly asked Hiram if he was ready to get rid of his yellow Samsonite college suitcase to make room for the new set.
Apparently, the last few months of inherited clutter have made him as determined to avoid saddling our kids with excessive baggage (no pun intended) when it’s our turn to break up housekeeping. He agreed to the proposition immediately and had the new luggage stowed in the closet and the old stuff out of the house before I could nag him about it.
This morning I walked past the suitcase sitting with the rest of the garbage out by the garage. Battered by years of use, misshapen after decades stuffed in one closet or another, and soggy after yesterday’s rain, it looked awful. I have no idea why we kept it around for so long. But yesterday, when I found this photo my mom took the day Hiram and I were engaged, I realized the suitcase isn’t the only thing that’s aged in the last thirty-five years. We have, too.
If we don’t let excess baggage weigh us down, I think we have more good years left in us than the suitcase does. So for the next few weeks, while I sort through closets and get rid of what we really can’t use, I’ll be checking for inward clutter, too, anything that will slow me down and hold me back. I don’t want those things anymore, can’t use them, don’t have time for them. If you see me coming your way, you might want to duck. I’m in a throwin’ mood, and nothing is sacred.
by jphilo | Aug 5, 2009 | Daily Life
Today has not been my best day.
I got up bright and early to start the wash. As I hung the last piece of laundry on the clothesline, it began to rain.
Thinking it would only take an hour, I organized the snake pit of cords and electronic devices in my office, record bills, and run errands before sitting down to write. By the time I finished it was almost lunchtime.
When Anne said she wouldn’t be home for dinner, I decided to make a nice lunch for the family since Hiram’s home today, and we don’t get to eat together very often. The blueberry pie boiled over.
When I finally settled down work on my new website, I clicked on a page that needed editing. But the page wasn’t there, though I distinctly remembering clicking the save button. It took a long time to write last week. It will take a long time to write it again.
While I worked on the website, Anne made cookies. When I discovered the page was missing, I went to the kitchen and ate three cookies before realizing they had raisins in them. I don’t like cookies with raisins in them.
An email greeted me when I got back to work again. The CD I sent for a church group to review wouldn’t play for them. It wasn’t until after burning a new CD that I reread the email. They’d been putting the CD in a DVD player.
This definitely has not been my best day.
Choosing an image to accompany this dismal post wasn’t easy, until I found this picture of the hydrangea on the east side of our house. Even though today has not been my best day, the picture made me smile because no matter how bad today is, the hydrangeas keep blooming. Not only that, but the sun is shining (thank goodness I left the clothes on the line in hopes of better weather), my husband loves me, my kids are healthy and in love, we can pay our bills each month, and our sorry excuse of a dog now lives with my brother and his saintly wife.
Today hasn’t been my best day, but it’s still very, very good.
