revdorothyl (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
revdorothyl) wrote2004-08-09 06:00 pm
revdorothyl) wrote2004-08-09 06:00 pm
"They're less likely to throw you out, if you come bearing food."
I'm only too aware that it's been over three weeks since I last posted anything or read anything on LJ, which is really embarassing and pathetic. It's not quite as pathetic as the reason for my laxity, though -- sheer, unaccountable, unending exhaustion.
However, to quote a favorite line from the old sit-com Night Court, "I'm feeling much better, now!" Maybe the new meds the doctors have been prescribing are finally doing some good, or maybe it's just that the summer is quickly drawing to an end (meaning an eventual end to hot weather and hiding out alone in my apartment), but I actually woke up last Tuesday morning feeling somewhat hopeful and ambitious, rather than utterly exhausted, for the first time in more than a month.
So, for anyone who's been wondering, I'll try to fill in a few of the blank spaces from the past weeks, just in case I actually learned something in between feeling sorry for myself.
1) Sunday night (July 18), I 'bravely' bundled up my home-made salsas and some bags of tortilla chips and made my way to the home of a perfect stranger to watch the "Outfoxed" documentary along with many other perfect strangers.
I ended up arriving a bit late and sitting in the over-flow room, sharing a separate TV monitor with two guys from the "Veterans for Kerry" demographic (a Vietnam and a WWII vet, both of them with very strong views on wars based on misinformation and fought with inadequate resources) -- who were very good company, all things considered. Everybody else under the age of 65 was gathered in the main room, of course, so I had a slight feeling of being in the 'unpopular kids ghetto,' but I think I may have been projecting issues from my childhood onto the present situation. Anyway, the wine was good, and I enjoyed several interesting conversations with other people between the documentary and the on-line discussion.
All in all, I was very glad that I hadn't 'chickened out' at the last minute, as I'd been sorely tempted to do out of fear of a completely new social setting. Having checked the box that committed me to bringing snacks to the house party, I couldn't, in good conscience, do a no-show at the last minute. Plus, bringing food to a strange house always makes me feel a little less like I'm encroaching and helps me to work up the courage to ring the doorbell.
I told myself I must remember that for future occasions: "When chickening out is a distinct possibility, promise to bring food" -- the social equivalent of throwing my hat over the fence, so I'll have to climb over it, somehow.
2) I was supposed to drive up to Wisconsin first thing Wednesday morning (Aug. 21) to celebrate my Dad's 68th birthday and stay over the weekend, but the debilitating weariness I'd been experiencing for the past month had other plans.
Ever since my vacation in Iowa at the beginning of June, I'd been sleeping as much as 14 hours a night, at times (or, at least, staying in bed and repeatedly falling back asleep long after I should have been up and at 'em), without ever really feeling like I'd had enough sleep or had come even close to replenishing my bankrupt stores of energy. No matter how much time I spent 'resting,' I never seemed to feel rested.
So, the day before I was supposed to make that long drive (Tuesday, Aug. 20), I worked up the energy to wash my hair for the first time in almost 8 weeks -- which sounds much more disgusting than it is (my hair is very dry as well as very long and thick, and it takes a long time for any natural oils to work their way down the great distance between my scalp and the dry ends, so I've tried never to wash it more often than once a week, and once every two or three weeks is more usual for keeping my hair both healthy and clean). Even so, this time I had to admit that I'd let it go far too long, and I couldn't help but notice and be chagrined by the fact that my hair felt a pound or two lighter after shampooing!
I followed that Herculean task (Augean stables, anyone?), with the only slightly less arduous chore of baking a Quiche Lorraine for dinner at my weekly Scrabble game (using the recipe that came on the can of fat-free evaporated milk, just in case anyone was in danger of thinking I'd made pie-crust from scratch, or anything of the kind). And that was about all I could manage for an entire day's effort, on one of the most productive days I'd had in recent weeks!
I was so tired on Wednesday that I didn't even get dressed, much less drive to Wisconsin as I'd planned -- I just couldn't get up the energy to even throw a few clothes in a bag.
