Lighthouse Keeper

  Lately, I've been thinking about this poem that was written back in college, not by me, but by a good friend of mine, Jaye. I'm going to put it here in its entirety because it matters to know what it's about, and it's good words. (formatting is mine)

I am the Lighthouse Keeper.

I live in the Lighthouse, 

Cold, Alone and Waiting

Waiting for the ships to return.

I am the only one left who remembers

when those ships were in port.

One by one they left

Different destinations

But all away from here

Here I stay Here I stand Waiting

I have the list of the names of those ships

I kept tabs on their destinations

I am proud of those boats

I am proud of their journeys

Some traveled across the sevens seas

And carry the circus to towns

One is now private and hosts parties for

the best of Broadway

Some now show other boats 

how to move

Some still wander searching what to do

Some have been updated

Some have been destroyed

I swear one day they'll all come back

That's why I can not leave

For some one must be here

To make sure they're safe,

they're happy, they're proud

For although this boat doesn't leave

and this boat is now rusted

And all the others don't stop moving

And never get rust

I love each and every one

And I will wait for them

right here

For some are destined for greatness

Some find it by chance

Some help others make it

And one must stay behind

One must keep the light on 

So the others can find their way home

So they can come back

enjoy their time together

remember old times

catch up on what's been happening

And hopefully they won't stay

"That poor guy, stuck here all this time,

all these years"

Hopefully they'll thank me

for keeping the lighthouse on.

For I am the Lighthouse Keeper

I've been thinking a lot about this poem lately, which was written probably close to twenty years ago.  

I've been thinking about this poem lately because I've been in my profession for 20 years. I've been working as an English teacher at Stagg High School for 19 years. I have watched people come and go my entire life, and here I sit, hanging on, hoping others will come back to me someday, just to say hi.

I'm not a favorite teacher very often, but I know that I'm liked. I had a student today tell me that I'm his favorite teacher because I try to relate to my students. I said thank you, and he laughed and said "No, I'm really serious. Like-- you try to listen to us!", and I can't imagine being a teacher who doesn't listen to their students and let them talk to you. But, I am here - being a teacher. 

I've been thinking about this poem lately because I am here in Stockton, and I don't see me really going anywhere. In spite of the moniker of "Most Miserable City" (Thanks Forbes), and "Murder Capitol" (which I don't think we are) I love my city. I love its diversity. The diversity of the people, the diversity of the opinions, but especially the diversity in restaurants. I can go 4 blocks in any direction from where I am and find Indian food, a few sushi places, a poke salad place, a few Italian restaurants, a decent(ish) diner, a mom and pop hot dog store and even a Panera.  On my drive home from work there is quite a diversity of food - even if I need to cook at home more often.

I've been here in this apartment for the last ten years. It's the longest I've ever lived in one place in my entire life, but I've (almost) always lived in Stockton, and the neighborhood I'm in now is wonderful. Maybe not the quietest all the time, but a good apartment, the people are friendly and the noisiest it gets is around the 4th of July. The walk around the complex is a quarter mile track, the leaves are just beginning to turn brown and the sparse lawn between the buildings 

I've been thinking about this poem lately because I feel like the Lighthouse Keeper of the poem, I have watched everybody move away and wander to find their destiny. My students, my friends, my lovers. They all go off to find their fortune in the world, and I watch them, and wish for the best for them in everything, hoping that once in a while they look back with fondness on me and maybe think to say "Hi" once in a while, knowing that I think of them fondly. 

Sick Day

 I love Autumn. I love the crisp air, the sound when the wind sussurrates through the trees, and the light is grey from the clouds. It makes me think of flannel sheets, glowing screens and comfort. It has been a beautiful day.  I took a sick day today to catch up on my grading and catch up on my mental health. The weekend just wasn't enough.

I always feel guilty when I take Mondays off, mostly because I think it makes me look lazy, like I'm trying to get a vacation or a three day weekend, but this one was the culmination of too many vegetables - and the resulting upset stomach - and stress. Since I got COVID, my life has been nothing but stress lately: stress because of procrastination; stress because I am just still so tired all the time; stress because I'm me, and I'm not taking care of myself.

