Windy’s Blog

I am a person who likes routine. Any relatives or friends who may be reading this are most likely saying “No, REALLY???” in a sarcastic manner. I like to keep things on a schedule, and everything must be in its proper place at all times. Such an organized lifestyle permits me to concentrate on other things such as thinking about the sanctity of life or trying to find answers to the numerous questions I have about innumerable subjects. In a nut shell, I don’t enjoy change very much.

This is ironic since my life has been full of nothing but change, and the last few years it has spun totally off the routinely organized axis I put it on. Go figure that my life has not turned out as I planned.

Once again I have moved. This is the fifth time in one and a half years that I’ve packed up all of my worldly possessions (which I admit may just be a bunch of boxes of junk) and moved to a different residence. Not only are these moves physically challenging for me, but the emotional roller coasters that the events throw me on are even more staggering. Have I mentioned that I also abhor roller coasters?

Over the last week I’ve been packing my car, driving to my sister’s, unloading, and repeating the procedure. I had the weekend off of work, so on Saturday I finished the project. I am now living with my sister, brother-in-law and niece. Surrounded by bins and boxes and all kinds of things, I have found my little niche here. I know that I will eventually unpack my things, but I’ve learned over the last two years not to stress about that. I must do that slowly, as I take my time to organize things in that “proper place” which will relieve future stress.

I am content in the decision to move here. I am forever grateful to my sister for opening up her home to me, just as I was to the four other “families” I’ve lived with since August of 2008.

But leaving one home to go to another always brings a time of much sadness for me. I struggle with the emotional ties that have developed with each family. And so although I will enjoy the shorter commute to work now, I will miss the calmness and the routines I had while living with Nonna. Most especially, I will miss Nonna herself, who I will worry about just because I am not there with her.

Living back in this area is still strange to me, even though I’ve been here for six months now. For twenty five years or so it was my “routine” to visit this place, pack up and leave. There are times when my mind says “when are we leaving?” And then I have to remind myself that I am staying. Okay, well, at least for now.

When I lived on Long Island, I frequented the local 7-11 stores for my daily cups of coffee. I also stopped every morning for a coffee and muffin or bagel (when I was not on a diet). The staff at these stores got to know me because they would see me every single day and I very seldom diverted from the coffee and breakfast routine. It progressed to the point of the staff ringing up my order before I even got to the cashier’s stand.

When I lived in North Carolina I began to frequent a local coffee place. Every day I’d drive up to the window and order my coffee with sweet and low, cream and vanilla. After a few weeks time the staff recognized my voice through the drive thru speakers and soon they would cut me off with “do you want your regular today?”

Over the last five months the same situation has occurred at the local McDonalds, where I’d drive up to order my daily coffee. Soon the staff recognized my voice and I didn’t have to go through the spiel of explaining my large coffee with 2 splendas and 3 cream.

I kind of enjoyed that routine and thought it was funny that the staff always remembered me. Now that I have moved there is another McDonalds that has been receiving my daily business. So far they have not realized that I am the same woman who orders the same darn thing every single darn day. But I have faith that they’ll get it soon. Once that routine has been established and I have all of my things organized here, I will feel much less stressed and life will once again be fine.

As I push through these challenging times, I pray a lot. The other day I was praying while waiting at the drive thru to that McDonalds (you know, the one that hasn’t recognized me yet). I started out by saying to God, “Thank God, for… You.” Then I laughed aloud just as I was about to place my order over the drive thru speaker. I had realized what I’d just prayed. I then changed my prayer to “Thank YOU for You,” and chuckled once again.

I know that God appreciated my humor, because that’s the kind of God I serve. He knows me, and He knows all that I’ve gone through and all that I will be going through in this life. He knows my inner heart’s desire and He knows that my trust in this life has been totally placed in Him.

But sometimes I think we all need to be reminded of who He is, even if it comes in a moment of laughter or through our mistakes. The other day as I thought about my prayer at the drive thru, I realized that I was thanking God, not just for being who He is, but for being in my life. Truly I do not know what I would do without the Lord. Surely I would not be able to press through difficult times if I did not have a deity to rely on.

Some may say that relying on faith or a higher power or God or whatever is just a crutch, a means to get to the end of denial. And they can go right ahead and say that. I don’t really care. My faith has sustained me through the years of grief and turmoil and dysfunctional family interactions. And if that’s what it takes for me to get through this life victoriously, then so be it.