However, by Wed. evening I finally felt able to do some things -- possibly related to the fact that, when my weaker self was urging me to forget the whole trip on Wednesday night (because I was just too sick and tired and nobody could expect me to make such an effort at this time, etc., etc.), I firmly vetoed the notion, on the grounds that a) I had gone to all the trouble of taking Sunday the 25th off from my preaching job and shouldn't waste the opportunity to get out of town, and b) I knew by now that no matter how much rest I got the next day, I would not feel noticeably better.
Once the decision to go was irrevocably made, I seemed to feel a bit more able to move. I used up the fresh produce in my refrigerator by baking a double batch of blueberry muffins to take to Wisconsin (remembering that I hadn't gotten Dad a birthday present, and forgetting what my sister had told me about Dad supposedly being on a low-carb diet these days), whipping up a couple of fresh batches of salsa (in lieu of the birthday present I hadn't gotten my mother in April!), and freezing everything I couldn't turn into a designer breakfast food or condiment.
(My obsession with bringing gifts of food in order to overcome my shame and fear of rejection strikes again!)
3) July 22nd: I'd intended to set out early Thursday morning, and had told my mother so when she called me late Wednesday to see if I had left yet. But packing enough clothes for even a few days away turned out to be much more complicated than I'd expected (especially since I couldn't remember where I'd left a bunch of stuff). So, it was going on 11 AM before I pulled out of my parking lot (which, if I'd bothered to do the math, would have warned me sooner that -- no matter how fast I drove and how many speeding tickets I risked -- I'd be caught in Chicago at rush hour).
I felt very good about the fact that I had no trouble staying awake on the drive north (yay, me!). And that was in spite of the fact that the trip ended up taking slightly over 10 hours, instead of the 8 or 8 1/2 I can do on a good day, because I ran into horrible traffic jams in Chicago (even bad by Chicago rush-hour standards) -- on the order of the traffic encountered on Route 1 in NJ or the Long Island Expressway and Southern State Parkway at rush hour at the start of a holiday weekend,. . . only worse.
Those hours in Chicago were a nightmare of long stops followed by a few yards of inching forward, followed by more long stops -- 6 lanes of northbound traffic on the Edens and Kennedy expressways, all doing a very good impression of the world's longest parking lot! Instead of the thirty or forty minutes it takes me to get from the Skyway to the Wisconsin border on I-94 on a really good day (or in the middle of the night, when traffic is comparatively light), it took me a little over 2 1/2 hours to cover that distance this time.
When I finally pulled into my parents' driveway, a couple of fingers on my left hand had gone numb from stress (holding onto the wheel too tight, I guess -- possibly aggravated by my very ambivalent feelings about going 'home'), but the welcome was all I could have wished for.
Mom and Dad didn't exactly kill the fatted calf for the prodigal daughter's return, but they did set a perfectly grilled bratwurst with all the trimmings in front of me, saved from the supper I'd missed hours earlier (and actually, I think I prefer a really good bratwurst, warmed over in the microwave at a minute's notice, to a whole fatted calf that has to be butchered and barbecued, while the prodigal offspring waits, practically dying from hunger -- hmmm, I'll have to remember that for the next time I preach on Luke 15!).
More even than the warm welcome and warming bratwurst, I was thoroughly delighted to discover that by the time I got out of my car at the end of that long day, the temperature outside had dropped so far as to feel actually CHILLY! And it was destined to stay comfortable, at least, through Monday (cool nights and daytime highs only in the low 70's -- such bliss!).
Words cannot express how nice it was to wake up the next morning (Friday the 23rd)and smell coffee that I hadn't had to make myself and find the cereal waiting for me on the table and my mother and father ready to share a bite and talk to me over breakfast, after their early morning work-out at the YMCA. Of course, there was no Racine kringle to have with the coffee (as there always is when I come to visit at Christmas), but only the blueberry muffins I'd brought myself, but it was still awfully pleasant.
