Happy New Year

It's trite, I know, but the new year (inspires? incites?) makes you contemplative. Where did the past year go? What did you accomplish?

Actually, the past year was pretty darn amazing. I found my way back to emotional health, I got a new job and I bought a new house. HUGE. And how do I top that? We'll have to wait and see.

Not off to the most auspicious start ... I've been battling a headache for 4 days now. In an effort to be frugal, I didn't refill my birth control prescription thinking that it would be co-pay free if I waited until 2012. So I'm off the pill and wondering if the headache is really a hormone headache from not being on the pill. My body hasn't adjusted to making its own hormones again. Or maybe it's the weather - 40+ degrees in January and no snow. What's up with that? I probably should be putting this in my health blog.

Still in my pj's ... pretty much a wasted day. I can drop by the neighbor's dessert reception later (and I will). I have tomorrow off and I'm glad for the break. I need it. Lots of stress at work but that's why they pay me the big bucks.

I've thought a lot about this in the last few weeks - I really am on good financial footing now. I can pay my bills and I often make purchases without even thinking about the cost. I'm lucky. Watched an episode of "30 Days" on NetFlix earlier and it was about trying to exist on minimum wage for 30 days. Damn near impossible. I have a home and I can pay for the heat and electric. I have health insurance and am putting money away for retirement. Lucky.

So yes, Happy New Year to me, and to you. May it be our best year yet!

Working On It

So hey ... lots of news here. New house, new job - all on the same day! (Sort of - the day I closed on my house was the last day at my old job.) The house is good, but I'm still not totally settled in. Too much stuff still weighing me down.

And the new job ... well, be careful what you wish for! I can handle it, but every day is a challenge. Not because the work is hard, but because the women I'm working with just don't know how to not crawl up into each others business. And the boss is indecisive. She changes her mind like she changes her underwear.

So I keep my head down and just try to be consistent. It's all I can do.

The Mastery of Love

I joined a book group last fall and I'm really enjoying it.  It was something I wanted to do for a long time, but no one ever invited me and I didn't make the effort to create my own book group.  Thank goodness someone else took the initiative.  It's kind of a strange little group - we read what I'll call spiritual self-help books.

Six people came to the first meeting, but two of the women quickly decided it wasn't for them and we never saw them again.  We were four strong through the first two books and then a fifth joined us.  She's missed as often as she's made it, so I won't really include her as a member until she comes on strong later on. 

So the four of us ... all divorced.  I'm the only one with no kids.  We started by reading "Practicing the Power of Now."  Yeah, basically the abridged version.  But it worked for us.  Then on to "The Untethered Soul" followed by "The Buddha in your Mirror" and we're just now finishing up "The Mastery of Love."

I've learned a lot from all of the books, and I would love to go back and highlight it all, but that's not going to happen.  So let me just share today's breakthrough with you ...

I had spent the night with The Man and got up early.  Did a bit of reading and was on Chapter 11, Healing the Emotional Body.  There were a number of passages that struck me, but to make a long story short, what started the tears flowing was the section that talked about forgiveness:

"You must forgive those who hurt you, even if whatever they did to you is unforgivable in your mind.  You will forgive them not because they deserve to be forgiven, but because you don't want to suffer and hurt yourself every time you remember what they did to you."

And do you know who I need to forgive first.  Myself.  Oh yeah - been beating myself up forEVER.  The good news is that I turned a corner last year when I finally stopped reading the Ex's email.  I was just never letting the wound heal.  It wasn't that I cared about him any more, it was that I was punishing myself by invading his privacy, somehow thinking that I was superior by being so smart that I knew how to hack his account (which wasn't hard, because he never changed his password which meant he was stupid).  By once and for all letting go of that, I turned the corner.  I have been in a much better place for the past year, but I still need to forgive myself.

I forgive the Ex for whatever he did to hurt me, or whatever I thought he did (or didn't do) to hurt me.  I think I've finally let that go.  But thinking of it brought me to tears - which is a good thing.  It was a good release.  The Man called out to me and I crawled back under the covers and we talked about why tears were streaming down my face.  It was a good thing.

