Hallowe'en

Did I ever tell you I despise all hallow's eve? I detest what it mostly stands for. I heartily dislike costuming my kids. I especially don't care for all that candy.

Don't get me wrong, I really like candy. I just want to choose the candy I like and not have to deal with all the candy I don't. It feels wasteful and almost disrespctful to throw away candy that someone spent their hard-earned money on so that my kid could come home with a sackful.

I tried years ago - with the first set of kids we raised - to talk them into going out for a nice dinner and then giving them each about $10 to spend on candy they wanted. In today's economy I'd go $20 each but it's a no go. They want to dress up, wander the streets with 150 other dressed up kids and beg candy from people we don't know.

We would never let them do this on any other day of the year and we would be calling the cops if 100+ kids were roaming the streets. Especially when 1/3 of them had knives and hatchets and guns!

Hmm, maybe calling the cops this evening would add some serious excitement to the night. I'd have to borrow somebody's cell phone though.....

Weekends. I don't care for them much.

With the Hero gone for 8 or more weeks I have a lot of time on my hands. Not free time, just time that needs filled. I have the kids but they use the time on the weekends to visit with their kid friends. They have no great desire to go somewhere to use up the time. They already know how they want to use their time.

I don't complain on any public forums because I don't want to sound like I'm fishing for an invite somewhere. I'm not. I just want someone to acknowledge the fact that I, in my aloneness, want to be recognized as existing.

I have friends who would be ecstatic - they think - to have this much time without a husband to cater to. Maybe I'd feel differently if the kids were grown and gone or if there were someone here who would take the kids for a few hours or even an overnight. There was a time I dreamed of checking into a posh hotel by myself and ordering room service while I read or slept or watched mindless television without interruption. I almost have that now but it's boring. And no one comes in and cleans the kitchen.

I have 7 more weekends to get through and one of them is a long weekend with a holiday. That's worse but we already have a plan to get through that one. Dinner out, a couple of movies, and a frozen pizza for supper. I'm not sure what we'll do about the three days remaining but at least there's a plan for day one.

Today I'm roasting pumpkin for pies and bread. I cooked the chili for tomorrow's chili cook-off. I came up with an alternative plan for Emily's halloween costume. I'm washing laundry. Although the work itself is satisfying because it has visible results, the loneliness is rushing in.

Maybe I'll go eat worms.

The Zoo

Well, back to being not so responsible. It's a pleasant change since this is who I usually am...

We hadn't been at the zoo very long when we wandered over near the Malasian Tapirs. They were pretty active, eating their breakfast and walking around their little enclosure. One of them - and I don't have a picture - was investigating the plastic pipes holding the electric wire taught with her nose. She touched one pipe, then another, then *zap*, she got the wire itself. She took off like a shot jumping up and down and screaming tapir screams (I have never heard one make a noise in all my life. Who knew?). She ran the entire circle around her enclosure and then stopped. The 12-15 people present for this show were all laughing (me, too). Her look was quite accusatory which made me laugh all the harder. Grown up I'm not.

We went to the bird house and fed the lorikeets. I love these colorful little birds and would gladly spend most of the day with them.



The kids wanted to see the gorillas and since we were on that side of the zoo... yeah a moment of thinking it through. I'm including the next picture because it's actually a good shot of Em.



And what could, quite possibly, be my favorite photo op - and proof that I'm not responsible at all - is the picture of the dead camels.



Okay, so they aren't actually dead. One even raised its head and looked at us for a moment. It decided life was still too boring to bother.

It was a good day. The hero even agreed to buy snacks for us and the family whho came out with us (7 of them!). It was a great day.

Forgiveness is a choice

And sometimes it's a hard choice I only make because the Lord told me I had to forgive.

I have friends. A few, but friends none the less. I expect them to treat me as I treat/would treat them. Sometimes they fail miserably at it. Mostly I'm okay with it but when someone doesn't do what they said they'd do because they're more concerned with what someone else thinks about me - the one you're supposed to be friends with - well it's hard for me to think about remaining friends.

That was some kind of long, drawn out, run-on sentence.

The thing is I'm going to forgive this friend for failing so miserably. I've screwed up before (although not in this particular arena of friendship) and with my very best friend who, I might add, remained my best friend until she died (4 months after my screw up). I just don't know how much farther I'm willing to go with this friendship.

Now I have to figure out where the line is between forgiveness and trust. Because it's going to take some time to trust this person's word again.

Sometimes my disguise is not very good. Sometimes I don't want to be an adult. I'd rather stomp and scream and quit this friendship. But I won't.

Lone birthdays

I've been without my spouse for the last few birthdays. He's been in the Southern Hemishere seeing my birthday come the day before I do. Figures: he's been getting information about stuff I should know about first (like the results of my first-ever pregnancy test because he was friends with the lab guy) for a long time. He gloats about it (but that's probably a rant in its own right).

Anyway, he hasn't personally bought me a gift in a very long time so, technically, nothing's changed. He just won't be here to cook the obligatory birthday dinner. So I'll take the kids out somewhere. And I'll buy my own gift(s). And maybe, just maybe, I'll spend more than he would have if he ever bothered to buy a gift. He always takes the kids out to get some little something or other but he doesn't think about buying something. I've never understood it since his father was such a great gift-giver.

So what am I thinking about spending his hard-earned cash on? Maybe a new pair of running shoes. Not just adequate shoes, but shoes with style. Shoes with attitude. Shoes that say "yes, she ran, and she flew like the wind". Even when I didn't. And because it's my birthday, I'll buy something totally unnecessary. An ice cream cake maybe? Hey, I heard if one runs, one can eat cake!

Empathy

I heard on the news this evening that a father and five of his adopted/foster children were killed in a horrific crash out on the eastern plains of Colorado. Five other children were seriously injured. I don't know these people and the chances of ever knowing any of them are infinitessimally small but this hit me hard. I cried.

I have a YouTube video of baby moose playing in a backyard sprinkler while their imposing momma watches over them. It's a sweet video. I cried the first time I watched it and again this evening.

I dug out my copy of Old Yeller because it's on Emily's book list for 5th grade. How am I ever going to get through this book with her? I cried every single time I read it between grades 3 and 6. Every time.

Maybe it's time to invest in Kleenex because I don't think I'll ever quit crying at the sappy things, the sad stories, or the loss of innocence and life.