Same Old Story

Sometimes life catches up with you at the strangest times.

I was helping a customer to pick out a book for a gift and found myself flipping through books about enduring love and friendships, the power of a promise, hope in the face of despair and whatnot. I found that I was getting choked up as each book told me, 'No matter how hard it is, you must always try.' And I thought, I haven't been very good at trying lately. I think the people in my life know that I love them and care about them - I'm good at expressing myself with words - but how many times have I said I'd be there and not followed through? How many people have I promised we would never lose touch and then never called? It's too easy to get distracted with the busy-ness of everyday life and push the past further and further away.

I still haven't seen my cousin and her baby since they moved to Edmonton; emails from Jess, Laura and other older friends sit gathering dust in my inbox; Hunter, Nathan and Roya have all tried to contact me but other than Alyssa, I still haven't really spoken to anyone since leaving Wildfire; Mike remains the only person to successfully make me following through on coffee dates and some of my siblings become more distant everyday. They say no man is an island but I don't have the time or the energy to build the bridges needed to make that true. I think half of the reason I fear the end of relationships and hang on to them even if I know they're dead is that I also know even if we say we'll stay friends, we won't.

Am I a bad person if I'm not willing to put in the effort required to sustain anything? I'm tired all the time as it is. I don't know that I can handle feeling guilty on top of everything else. But I do. I hate that I'm not a better friend to the people who love me. I hate that I'm unreliable at best. And I hate that this even though I know this depression is a slump that will pass, caused by forgetting to take my pills last night, the truth will remain the same afterwards.

They say the first step is admitting you have a problem... So what's step two?

Revenge of the Babysat

So I spent the weekend with Eric, the little girls and Baby J as Star, K and Baby D had gone to visit family and Baby J was not doing well health-wise. And wow, memo to self: I am not ready to be the mother of three. One, maybe. Three, no. I am exhausted. I don't know how Star and Eric, James and La, and all the other incredible parents in my life do it. Between getting up every four hours to give Baby J his meds and change his feed, getting up to fix his soother/blankets/swing and resettle him, and just plan not sleeping because of nerves and stress, I didn't sleep at all Friday night. I can't imagine doing that day after day after day. I want to be a mother but sometimes I wonder if I could actually handle it. I can barely keep myself in one piece - how can I take responsibility for another life? It doesn't seem fair to do that to an defenseless child. I love my nieces and nephew and great-nephew so much and I love spending time with them and being their favourite auntie, but I wonder if I could handle being more than that. It's a scary thought, realizing you just might not be up to the job you wanted.

Speaking of jobs, things at work are going really well. Having become the senior staff quite suddenly and unexpectedly seems to be working out for me. Apparently Mitch was right - trial by fire is the way to go. I finally feel like I'm getting to the point where I know most of the answers and can handle pretty much any crisis, big or small. And the boss is treating me with respect and kindness which is weird and cool. And she's asked me to sit in on the buying meetings with the publishing reps for Small World which is usually the manager's job. But, as she said, I have more of an idea of what to buy/is selling than she does, so it'd be good to have me there. I have to admit though, it's really nice to feel like all the hard work you've been putting into something is finally paying off. I love my job so much and feel incredibly lucky to have it but it's still good to be reminded that I'm appreciated and needed and all that fun stuff. It's actually made me seriously consider not going to university in the fall and staying at the store full-time. I suspect that I would be made manager which would be amazing and could honestly be a career instead of just a job. But I've wanted to go to university since I was a little girl, and honestly, I don't think anyone would take me seriously as a manager yet. Maybe in a few years when I stop looking like I'm 13.

Other than that, life has been pretty good lately. Busy and stressful and full but good. There knight in shining armor (hereafter just known as the Knight) is still around and continues to make me smile. It's funny, after Rob left I really had no intention of getting into another relationship for awhile. I wanted time to think and to figure out whether I was still okay with who I was and why he had left and what I was going to do and all that, but things happen for a reason, right? You can't control your heart - that's what I always tell my friends when they're having relationship problems. And I don't know where this is going or anything. It might last another day, another week, another month or another year... it's anyone's guess really. Anyway it goes though, it's made me smile and given me lots to think about in relationship to myself and what I want/need/have to give, so I figure it's been a positive experience. Can't ask for much more than that.

Well, actually I could ask for a lot more things. A few more hours in every day to start with. I feel awful about how I've been neglecting my friends, my family, my house and my blog. So many parts of life have fallen into disarray and the obsessive-compulsive perfectionist in me is freaking out. I'd like to say that I just have no time but that's not quite true. It don't have a lot of free time, for sure, and I guess the time I do have tends to be wasted on resting or spent trying to fit in a semblance of a social life. I miss my old friends though, people like Laura and Jess who I haven't seen in forever and who email me and I never write back. It's too easy to just put an email aside for later and never get back to it. And I miss having a clean, organized house. I still haven't finished moving all my stuff into one room since Rob left! Most importantly of this is my bookshelves so I've just been stacking books in piles around my room and it's starting to get to me. I really just need to buckle down and spend a chunk of time cleaning but there's just always so much to do and so many excuses not to. Like, I need to go out with Myrna to find a costume for Saturday's Arthurian game. Which I did and it's amazing and I can't wait to wear it. Lara is so cool. And it was fun to just hang with people with no rhyme or reason. Even if they made fun of Myrna and I for Rosie and Guilda-like behaviour.

But, alas, it has become late and I have to work tomorrow so I should go to bed. Even if I can't catch up on my sleep deficit, there really is no point in adding to it. And my pillows are looking awfully inviting...

"Goodnight stars. Goodnight air. Goodnight noises everywhere."