Something is motivating me this week, and I hope that I can hold on to this feeling. It felt like something clicked into place. I started journalling again. It feels good to write in my journal again. It's good for my mental health to find a place. One of my students said to me this week "I haven't been using the Word of the Day, Ms. M. I've just been writing to myself, and it really seemed to help!"  I was so proud of him. Writing can be cathartic, and it's good to see that at least something is getting through to some of my students. 

I have two weeks until Fall Break, and then I can relax. I am hoping that I can relax with all of my grades done so that I can sit at Panera, drinking free coffee, writing and planning out this year's novel. It will be so good for my health. (Panera is my favorite third space!) I like to go in the morning when it's cool so that I can write while my husband is still asleep. (He usually doesn't wake up before 10.) I'm trying to write a romance this year- something I really haven't tried in a long time, but many say I would be pretty good at. I'm excited. The idea affords some research and a lot of imagination, but I'm excited.

Two more weeks... I can't wait to get to my writing life again. :)

Episode 85: To be continued...

My part of California hasn't had much rain lately, but this last weekend, I got to snuggle down into my warm little apartment and experience something I have needed for a long, long while: a weekend of rain and relaxation and lots and lots of grading.  I have today off too, and I have a lot of grading to do, since my grades for the progress reports are due on Wedensday, but I got a big chunk of grading done that I had been avoiding for a while. So, Yay me!  

What I haven't been so good at, dear reader, is actually spending any of that time cooking. I have not created anything healthy in my kitchen for.. a few weeks at least. Not for lack of fresh and good ingredients.  My wonderful AM has started his skills based class at San Joaquin Delta College, and he is doing amazing.  So, in his spare time, when he's not doing homework or being awesome, he is spending time practicing his knife skills by cutting up vegetables, or clarifying butter for a sauce or just a lot of things. He is amazing.  But, now I have a refrigerator full of diced, sliced, chopped vegetables, and I haven't been using them.  Bad Tory!

So, today's goal is to pull out the slow cooker and start to make a good stock that we can add some noodly bits to and make a great vegetable soup.  It is getting to be soup weather around here, and it is something I can take to school for lunches and savor.  I hope to get this started before I have a busy busy day off.  Why do I have to schedule all the stuff on my day's off and not actually have a day off? Because I'm a teacher.  So, today's to-do list includes: Start stock, my annual physical (yes, I'm nervous!) and buy clothes for my trip to Arizona next week (and even more nervous!)

I don't really know why I am writing today except that I want to write.  I want to start writing again, and I am tired of saying "Oh, I'm refreshing, or oh.. it's a new me" because it's not. This is the same old me. I am not starting anything new, I am not trying to be anything that I am not.  I am just trying to get healthier. I am trying to be better at being human, but that is all I am doing.  Just becoming a better human.  Coming out of my chrysalis, I suppose.  It has been a long, slow journey and I have a lot more struggling to do.  

I think I'll start writing every day, even if it is just for me.

This is my chronicle.  This is the page that reads: And the story continues...

Love and Lollipops,

ToryLynn

Episode 84: My Not so-BFS List!

I saw this on the Nanowrimo forums and I thought I would make one of my own here, so I have a place to keep it.  My BIG, FUN, SCARY List of thing to do.  Now, I know it's getting on towards 2014, but I don't want this to be a list of resolutions. I don't want this to be just one more list of things that I will "try" to do, but a list of things I plan on actually doing, things I can set in motion, make plans for, make a goal for and just.. you know.. be awesome at!  Nanowrimo is sort of the end of the year for me and the beginning of being motivated. If I can write 50,000 words in one month on one story (and not even finish it, but it is there, in a file, waiting to be opened on Martin Luther King Jr. Day where my Writing Monster can cry out "Free at Last" since I have put her away for 6 weeks to let my writing ideas simmer and see what comes to fruition), I can do just about anything I really set my mind to, as long as I break it into smaller chunks.

See, that's the nice thing about Nanowrimo.  I took it day by day. I didn't look at 50,000 words and have a panic attack. I looked at 1667 words a day for 30 days.  So I can't look at the nearly 200 pounds I have to lose as 200 pounds (and believe me, that's a lot of butter!), I can just take it a pound at a time (probably by not eating pounds of butter).