I even began to wonder if part of the reason for my excessive, debilitating weariness was just that I'd been feeling lonely and thinking that there was no reason to get up in the morning because there was nobody to talk to and nothing fun to do.
To be continued . . .
However, to quote a favorite line from the old sit-com Night Court, "I'm feeling much better, now!" Maybe the new meds the doctors have been prescribing are finally doing some good, or maybe it's just that the summer is quickly drawing to an end (meaning an eventual end to hot weather and hiding out alone in my apartment), but I actually woke up last Tuesday morning feeling somewhat hopeful and ambitious, rather than utterly exhausted, for the first time in more than a month.
So, for anyone who's been wondering, I'll try to fill in a few of the blank spaces from the past weeks, just in case I actually learned something in between feeling sorry for myself.
1) Sunday night (July 18), I 'bravely' bundled up my home-made salsas and some bags of tortilla chips and made my way to the home of a perfect stranger to watch the "Outfoxed" documentary along with many other perfect strangers.
I ended up arriving a bit late and sitting in the over-flow room, sharing a separate TV monitor with two guys from the "Veterans for Kerry" demographic (a Vietnam and a WWII vet, both of them with very strong views on wars based on misinformation and fought with inadequate resources) -- who were very good company, all things considered. Everybody else under the age of 65 was gathered in the main room, of course, so I had a slight feeling of being in the 'unpopular kids ghetto,' but I think I may have been projecting issues from my childhood onto the present situation. Anyway, the wine was good, and I enjoyed several interesting conversations with other people between the documentary and the on-line discussion.
All in all, I was very glad that I hadn't 'chickened out' at the last minute, as I'd been sorely tempted to do out of fear of a completely new social setting. Having checked the box that committed me to bringing snacks to the house party, I couldn't, in good conscience, do a no-show at the last minute. Plus, bringing food to a strange house always makes me feel a little less like I'm encroaching and helps me to work up the courage to ring the doorbell.
I told myself I must remember that for future occasions: "When chickening out is a distinct possibility, promise to bring food" -- the social equivalent of throwing my hat over the fence, so I'll have to climb over it, somehow.
2) I was supposed to drive up to Wisconsin first thing Wednesday morning (Aug. 21) to celebrate my Dad's 68th birthday and stay over the weekend, but the debilitating weariness I'd been experiencing for the past month had other plans.
Ever since my vacation in Iowa at the beginning of June, I'd been sleeping as much as 14 hours a night, at times (or, at least, staying in bed and repeatedly falling back asleep long after I should have been up and at 'em), without ever really feeling like I'd had enough sleep or had come even close to replenishing my bankrupt stores of energy. No matter how much time I spent 'resting,' I never seemed to feel rested.
So, the day before I was supposed to make that long drive (Tuesday, Aug. 20), I worked up the energy to wash my hair for the first time in almost 8 weeks -- which sounds much more disgusting than it is (my hair is very dry as well as very long and thick, and it takes a long time for any natural oils to work their way down the great distance between my scalp and the dry ends, so I've tried never to wash it more often than once a week, and once every two or three weeks is more usual for keeping my hair both healthy and clean). Even so, this time I had to admit that I'd let it go far too long, and I couldn't help but notice and be chagrined by the fact that my hair felt a pound or two lighter after shampooing!
I followed that Herculean task (Augean stables, anyone?), with the only slightly less arduous chore of baking a Quiche Lorraine for dinner at my weekly Scrabble game (using the recipe that came on the can of fat-free evaporated milk, just in case anyone was in danger of thinking I'd made pie-crust from scratch, or anything of the kind). And that was about all I could manage for an entire day's effort, on one of the most productive days I'd had in recent weeks!
I was so tired on Wednesday that I didn't even get dressed, much less drive to Wisconsin as I'd planned -- I just couldn't get up the energy to even throw a few clothes in a bag.
