Saturday, February 18, 2012

L.A.Z.Y.



Gosh, I have been so lazy with this blogging thing! It doesn't help that my computer, once again, is virus-prone and now doesn't let me even log on to the internet, ugh! I ask so little and the internet was one of the few ways that I was able to feel somewhat connected to, well, anything!! Perhaps, that's the true lesson here? Perhaps the lesson that I am being shown, among many, is that I need to focus my attention on my life HERE. I, somehow, need to embrace my life as an Ohioan (I refuse to say that I am a Buckeye!!!!) But, how to do that?

How to do this when there are days that I am so lonely for friendship that I can barely breathe? Too dramatic? Maybe I'm being a bit dramatic but I want to be able to dive head-first into my/our life here and it's difficult when I'm either the new girl sitting alone in the cafeteria or the poor girl with her nose pressed up against the window at the toy store. Neither scenario is really a place that I've ever been. Except once...

Only once have I experienced a worse case of loneliness. It was roughly 12 years ago that I was a new mother of 2 in a 3rd floor apartment with only 1 car. I had returned to Ft. Wayne, IN - back to the scene of some horrible choices and horrible times of my college career. Sure, I met some great friends and my sister was there with me but college was a dark time for me in so many ways. And, yet, here I was again in THIS city as a married mother of a 2 year old and a newborn. The hubby worked all of the time and when he wasn't working, he wasn't home very often. I was forced to function on about 3-4 hours of sleep a night as my daughter had trouble sleeping at night so I was up all night with her and then had to entertain my 2 year old son during the day with no napping during the day. Any friends that I had in college had since moved away except for a few and even if I wanted to meet up with them, I had no vehicle in which to do it.

I describe this particular period of time because as lonely as I am here and now, I am very thankful and very blessed that I have the beautiful kids and the wonderful husband that I do at this moment. I can look back at that terribly awful (seriously, one of the lowest times of my life despite the fact that I love, love, loved my babies) time and realize that I have much to be thankful for now! Again, I am thankful for my husband - who when is not work IS home with the kids and me. I am thankful that my 3 beautiful children are super smart in school, wonderful athletes, kind, and thoughtful. I am thankful that I have a car and the ability to get around if I need to do so. I am thankful that I am not 29 years old (as I was then) and that at 41 I'm a little more secure in the person that God wants me to be and that I can remind myself more easily that I do not require the external things like weekend plans or family down the street to make me whole. I do not require anything except the love of God and family and I have those in abundance!!

So, yes, because I am human I do sometimes feel like that little girl left out of the slumber party but it does not define me as it once did! I just need to work on not airing everything out via Facebook or via texts or whatever technological device is handy. Winning the race is much sweeter when you've tasted the pitfalls of defeat once or twice (or thrice - thrice?)