Lots of rain again! I’m going to do something outside tomorrow even if I have to wear my boots and rain gear. Reminder to self: check for spiders living in boots before putting on.

Who remembers where they might have heard the quote in the title of this post? I remember.  Quote the next line if you do.
Answer in next post.



Rain barrels are full – water just runs off the top



So, did you ever join a cult?  I did, although I wouldn’t have called it that then.  Even now, I like to think of it more as a stage of learning that had some pretty positive points to it.  I guess for others it was a real nightmare and kind of wrecked their life. Today I had occasion to read some of the history of the church written by people who had different takes on it. It has been a bit upsetting and I don’t think I can be sure who the bad guys were and who the good guys were – just that there were obviously some of both. I’m also thinking that whenever you put people and power together, you are probably going to get some corruption along with the package.

What is interesting to me is that, having joined the “cult” I really became quite busy applying it’s teachings to my own life and didn’t notice a lot of the disturbing stuff that was probably going on.  It wasn’t like we were being prepped to drink kool-aid, or shave our heads and wear robes in the airport  – but we did do some things that were considered pretty odd to others.  But odd in a normal sort of way.

I grew up going to a evangelical, protestant church where my family and most extended family had gone for years.  I knew about youth groups, church camp, VBS, and could find scripture references as fast as anyone could and it was okay I guess.  But other than the arguments at school between the Lutherans and the Catholics and us, I never had my thinking challenged in the areas of faith and personal philosophy of life.  Then along came the cult.  After my initial objections, which were more social than anything else, I found it very exciting that I could study the Bible and discover stuff I hadn’t heard about or thought about before.  It felt dangerous, but good, that God could lead me to be different for reasons I really believed in. I think it was a good thing that I got excited about God at all and for that I’m thankful.

I’m not in the cult anymore.  I’m not saying it was easy to break away from 20 plus years of thinking and doing certain things. There was pain involved.  I changed but I don’t really see that God did.  I appreciate his constancy more each time I survive another upset. The beliefs I hold about him keep getting more real, more central and more important to me.  I believe God has led me into, through and past a lot of different situations and has made something beneficial for me out of all of them.  I have no regrets and frankly, can’t thing of anyone I’d like to trade lives with.  I also believe that God does this for anyone who decides to trust him to do it.

I have been disappointed.  On the scale from 1 being least to 10 being greatest, this is only about a 2 but it is the most recent disappointment I’ve had so here it is…  (It’s also slightly disgusting)

I’m making soup with my home canned tomatoes, a whole chopped onion, a bunch of celery, some white beans and as the final ingredient other than spices I’m preparing to cook some brown rice.  Thankfully I decided to cook it separately and add it later.  After rinsing it under running water as per instructions and putting it into the pan to boil, what do I see but a horde of little black guys floating to the surface, taking their last breaths I suppose.  This is long grain organic rice and I guess having used no pesticides, the bugs come with the rice, for the same price.  What a deal. 

Well, they’re floating, so I thought maybe I could fish them out with a spoon. That worked pretty good but everytime I stirred the rice a few more came to the surface. Evidently, not all of them are bouyant – the more muscular ones are heavier? I don’t know.  What to do?  I mean how dangerous could they be? They’ve been eating organic rice all their lives in this bag where they probably were born.  Couldn’t we just eat them?

Now for all of you who have ever eaten at my house – rest easy.  I did throw them out.  I checked the bag and threw it out too.  I’m just sayin’ I hate to waste things so this was disappointing. 

I went in search of comfort food in my kitchen (shortly after reading about fudge in someone’s blog) and there wasn’t any, unless you count grapes or metamucil cookies, and I don’t.   There was nothing that fit my craving.  What a different life I lead than in the past!  Where are the cookie bakers, the hot chocolate drinkers, the brownie fiends? Instead I am left with the “disappearing husband” who can’t eat any of that stuff and doesn’t even dare have it around anymore.  Every once in a while – like this last weekend – one of my young, healthy family members comes home and blows the fat restricted cardiac diet out of the water.  We went out for pizza –  Dennis asked if there were any low fat pizzas on the menu and the waiter looked at him like he was from another planet.  We ate macaroni and cheese –  I had to have something for dinner for the aged guest who can’t chew very well. (excuses?) There were cookies after church – I left before visiting the snack table but my daughter who stayed brought a cookie home for me.  We went to a birthday party and had ambrosia salad and cake from Publix, decorated in bright indelible colors. Twice I opened a can of soda, well, and drank it, of course.  It’s been months since I did that.  I was even inspired to post my love of butter on my facebook page. Crazy things happen to people who restrict themselves over much.

 But now the weekend is past.  I’m back to eating cereal in the car on the way to work, in the dark, mostly at stoplights. I feed the cat better than I feed myself.  I let the refrigerator get almost empty of everything before I grocery shop. I don’t want to cook so we have a salad almost every night.  I am imaginative as I throw it together but it still gets a little tedious. And no matter how hard I try to use it up, there is always some form of salad green rotting or turning yellow in the fridge.