There’s a hymn that describes the “blessed assurance” of Jesus Christ. And I rely on that assurance every day, just as I rely on that cup of coffee with the 2 splendas and 3 creams. Knowing that no matter where I go, who I live with, or what job I am doing, I have the consistency of faith. I have the assurance that God is faithful to me, and that knowledge alone will sustain me.

Still, as I get acclamated to this new living situation, it would be nice for the staff at McDonalds to get my coffee order down!

The last eight weeks or so have been full of emotional stress for me. New job, new challenges, and new living arrangements once again. I have found that during these times of  higher stress, as my brain tries to focus on the immediate task at hand, some part of the brain stops working correctly. Using the computer as a metaphor, it’s as if my brain is a hard drive running on limited ram and disc space. Once too much data is downloaded, the ram slows down and the hard drive space overloads. I have to use my “clean disc” feature and delete some things in order to keep on processing.

Of course, this could all be just age related. But let’s not go there….

What happens to me in these cases is that I tend to make embarrassing mistakes and things inevitably go wrong. My pen runs out of ink during a meeting, I forget to punch in and out for lunch, or in a rush to get to work I spill a mug of coffee all over my jacket.

In these last 8 weeks inumerable things such as the above have happened to me. I took some time the other day to reflect on this. I had never thought of myself as a “clutz”. But now I have to ponder this idea. Perhaps I am, indeed, one of those people who, in times of high stress, make laughable mistakes. And sometimes those are cases of what I call “mistaken identities.”

My earliest memory of such an event was when I was about ten or eleven years old. I had gone to the drive-in movie theatre with my sister and her boyfriend (who has since become my brother-in-law). As with any young kid, I had to use the restroom several times throughout the double feature.

Back in those days life was safe and we didn’t worry about predators or child molesters. Or at least I didn’t. So I walked to the restroom by myself. As an adult I now realize that my sister was probably enjoying some “alone time” with the boyfriend. Anyway, I made it to the restroom and back safely. I walked to the car, opened up the back door and got in. After about five seconds or so the couple in the front seat stopped kissing, turned around and stared at me. They were NOT my sister and boyfriend! I had gotten into the wrong car!

Then I was faced with the dilemma of trying to figure out just where my sister was parked. The couple tried to help me and I could tell they were concerned about a little girl who just entered their car. I finally located my sister and we laughed about the incident. But it was a nerve-wracking event that I still remember clearly to this day.

Many years later I was going to visit my Aunt Charlotte and Uncle Charlie. I had been invited for dinner and I was running late. My Aunt and Uncle lived on a block of houses on Long Island. For those not familiar with L.I., a lot of the houses there are the exact same design. People try to get away from the “cookie cutter” look by adding on, changing windows, etc. But basically the suburbs are full of the same houses.

Knowing that I was running late was killing me. I hate to be late for anything. I quickly pulled up to the curb and walked up to the back door of the house. I noticed that the window decorations had changed. Since my cousin always decorated for every holiday, I assumed she had just finished another creative design. I knocked on the door and walked right in since that was my habit, and immediately thought “Oh, Aunt Charlotte painted her kitchen!”

Just as I was noticing this, an elderly couple who was sitting at the kitchen table turned to stare at me. Thinking they were friends of my Aunt and Uncle, I smiled and gave them a big “Hi, I’m Cindy!” greeting. I expected them to introduce themselves and tell me that my Aunt was in the dining room or something. But no, they continued to stare at me as if deciding whether to jump up and strike me with a kitchen knife.

I had entered the WRONG house! I finally realized this and laughed as I explained that I meant to enter the house next door to them. I told them who my relatives were and that I was late for dinner. Looking down at their plates I tried to lighten the situation and said to them “So, what’s for dinner? Maybe I’ll just stay here!”

Unfortunately the elderly couple didn’t think my humor was so funny. I apologized for the interruption, and meekly backed out of their kitchen. Then I practically ran next door to my Aunt’s house!