However, by Wed. evening I finally felt able to do some things -- possibly related to the fact that, when my weaker self was urging me to forget the whole trip on Wednesday night (because I was just too sick and tired and nobody could expect me to make such an effort at this time, etc., etc.), I firmly vetoed the notion, on the grounds that a) I had gone to all the trouble of taking Sunday the 25th off from my preaching job and shouldn't waste the opportunity to get out of town, and b) I knew by now that no matter how much rest I got the next day, I would not feel noticeably better.
Once the decision to go was irrevocably made, I seemed to feel a bit more able to move. I used up the fresh produce in my refrigerator by baking a double batch of blueberry muffins to take to Wisconsin (remembering that I hadn't gotten Dad a birthday present, and forgetting what my sister had told me about Dad supposedly being on a low-carb diet these days), whipping up a couple of fresh batches of salsa (in lieu of the birthday present I hadn't gotten my mother in April!), and freezing everything I couldn't turn into a designer breakfast food or condiment.
(My obsession with bringing gifts of food in order to overcome my shame and fear of rejection strikes again!)
3) July 22nd: I'd intended to set out early Thursday morning, and had told my mother so when she called me late Wednesday to see if I had left yet. But packing enough clothes for even a few days away turned out to be much more complicated than I'd expected (especially since I couldn't remember where I'd left a bunch of stuff). So, it was going on 11 AM before I pulled out of my parking lot (which, if I'd bothered to do the math, would have warned me sooner that -- no matter how fast I drove and how many speeding tickets I risked -- I'd be caught in Chicago at rush hour).
I felt very good about the fact that I had no trouble staying awake on the drive north (yay, me!). And that was in spite of the fact that the trip ended up taking slightly over 10 hours, instead of the 8 or 8 1/2 I can do on a good day, because I ran into horrible traffic jams in Chicago (even bad by Chicago rush-hour standards) -- on the order of the traffic encountered on Route 1 in NJ or the Long Island Expressway and Southern State Parkway at rush hour at the start of a holiday weekend,. . . only worse.
Those hours in Chicago were a nightmare of long stops followed by a few yards of inching forward, followed by more long stops -- 6 lanes of northbound traffic on the Edens and Kennedy expressways, all doing a very good impression of the world's longest parking lot! Instead of the thirty or forty minutes it takes me to get from the Skyway to the Wisconsin border on I-94 on a really good day (or in the middle of the night, when traffic is comparatively light), it took me a little over 2 1/2 hours to cover that distance this time.
When I finally pulled into my parents' driveway, a couple of fingers on my left hand had gone numb from stress (holding onto the wheel too tight, I guess -- possibly aggravated by my very ambivalent feelings about going 'home'), but the welcome was all I could have wished for.
Mom and Dad didn't exactly kill the fatted calf for the prodigal daughter's return, but they did set a perfectly grilled bratwurst with all the trimmings in front of me, saved from the supper I'd missed hours earlier (and actually, I think I prefer a really good bratwurst, warmed over in the microwave at a minute's notice, to a whole fatted calf that has to be butchered and barbecued, while the prodigal offspring waits, practically dying from hunger -- hmmm, I'll have to remember that for the next time I preach on Luke 15!).
More even than the warm welcome and warming bratwurst, I was thoroughly delighted to discover that by the time I got out of my car at the end of that long day, the temperature outside had dropped so far as to feel actually CHILLY! And it was destined to stay comfortable, at least, through Monday (cool nights and daytime highs only in the low 70's -- such bliss!).
Words cannot express how nice it was to wake up the next morning (Friday the 23rd)and smell coffee that I hadn't had to make myself and find the cereal waiting for me on the table and my mother and father ready to share a bite and talk to me over breakfast, after their early morning work-out at the YMCA. Of course, there was no Racine kringle to have with the coffee (as there always is when I come to visit at Christmas), but only the blueberry muffins I'd brought myself, but it was still awfully pleasant.
I even began to wonder if part of the reason for my excessive, debilitating weariness was just that I'd been feeling lonely and thinking that there was no reason to get up in the morning because there was nobody to talk to and nothing fun to do.
To be continued . . .
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no subject
*hugs*