"And you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free."

Oh No I Dint!

Have been trying to catch up with Girlfriend A for months. She's just always busy, doesn't have time etc. But we persevered and finally got together last Friday. She made it sound like she didn't have a lot of time, and actually pushed back our meeting time, but then we ended up talking for an hour and a half and I actually had to sort of run out on her to make it to a movie on time.

A is a strange one - a very private person. That's fine, not everyone has to have diareah of the mouth like me. I respect her privacy. But as the conversation unfolded, it all began to make sense. There was a reason we hadn't been able to get together ... she thought I'd done something I didn't do and consciously or not, she had been holding it against me.

Six years ago I'd had a brief encounter with The Photographer. It was something I'd told her about two years ago when she began to have an affair with this person. The encounter went something like this ...

I went out for a few drinks with a girlfriend, and by the end of the night I'd had three glasses of wine, two White Russians, and innumerable shots of Captain Morgan. I brought home a man who I barely know and we ended up in bed. He was a perfect gentleman and nothing happened. I was drunk (which I didn't even realize until the hangover hit me the next morning) and I'm not sure if I said something or sent signals that I might not have sent if I was sober. I mean, we were in bed together. We kissed. I snored. He felt my breasts.

I told her about this as soon as I knew they were seeing each other. I told her nothing had happened between us and that I was glad of that - that I wasn't interested in him in that way. And besides, I began seeing The Man a few months after that and I've been with him ever since.

Well, except for that brief period when we broke up in 2009. Turns out The Photographer played her but good. Strung her along, let her get caught up in him and then dumped her unceremoniously. But I didn't know anything about this because she was all private and not wanting to talk about anything. So she sits at home and thinks up wild scenarios. Like I was with him when The Man and I broke up.

Are you kidding me? She's been thinking I screwed her man for close to a year now and never said a word. So she finally asks me and I tell her absolutely not but there's a bit of a smile on my face because it's so far from reality that I can't even believe she's asking me. So I hope she believed me because it was the truth and it sounds like this jerk is just not worth her energy.

But she thought it was possible because I'd also told her about The Politician. Because any woman like me who would allow an engaged man to hit on her would probably also bang her girlfriend's boyfriend.

Oh, wait - I did do that. Affair # 2. Okay, so maybe A had reason to worry. But I didn't do it!

Where Do I Go From Here?

I am getting better, I swear that I am, but how does it help me to know that the Ex had a baby girl with the new wife on April 14? How does it help to know that a college classmate got the job that I thought I should have had by now? And that in taking it she now has to sell her $340,000 home in another city? How does this help me when I can't find anything in my price range of $150,000?

It doesn't help me in any way but you know what? It doesn't hurt me anymore either. It's immaterial. I need to focus on what I'm doing in MY life. What makes ME happy. It's a journey, not a destination. And what a long strange trip it has been.

Suddenly Spring

Three straight days of 70 degree plus weather and suddenly, it's spring. Buds are popping and the grass is turning green. It's a few weeks ahead of schedule, and we could still get a killing frost, so I'm trying not to get ahead of myself here, but I'm enjoying every minute of it.

And as much as things change, still they stay the same ... trying to move past whatever it is that is holding me back. Is it my job? My living situation? My relationship status? Myself?

Just need to keep working on myself ... one positive step at a time.

Sofa Surfing

It's Friday night and I'm parked here on the sofa. Read my email, checked my bank account and tripped over to a blog I hadn't visited in a long time. Reminded me how I used to enjoy blogging.

What's running through my mind ...

... watching Hope for Haiti and have to admit I don't know who most of these performers are
... have been watching what I eat and trying to exercise more; it's been working. First thing I've stuck with for more than a few days in a long time
... despite some steady ongoing cleaning and purging, I'm still weighed down by the stuff in my life
... despite logging on and feeling an initial urge, I suddenly feel as if I have nothing to say

Yeah, it's been a long day and a long week. Maybe I won't be so brain dead later.