A few weeks ago I was at the bowling alley watching my sister’s team complete their Friday night bowling feats. I had been there, sitting at the table with my sister and her team, for over an hour. I stepped outside to talk to my niece on the cell phone and then returned to sit at the table. I didn’t see my sister and assumed that she was on the alley completing her turn. But when I looked at the alley, not only was my sister not there, but her entire team had been replaced and other people were bowling instead. I quickly glanced at the table and realized that I had sat down at the WRONG table! Jumping up I moved two tables down and found my sister’s team carrying on as if nothing had happened. They hadn’t noticed my error at all.

So the other day as I was pondering those events I wondered if I am indeed a clutz, or if I made the errors due to high stress and my mind being preoccupied, or if I’m just getting older and losing it. I don’t like any of those choices. But I think I’ve decided to blame it on the stress factor. I think I’m getting to the point where I need a complete disc defragmentation and clean up. My hard drive is overloaded and I need some new ram!

It seems that lately I’ve been having some strange Thursdays. I don’t know if I’ve stumbled upon bad karma with Thursday or what, but today was yet another wacky day.

Oh, the day started out just fine. I woke at a reasonable hour, enjoyed a cup of coffee and read the updates on Facebook. Then I decided it was time to bring in wood for the wood stove because 1) the pile was getting low and 2) I actually had the time to do it this morning.

So I bundled up and went outside. We keep a wheelbarrow here that’s used to transport the wood from the stacked pile outside to the back door. Then I carry it into the house from there.  A few days ago I had help from Bobby, and we filled that wheelbarrow up to the brim then wheeled it into the garage so we’d have “spare” wood in case I couldn’t get out to that pile in the back due to the snow we’d had.

I only had the pull that wheelbarrow about ten steps. I started to do so when I realized that we’d not loaded the thing right. There was too much weight on one side. I felt the wheelbarrow begin to tip and tried to compensate by pulling on the other side but my boot slipped on the ice and I lost all leverage. The wheelbarrow began to tip over. Instead of letting it go, I held on and futilely tried to steady the load. That didn’t work. Down went the wheelbarrow, the wood, and Windy.

With a great adrenaline rush that totally woke me up, I jumped up off of the ground and shook the snow off of my pants. Then I had to pick each piece of that wood off of the ground and carry it all into the house. I accomplished that and then went with that damn wheelbarrow to the wood pile in the back yard. I needed to load it and unload twice more. As I was doing so, a bitter and powerful wind began to blow, whipping me in the face repeatedly like a leather belt.

I pushed through all of that and successfully finished the wood project for the day. Then I went and did the morning yoga routine. I needed to go through those stretches since I probably twisted my back all out of alignment when I fell. My left hip was a little sore from the slip and fall. Thankfully I still have extra padding there, but I have the feeling that I’ll be sore tomorrow. The yoga helped me to stretch, but also to relax and prepare for the day ahead. Or so I thought at the time.

I drove to work at my normal pace (which is slow) and all was well until I sat down at my “station” and the darn computer wasn’t working right. So I had to quickly switch cubicles and get to a working station and plug into the monitor within 30 seconds. I just made it.

Now I began to get stressed over that when I realized that today was a testing day at work. I had signed up to test for a higher level of typing, which means a little raise. First I had to take a written test which was multiple choice and I sat there over-analyzing every question and choice because 1) I couldn’t remember all of the correct answers and 2) I thought they were trying to “psych” us out with some of the questions. After the test the supervisor called me back to the office (not a good sign) to ask me about one of my answers. It turns out I had checked every choice, when I was supposed to have put the choices in order from 1 to 5!  I had completely mis-read that question! Lucky for me the supervisor took pity on me and gave me a second chance to do it right.

Still, I thought I’d failed the test. As it turned out, I got 99 out of 106 points and that’s still an A. Then I had to take a typing test. I was still realing from the written test and tried to calm myself down which only fueled my anxiety. What happened to that “mantra” I was supposed to be telling myself? It must have fallen over and landed with the wood this morning!

Anyway, I passed the typing test enough to make the grade and the end result is that I will receive a little raise starting next week!

Phew.  I felt immediately relieved. Four hours later it was my lunch time and I was walking up the stairs to the office, feeling pretty good about myself, when I tripped on one of the steps! This time my reflexes kicked in just in time for me to catch myself from falling. Who else but me falls…UP ?

I have to say that I was very glad to get home safely tonight. It has been a strange day and I am glad that tomorrow is Friday. These Thursdays are really becoming a challenge for me!