Being All That I Can Be

The Writer’s Post #36 ~ Writer’s Choice

Winter means staying in much more than is healthy. It means I am house bound by choice. I do not like being outside in the cold or the snow or the wind. The sunshiny days are better than the gloomy ones, but for me, they all pretty much present the same challenge. How do I get through until summer returns? One more day. Then one more. That’s the only way.

Life goes on pretty much as usual except that I don’t smile as much and I don’t enjoy as much. I don’t even think that I care as much.

I’m talking about the every day things that I really love in the summer. The clean house with the sun shining through it always makes me smile and cleaning it so that can happen, well, that just makes me happy. Cooking healthy and nutritious meals is fun when the grill is handy and not requiring a parka to enjoy standing outside cooking something yummy. Making a big ole salad with freshly grilled chicken or steak from the grill sliced over the top makes me down right giddy.  Getting laundry done early in my day so that I can have lots of time outside in the afternoon and evening, oh yeah, I love doing that.  I’m talking about little things like, coffee on the deck in the morning sun or even a light rain with the awnings opened.  The warmth and the freshness of the morning air always gets me going in a good direction.

Those are the things my life thrives with. None of those things exists here from November until at least April.  That’s tough for someone like me.  And I know there are many like me.

That’s why I write about it now and then. That’s why I write about it at all. It helps me to think maybe someone who is like me, will read one of my blogs and feel just a little less odd. That is how I feel almost all winter. Not sad, like many people think. Not suicidal, just odd and out of sorts. Blah, without any joy. If anything bad is going to happen, I feel like the winter and fall is when it will happen. I don’t look for it. I don’t wait for it. I don’t even think about it. I just know that anything bad will be much more likely in the fall and winter months.  Not logical since I have suffered some very sad and heartbreaking things in the heat of my beloved summer. More than a couple of them and yet, I never associate summer with loss. 

There are happy days in the fall and winter, don’t misunderstand, but they are the oddity rather than the rule. Summer is full of happy days with the rare off or even sad day.

Being the best I can be, means I have to trudge on and look for, yes actively look for, happy things during the SAD season.  I find them, too. I make some of them happen by choosing not to be alone.  By choosing to be with people I love and who make me laugh. It’s such a difficult thing to do sometimes because what I really want to do, I mean totally want to do, is stay home and sit or nap or curl up on the couch and do nothing. Some days I let myself do that and others, I have to take control and drag my butt up and outside for fresh air and human contact of the non-roomy kind. He indulges me way too much. He’s an enabler. If I wanna just stay home, he says, “Okay”. He works hard and staying home is good for him.

Being the best I can be, means I can’t be what I feel like being, I have to be what I know keeps me going. It means I have to convince myself to get out in the cold and do something even if it doesn’t sound fun. It will be fun. It will make me feel better.  It will help make this day pass because that gets me one day closer to my blooming and shining season. 

Jo

Hall-o-ween What to Wear?

Over the years I have seen some crazy and outlandish costumes and I have worn a couple myself.  All of the employees in our salon would dress-up each year, making sure we could work in what we were wearing.  

I was a nurse, well endowed and comfy shoes.  I was Dolly Parton, well endowed and 4 inch heels. I was a witch, nope not this one. I was a hooker, well endowed and 4 inch heels.  I was a bag lady, very over weight and wearing 2 pair of socks.  (I loved that one! Talk about your comfortable costume!)  I was a clown, not comfortable and not well endowed.  There were others, but my favorite was the year I decided to be a man.



Yes, I said a man.  A yuppie, in fact.  I had short hair, so I gelled it back in a slicked kind of Wall Street style; scrubbed my face and then applied a small amount of darker foundation to the 'beard' area.  I used ace bandage to 'remove' my own natural endowment. I wore a black suit, a white shirt and tie, loosened at the neck slightly and red in color.  The power tie, relaxed.  I wore black socks and black tie 'boy' style shoes. I wore black large rimmed glasses and lowered my voice, which is already a low register.  I kept my voice soft all day.  I am not a soft speaker, in my real life.  My nails are usually long and painted.  I removed the paint and cut them man-style.  I wore zero jewelry.


Not one single person recognized me as I went through my day.  Not even my co-workers until I spoke.  (In my own voice to tell them I didn't need to sign in, I didn't have an appointment.) The woman at the bank refused to give my our bank bags because she said I wasn't on the list.  I picked the bags up Monday through Friday each week.  I was speaking to her.  It was so much fun.  Absolutely the most fun day at work in costume that I can remember.  And the simplest costume.

Oh, and no giant bah-boom-bahs to work around all day or accidentally smack my clients in the head with as I cut, combed or styled their hair.  Not to mention the eyes I poked while shampooing!


Ah...and not a single picture from that Halloween.  I have no clue why not.  


Memories.  he he he he


Jo