However, this list, this BFS list, is the beginning of the lists, the start, the "Where do I go from here" of lists that may look BIG and SCARY, but will also, ultimately be FUN too!  So, while this list may be a list of BIG things, (though maybe not quite yet a BIG list, I do plan on adding stuff to it), all of these can be broken into smaller, achievable, day by day every day I try this and it works for me goal list.  A list of "I can do it" not.. "I want to do it!"

So, here's my list (in no particular order)

1. Finish my pink and brown quilt that I've been working on since before my divorce.
2. Track my calories and exercise daily.
3. Exercise daily.
4. Record weight, blood pressure, blood sugar and exercise in a chart so I can see my progress.
5. Write an outline for each of the three (so far) books that are in my San Francisco Friends novels.
6. Rewrite/Edit one novel into a publishable draft by August.
7. Work hard and be an awesome teacher!
8. Help my district and my school transition to Common Core Standards and be a great on-campus leader!
9. Help my adorable, loving, wonderful husband get through the next year of college!
10. Complete the next 12 weeks cycle of Julia Cameron's 'The Artist's Way'.
11. Meditate every day.

So, those are things I can do!  Let's get crackin'!

Love and Lollipops,

ToryLynn

Episode 83: My tools

My school year has finished up.  The grading and the reading and the meetings that have kept me from blogging and writing and just finding my place in the world are over and I can be selfish... at least for a little while.

For the next two weeks, I will covet my time, since little of it will be mine. The little bit of time I get to myself, such as now, in the early morning hours, I will cherish.  I will use this time to clean up my office (which badly needs it), work on some craft projects and read and rest and reflect and hopefully do a lot more writing.  I want to do morning pages. I want to read Sophie's World.  I want to get healthy, not just physically, but also mentally.  I want to be able to dance at my wedding, play with my eventual children and live a good long, healthy and happy life.  And I can do it, with the help of some tools that I need to pick up again.

Tools are good things. They help you maintain, reflect, become better.  I am a a huge supporter of tools, and I use a few on a semi-regular basis.  Well.. anybody who really knows me knows that I do very little out of habit or on a regular basis.  I can't even really seem to remember to take my meds every day.  Hmmm

Anyway, here are a few of my tools that I have picked up as I go along my merry way...

Tool One: My big pink notebook. AM calls it my "bible" and it's sort of an apt description.  I keep everything in there. It has 5 sections right now.  The first is my planner, second is food stuffs, third is blog ideas and random writings, fourth is wedding stuffs, and fifth is financial stuffs.  If I lose the thing, I won't be able to remember anything.  It has a nice loop for my pink fountain pen and it is wonderful.  I carry it with me nearly everywhere, though it does need to get cleaned out and replaced sooner or later... probably sooner.

Tool Two: My pen.  I have a hot pink Levenger True Writer fountain pen with Hope Pink ink in it.  (you may be noticing a trend.. it is my favorite color).  I almost put Morning Pages as my second tool, but I don't really write them as habitually as I am supposed to. One of my summer goals that I will be writing about in a later post (probably tomorrow).  My pink pen, like my pink notebook, goes with me everywhere.  It is a reminder that I am supposed to write.  It is a reminder that I can jot down a note and my weird kinesthetic brain will remember it more readily than just reading it or asking someone else to remind me.

Tool Three: Our big freakin' white boards.  We have two in the house. One of them is our calendar, which we write up every month and our To Do List for that month. It hangs next to our front door in a prominent place near the table in the kitchen. The other, much more neglected one, is in my office, full of project ideas that never really get done.  I have to work on this this summer.

Took Four: My phone.  In this day and age, I couldn't live without my phone. AM is constantly saying that I am always on my phone and I'm afraid he's right. I use my phone to help track everything.  It is my backup calendar which I coordinate with the planner in my pink notebook. It my food tracker, my mood tracker, my link to other people through Facebook.  I use a few fitness apps, and am trying out new ones all the time (most of them are free).

My final and Fifth (and best) tool: AM and my friends circle.  I cannot say how much these people have helped me.  From my online big brother, RO, to our Stockton Writer's Group, I have so much support.  Having a live in personal trainer and personal chef helps, as AM is constantly helping me be a better person and reminding me that I am so much more than I think I am and I can do so much more than I think can.  These people have helped me and made my life amazing.  They are supportive and give me great suggestions and kudos and high fives and big hugs and I appreciate and love them all for it.

