Sunday, November 25, 2007

Synchronicity

When I started working at my new job, I was surprised to find a small framed picture of bamboo in the upper corner shelf of the workspace I share with my boss. It's a faded pastel toned colored line drawing in a boxy white frame and has the word "serenity" printed beneath it. I found that very reassuring at the time and continue to be reassured by it. Recently, my boss added a small book on serenity to the space as well. Another sign that I'm in the right place.

I wish there were signs in other arenas of my life that I continue to question.

Thursday, November 22, 2007

I'm Thankful For...

1. My family - though we're not as close as some, I know they love me and that means a lot.

2. My friends - from casual acquaintances to deep friendships, I am so grateful for those people who support me, make me laugh and share a cuppa. God, make me worthy of my friends.

3. My partner - this year we're spending the holidays together and he said, "We're each other's family now" since we can't be with our parents this year. It was so lovely. I so enjoy watching the evolution of our relationship.

4. My health - I'm so glad for my continued wellness. With each night of sleep, I feel strength returning. It's amazing to see just how much I need because it clearly reflects how depleted I've become in the last seven years.

5. My dog - Chibo is so patient with my efforts at parenting and always ready to play, cuddle or give me a little kiss to pick me up.

6. My job - I'm so lucky to work for a company with real values. My company takes good care of me for the amount of work I do. I heard an immigrant employee saying how spoiled we Americans are in general and especially at our store and I believe it. I'm so grateful to have good health care coverage, a retirement plan, free products, discounts, education and a job that I enjoy.

7. My practice plans - Something is in the works for starting a clinic next year and I'm very excited about it. I'm thankful for having some direction.

8. My apartment - What a gift to have my friend Jon offer me a one-bedroom apartment for less money than I was willing to spend with no paperwork or security deposit! It's perfectly cozy and such a nice place to spend this winter.

9. My turkey - It's in the oven and I can't wait to have a turkey sandwich tomorrow!

10. In the spirit of manifestation, I'm also thankful for finishing my thesis by year's end. Yes!

Thursday, November 15, 2007

It's Just Not My Week

What happened and how I felt or how I felt I was perceived:

Tuesday - late to meeting (irresponsible)
stuck in traffic on the way to a party (poor planner)
stayed only briefly at that and another party (bad friend)
didn't want to talk to anyone except my close friends (antisocial)
changed my mind on an important decision (pushover)

Wednesday - got rebuffed at work (over eager)
was told "that would be nice" in a nasty tone when I offered help (lazy worker)
forgot appointment (irresponsible)
boyfriend realized we might not see each other for several days (bad girlfriend)

Thursday - forgot that I was supposed to come in early (irresponsible)

The end result is that I find myself wanting to withdraw from society even further. I don't want to offer up ideas at work, I just want to do what I'm told. I don't want to make social plans because they backfire either due to traffic (that makes me extremely bitchy) or not feeling up to being social. I just want to end my relationships before I get my feelings hurt any more and I want to go it alone. That said, I know escapism doesn't work and I don't really want to be alone. So, I'll take this weekend as a break, hit the reset button and try to do whatever it takes to get myself back on track.

Sunday, November 4, 2007

Food Moods

A and I spent the night at a B&B on Friday. It was practically perfect in every way.

Compliments don't come easy to me and high praise is even harder to pry from my lips, but I will say again, our night at The Portland White House was practically perfect. We had the best room in the house with a private bath with a jacuzzi bathtub for two. The bed was a huge four poster with immense columns and a feather duvet. The entire house has an old world feel to it and our room was incredibly romantic.

Into that setting, I brought our take out dinner.

Now, take-out has the suggestion of fast food or ethnic food from southeast Asia, but I just picked food up at work, so it was northwest cuisine - chicken meatballs, potato-leek cakes, a green salad and a bottle of Tantrum from our wine tour last January. It was delicious and I had carefully selected it to make sure we didn't get overfull. I also brought Tiramisu, which we still haven't eaten. Somehow, eating this meal laying in bed in our bathrobes was more romantic, more delicious and gave me more feelings of romance and contentment than either the wedding reception dinner we had last night or our anniversary dinner out the previous night. It's certainly not all about the food, but I think the food contributed to the atmosphere as much as the atmosphere contributed to the food.

For example, for dinner, we relived our first date, so it was a very romantic restaurant with a cozy booth setting and a history of providing us with very good food. This time, we had awful service, probably the worst table in the house and a meal that neither of us really enjoyed. We had green salads, clam chowder, goat cheese torte and sauteed mushrooms. I very much enjoyed the chowder (which was more northwest style than New England as both A and I could attest after our recent travels) and the torte, the salad was passable and the mushrooms were not my style, so generally the food was good, but we weren't content and ended up coming home and removing our finery to watch a movie (that, come to think of it, also wasn't that good) and go to sleep. Last night's meal at the reception was a lot of foods that should have been really good, and I heard people claim it was, but for me, just wasn't that interesting.

To sum up and end my rambling exploration of food for the time being, the conclusions I've reached (which are not unique) are that I enjoy my food best when I am relaxed, but hungry and that I enjoy simpler foods. Contributing to that simplicity is both fewer options (less stress of choosing) and fewer flavors/kinds of foods. Silly that I had to write that much to come to those conclusions again, but I guess it never hurts to repeat the lesson.

Saturday, November 3, 2007

Insomnia

I hate not being able to sleep. Is it sharing the bed with my dog and/or my boyfriend? Is it the temperature of the room? Is it anxiety about waking up for work? Is it the mysterious alarm that woke me up in what seemed to be the middle of the night?

Like so many nights, I tossed and turned much of last night and couldn't even sleep in until 7 as planned. I find myself up getting ready for work a little earlier than usual and not one bit happy about it - in fact, I'm fairly frustrated and furious at moments. Tonight must be nap evening and/or alone sleeping time - sorry Chibo, sorry A.