All this is to report that the husband is indeed, still disappearing, losing weight and exercising.  Still motivated. Still in a good mood about it all.  He’s going for another check up on the blood pressure tomorrow, but lately  it is often too low  rather than too high.  My day off tomorrow will have to include vegetable procurement which is our biggest grocery expense anymore.  Vegetables are good.  Fruit is good… hmm….  There are two bananas left and I’m thinking they are just right for some banana bread.  Oh yeah.

It’s been hot and steamy these days.  Hot is around 90 degrees, although it starts out cooler in the mornings because it’s autumn. On my usual walk out to prepare the pool for the morning swim (at work) I always look around at the gardens to see if anything adverse has occurred, at the machinery to see if there are malfunctions with the pool pump or the irrigation, and at the wildlife – if there be any.  The place is pretty wild actually, lots of raccoons, possums, osprey, woodpeckers, lizards, fish, manatee, dolphin. There is always something to notice for the discerning eye.  This particular morning there was a low, prolonged croak coming from high in the canopy and it wasn’t hard to locate – such an unusual sound.  I should have recorded it but by the time I got the camera it had quieted down.  Here is who it was…



Great Blue Heron perhaps?

 If it’s a Great Blue Heron, I don’t think I’ve ever seen one in a tree before. You might not be able to see the scale of bigness here without something to compare it with, but take my word for it, this was a big bird. Lots of amazing things in Florida.

Yesterday as I was leaving work my employer announced that a new worker was coming to train on Monday morning.  She has spent time training on the night routine already and now will learn how to do the day routine BECAUSE she is going to be the new travel nurse.  I’ve been taken seriously in my requests not to travel anymore! And my employer hasn’t been upset with me that I can detect.  She’s actually been very appreciative of the recent care I’ve given during her bout with the flu.

This new full time worker, I think, will allow me to have my regular weekly schedule of four days with Wednesdays and the weekend off.  In addition, when they travel I will have mini-vacations when nothing is required of me.  Oh how I look forward to that!  I’ve recently suffered from a “burn out” energy crisis but I can feel myself getting motivated to do stuff again at the thought of having that time.  I will no longer have the dread of the next request to go out of town.  It’s like entering a new era of life. 

And I don’t have to get anxious about it being an era of less money either – because there is that aspect of it.  I have word of a possible place to get extra hours at higher pay for less strenuous work.  That is really what I need at this point to spare my joints and muscles the constant pain. I am so grateful for this turn of events and will live in a mode of inner celebration until further notice.

Finally, I finished it off! Some tasks that I desperately want done just seem to hang around forever.  I start them and make a big mess and don’t have time to finish.  I end up looking at the mess for days and days.  Sometimes I don’t know how to finish it, or sometimes it’s just so tedious that I can’t stand to spend my precious time on it.  But today the critical pressure built up and I forced myself to clean up and pare down my Mary Kay store.  All those things that will never be sold, never be used by me, never given as gifts – things that take up space and grow old yet are so hard to throw away – they are now sorted, boxed up and on their way to new lives somewhere. I am so relieved and it was worth the hours it took to do it. (By the way, if “anyone” needs some bright blue and gold cream eye shadows for their next face decorating occasion let me know. #freestuff.)

I once heard someone thanking God for the meaningful work that he had that week and I must say, that was a new thought to me. I liked it. I need to have a reason to apply myself to something, hence the importance of being meaningful, and I need it to be work in order for time off to be different and special in contrast. 

This week it became apparent to me how much my employer really does appreciate the care I give her.  It made it so much easier to go to work and I almost didn’t mind going at all. This was a breakthrough for me. Every once in a while I get so tired of my job that I could easily quit if it weren’t for financial necessity. It’s been this way my whole life which is why I have no 25 year history with some good company and a retirement pension. In fact I think I’ve had this job longer than any other I’ve ever had and I’ve only had it three and a half years. Kind of a sorry record. I get so tired of my work for one reason or another that I find a way to leave and do something else.

Here’s the bottom line. I was at this precarious stage of attitude and knew I needed to change my thinking. I was praying for some genuine reason to like going to work again.

So remember last week when I got the flu/cold virus and spent the whole weekend in bed?  Guess who was coughing and miserable when I got to work Monday night? Yes, she got it from one of us in spite of our wearing masks and trying not to breathe on her.  She has been very sick all week. I’ve been extra careful with her in spite of not feeling well yet myself and she has been thankful.  I feel a little like a cross between a nurse and a mother as I work with her.  For the time being that dark, oppressive “anywhere but here” feeling is gone.  Our thinking, our minds, … very spooky places.

My other meaningful work – getting rid of unneeded things in storage – is a bit stalled.  Stacks of paper did not get shredded. Closet is emptied but it’s all on the table in the hall instead and I still don’t know what to do with half of it.  I did organize a potluck dinner for 25 people for tomorrow night.  We are having it for the visiting Cambodian pastor at whose house I stayed last December.  That was mostly email work, but it was meaning ful too. 

And now it’s the weekend and I get to enjoy going out to eat, not cooking, tonight.  And I get to enjoy sleeping without an alarm in the morning, and a cup of coffee NOT in the car, and many other things, none of which would seem too special were it not for my meaningful work.