Anywaysssss.... before I get too sappy... I am going back to bed.  I walked 3.74 miles yesterday and I am SO feeling it right now.  Now that I'm off for the summer, I plan on making writing part of my regime, as well as some reading, some exercising and a lot of snuggling from my wonderful AM! :)

Love and Lollipops,

ToryLynn

Episode 76: Happy!!

Every night before we go to bed, we sit at our dining room table, fountain pens in hand, and write on small 2"x2" pieces of paper that are cut from 24lb stock.  These pieces of paper are light blue and pink, the color of youth, the color of gender and for us, the color of happiness.  With my pen, filled with a beautiful hot pink ink called "Hope Pink" for breast cancer awareness I write my happy thoughts for the day.  Across the table from me, AM, with his turquoisish pen, filled with Bahama Blue, writes his happy thoughts for the day.  Our world is color coded in this way. When we are finished, we put them into an 8 cup Ball jar and seal the lid.  In this way, we record our happiness, one day at a time and fill a jar with love and hope.

We've been doing this since around February. Originally the thought had been to start January 1st, but we are slow to get organized.  The jar in the picture is our happy jar, with our happy thoughts color coded to suit us.  We put the day's triumphs, the happy little things that we did for each other, or that we talked about, or even just what we ate for the day.  They can be any thought, as long as they are happy and not negative.

The plan is to open the jar at the end of the year as a New Year's ritual and see all of the happy thoughts that we have created over the year.  Ideally, if we had started on January first, we would have 730 happy thoughts in it by the end of the year.  730 happy memories, 730 meals, 730 joys that we could share.  I am not sure what we will do with them as we review them. Perhaps we will create a scrapbook, putting them in order and gluing them to pages as a reminder of all the happiness that we had the year we got engaged and then got married.  Maybe we will let the jar fill (though it is already getting pretty full and we have to pack the slips down well) until our first anniversary, so we can have a record of our first year together and the time that we were engaged.  Maybe we will just tear them into smaller pieces and throw them over ourselves and our friends at our New Year's celebration.  We have a while to go until we pick out those pieces of paper and find out all of our happiness throughout the year.  I'm excited to see what he wrote, since our happy thoughts are private until the end of the year, locked up in our little jar on little pieces of blue and pink paper.

I hope that you all have your happy thoughts and that you share them with the ones that you love, today and every day.  Keep them somewhere safe, even if it is a journal or notebook, a planner or just in your memory, but my hope is that everybody has at least one happy thought a day, even if it is as simple as "the cute guy on the bus smiled at me" or "I ate all my vegetables" or even "I am still alive and my heart is still pumping blood through my body", everybody should be happy, every single day.

Here is to all of your happy thoughts!

Love and Lollipops,

ToryLynn

Episode 66: Putting Color Into Life

Today we went to the Farmer's Market behind the Weberstown Mall.  We got up, even before breakfast, put on clothes, braved the cold, crisp morning (at 8:45) and went out to see what sort of fresh produce they had for us today.  What you see in the picture is what we bought.  Fresh veggies, raspberry jams and some pomegranates.  They are all glorious (and barely fit in our tiny tiny apartment fridge).  The plan is to make some really awesome veggie soup, since we're on a type of Weight Watchers.

 In fact, I'm sort of cheating.  I have no money and very little resources to rejoin Weight Watchers at this time, but I have all of my old book and all of my old program stuff, so we're using these as resources, with some help from some web sources, to create our own version of Weight Watchers.  I haven't given up on the whole milk or the whole fat yogurt, as they seem to be better for my digestion than the low fat stuff (I don't get nearly as may ucky tummies), but we are adding many more veggies and things to our diet.  I feel healthier.  According to my Wii, I have lost about 5 pounds in the last two weeks.

Just looking at that picture makes me happy!  The colors, the vibrancy, and I've noticed that since we have been eating better, cleaning our apartment more often and working out a bit more, my whole life seems to be coated in this new vibrant color.  A year or more ago, I was feeling kind of in the doldrums.  I lived in a beautiful place, I had everything I ever wanted, but it wasn't satisfying. I was unhappy.  I was overweight. I was lazy and in pain and everything seemed like crap.  I was taking medication for bipolar disorder and it wasn't helping much.  And the food I was eating was awful!  Looking back at my Weight Watcher's books from a year ago, I was eating fast food daily.  One day was Wendys. One day was Subway. One day was Taco Bell.  Fried foods, foods full of fat, foods full of fillers. These were the things that I was putting into my body, and my body fought back with depression, acne and weight gain.

Now I eat what you see on the table.  Fresh fruits, fresh veggies. I make my own breads sometimes.

 I take a vitamin daily, and I cook my own food. I have even, on occasion, made my own butter (which is absolutely delicious!)  I know exactly what goes in my food. If I write down a recipe, or a list of ingredients, I can pronounce every single one of them.  I still eat meat, though we do have our Wegitarian Wednesdays, and Pizza Fridays (our one little concession to the "how do you pronounce that?" foods).  We will eat out, but we go places where we can eat healthfully.  We found this great little sushi place (at Sherwood Mall, no less) that makes great rolls and you can watch them make them, so we know exactly what goes into them.  All of these things have greatly improved the quality of my life.

I plan on keeping up with this blog some more.  I want to write and keep track.  I want to post about how I organize my life, how I make it can make it better, and how I have learned to enjoy a life lived in less space and fewer calories but much more enriched.  I'll post some of my recipes that we have found particularly yummy, some ideas for keeping life organized, and my adventures of jumping off the high dive of life and just, well... Weighting in the Deep End!

Keeping happy and healthy!

ToryLynn

Episode 56: Rebirth

Hi! 

I know, I haven't been around much lately. When you're living a life of this much bliss, you can't be bothered to do much blogging, I suppose.  Well, mostly bliss anyway.  Things are good... for the most part.

Except my weight.

I seem to have reached some sort of plateau.  I'm not really losing weight, but I'm not gaining too much weight either. I rubber band around mffmmm and mffmm, gaining or losing about 2 or 3 pounds every time I weigh in.

This needs to stop.

So, Easter is coming up.  I don't celebrate it, as I have a tiny little hitch in my whole stance of belief and religion.  That being said, Easter is an interesting time.  It is a time when the Christian world celebrates the rebirth of their god with stolen pagan rituals.  But it's that word, that term rebirth that gets me thinking. 

Once a year, most of the world (about a third, really.. 2.2 billion, according to Wikipedia) reflect on rebirth once a year.  Their God is reborn after three days.  I think I'll take a cue from them, and consider my own bit of rebirth.

I need to get back on track.  I need to be counting points, spending time exercising.  Recently, AM and I went to Japantown in San Francisco and did about 5 hours (conservative estimate) of walking.  We actually stayed for 6 and a half hours, but I'm giving us an hour an a half for the times we sat down to eat, write, talk, enjoy each other's company.  We had a really great time just hanging out and engulfing ourselves in the two malls that surround the Japanese Peace Plaza.  (If you're my friend on Facebook, I will post some pictures).  We hung out at MaiDo, we strolled around, we had lunch at Mifuna (I could be wrong on the name), and altogether it was wonderful!  And we walked so much!!

And when we got home... we felt it!  I don't exercise much, and my body screamed in the only way that it could that I need to do walking more often.  Maybe not 5 hours in one day, but a half an hour - maybe an hour a day - may not be the worst thing for my system.  So, part of my rebirth will be walking, even if it is just walking daily down to the market to pick up a little bit of groceries for dinner.

Since... well, let's say since January... I haven't been big on meal planning and counting points.  Those things get in the way when you have a Nubi (good frozen yogurt) just down the street from you.  Those things get in the way when you are suddenly rediscovering that the city that you live in has wonderful cuisines that you have never tried before (like the Greek cuisine I had never noticed in Stockton before.. and the Vietnamese.. and the tiny Italian places).  Those things get in the way when you start focusing on work and grading and really teaching lessons that make your students thing.  Counting points and calories hasn't been much on my priority list. 

But they need to be.  I don't want to live forever, but I don't want to die early either.  If I stay at my current weight and my current eating pattern (high sodium, fat and sugar content) I will develop some serious illnesses. I am already on the path to diabetes and I already have to take a slough of medications for high blood pressure.  My asthma has begun to kick up again and my back has thrown in its screaming pain along with all of the else that is going on.  If I want to be healthier and happier, I have to stick to a diet rich in foods that are healthy for me. (I hate the word diet.  It implies something temporary to me in a way that is like "With this 8 week diet, you'll lose 50 pounds!" which never really works out because these diet plans are ridiculous starvation acts that deprive your body of healthy nutrients and carbohydrates that your brain and other organs need to function! Diet for me means "the way I eat every day.") Counting points and making sure that I check off all of the items on that healthy eating list are important for me. AM and I have littered our apartment with whiteboards and reminder notebooks. It is time I used them.

The last part of my rebirth is my blog.  I need to start blogging again.  I meant it to be a record of my journey, perhaps a way for me to express myself that will give other people hope, ideas and the occasional recipe or healthy hint that they can take away from it.  I honestly don't really expect very many people to read it, but I enjoy writing it and sharing my life with my family and friends, who I have been spending a lot more time with lately.  I need to get back onto a nearly daily updating routine. Maybe a "just before bedtime" bit of writing, just to check in. Maybe a quick 15 minute "this is my motivation for today' writing in the mornings. All I know is that I need to get back to it.  This is (mostly) for me.

I have been lax, and inherent in that laziness has been the weight that I have gained and the lack of exercise and good eating.  I am a responsible adult.  I have the tools I need to succeed. Now I need to use them.

Hoping that you find your own rebirth this weekend,
Love and Lollipops,

ToryLynn

Episode 50: A Review

Wow.. has it been 50 posts so far?  Ok. I admit, I have been really lax at posting for the last week or so, mostly because of my complete lack of internet connection.  I am currently sitting and soaking up the warmth, the coffee and the ambiance of Noah's bagels... and stealing their internet.  I won't get mine back until the seventh.

I didn't weigh in this week (mostly because they were closed on Christmas day), so I don't know my current weight loss situation, but I have lost over 15 pounds so far, but that isn't far enough, and I'm pretty sure with the holiday gluttony I have probably gained some back.  I have to get back on track for a few reasons.  I may  have a fairly strong heart, but I want to give it as much of a chance as I can to live and be strong.  I want to be the girl that I see when think of myself in fantasy.  I also just want to be healthier.  So, that is what I'm going to do.

When I think of 15 pounds in the grand scheme of how much I have to lose, it doesn't seem like a whole lot, but at least it's a step in the right direction.  If I put three bags of sugar together, that's how much weight I've lost. I've lost 15 packs of butter from my body.  I've lost 32 8oz filet mignons.. and I'm only bound to lose more. When I put it like that.. it makes me feel like I can do anything!

In the week without internet, I have moved into a new apartment and started a new life.  I'm spending today finishing cleaning out the old apartment and getting everything out of it, even if it kills me.  I know I can do this. I am strong enough to do this. It requires that I clean out my car first, and throw away some of the boxes that I have in my current apartment to make room for the stuff coming in.  I'm almost done packing and I'm only going to give the old place a sort of cursory cleaning, hoping to get my deposit back.  As I have my rent paid up for next month, and a few other things, I may take a small part of that deposit and get my bass guitar kit and then put the rest on the credit card to pay back the exorbitant amount of money that I put on it in the moving expenses.

This new year will be a new start for me.  I think back on my last few years, and I think about EH and AM and everything that has come and gone from my life this year.  My family and my friends all say that the divorce was a long time coming and probably should have been done sooner.  I guess I just needed a catalyst.  I regret hurting my husband, who has taken care of me in the past, but in taking care of me, he stunted me as well.  I am 35 and I'm just learning how to balance a check book, how to pay attention and pay my bills and how to eat correctly and healthfully.  These are all things I should have been doing my entire adult life, but that I have neglected because I thought that someone else would take care of me.

Now, as I begin to grow up, I eat my vegetables (Brussel sprouts ARE palatable when roasted with garlic and olive oil!), I pay my bills, I have my own place and I am rediscovering my creativity again.  I am rededicating myself to The Artist's Way by Julia Cameron and I am hoping to rediscover my creative self and finish a damned novel.  I only have 283 days left to get it finished and I hope.. publishable. I start on Sunday... a new year.. a finished novel... a new love.. a new life... all in my new apartment.

I have to become a better teacher too, but with living on my own and everything, I think I will have plenty of time to work on grading and lesson planning and being the best teacher and writer and poet and singer and artist (and bass player) that I can be.

Anyway, I have about a mile to walk back home (it's .91 miles from home to Noah's), and then unpack and clean out my car and go move everything in my old life in order to start my new.  I hate moving.  I hate looking at the old memories.  I think back to the good times, and I know that I will miss them, but I also know that I am making the right choice for myself.  I can't go on living like I did, because I just kept getting more and more miserable.  I have been posting my emocubes (or emorbs as the case may be) on Facebook. I've been tracking those for about six months now.  My little emo chart had been going steadily down, with a few up spikes every once in a while for a while.  Once I made the decision to change my life.. the line on the chart has been going steadily up, with a few little dips here and there.

I know that I can make it on my own.  I know that I am strong enough to do this, and that my life can be anything I want it to be.  Life is what you make of it.  Today, I am making it my own.

Love, hugs.. and Chiiiii

ToryLynn

Episode 33: Wherein I break a habit by overdoing it

Morose. Morose Morose Morose Morose.  I like that word, Morose.  I've sort of liked it ever since I heard it on Chasing where Jay comes in on a brooding (yet hot) Ben Affleck (Holden), and says "Well, look at this morose motherfucker".  I just like the word.  Apparently I overuse it though.

I am morose today.  I am sour, glum, moody, crabby, cranky, disconsolate, saturnine, ill natured, splenetic.  If I didn't have to go to work to do my post-observation conference, I probably wouldn't go.  I will go though, with my best smile on and in my most comfortable clothes I can get away with at work (black jeans, black shirt and my new trendy sweater).

I think my observation went well yesterday.  I find out today during my prep, but my students were (mostly) on task, the lesson was well prepared.  I knew what I was doing. If only I could be as well prepared every day.  Teaching is draining. Life is draining.  It's not that I'm exhausted (although I did get up at 2:45 this morning) it's just that I'm drained.  I feel that life has ebbed out of me today.  I know that it is chemical, some neuron in my brain misfiring or some lack of hormone or something, so I am not going to worry about it. I will be on an upswing soon enough.  I can handle this affliction without adding more chemicals to my brain that I don't need.  I will sip my coffee, suckle the caffeine teat, and try to energize myself for just two more days of school until the blessed blessed weekend.

Morose! (You know, the more I use the word.. the less meaning it has.  Maybe I will stop using it.)

(By the way, of all the Kevin Smith View Askewniverse movies, my favorites go in this order... Chasing Amy, Dogma, Clerks, Clerks 2, Jay and Silent Bob, Mallrats.  I have a signed 10th anniversary edition of Clerks.  It is awesomesauce. Oh now I wish I could take those to school and watch them.  Now that would cheer me up.)

Episode 29: Proud of me

Every night, I sit up for a few minutes and I write down what I ate that day. I used to have a paper book that I recorded everything in, and I have my Droid app for recording stuff in as well, but those mostly get ignored.  I have so many tools at my fingertips, but what seems to be the best thing for me lately is to sit up in the evening, watching movies and talking to AM while I record my food for the day and figure out if I need an evening snack.  Peanut butter from a spoon has become one of my favorite snacks late in the night. High in protein, and only one tablespoon, since it is 5 points for one tablespoon, but once that sticky, sweet almost salty goodness hits my tongue, I am happy.

Every night, as I record my points, he asks me what I am doing and I tell him and then he says "I am so proud of you."  I have heard that statement quite a bit lately, from family and friends.  It is an amazing feeling for someone to take pride in me. It makes me feel amazing every time I hear it.  I know that I shouldn't place my self worth in the opinions of others, but it feels really great to have a little bit of pride in myself.  Yes! I've lost over 10 pounds in the last month. Yes! My clothes are beginning to fit better.  Yes! I can move better now!  I feel amazing and special and it is because so many people have told me that they are proud of me.  I am loving this!

I don't feel depraved.  In fact, just the opposite. I feel satisfied, like the cat that caught the canary and is hiding it under her paw, waiting to savor the experience that skill and life have given her.  I eat enough, I am emotionally fulfilled, I am taking over my own life and it feels amazing. I feel like I can do anything! Now... what was that about Nanowrimo?

Love and snuggles,

Tory