Thanksgiving went well.  It was nice with just my Mom and me, to be honest.  I usually feel really tense there because she and her husband bicker a lot and he just hollers at her to bring him stuff.  So she's constantly running back and forth fetching and carrying (not enough ice! food's not hot enough!) It really bothers me.  And every little thing has to go in the precise same space or it's "the napkins are upside down in the napkin holder!" and "the green sponge is for the stove!" like all this should have been ingrained in me since birth.  Consequently, it's easier to do nothing.  I will even bring my own food sometimes so I don't have to cook anything on the "wrong burner" or something. 

And I think it bothers my mom.  She seems really tense when he's around.  She comes in after me and makes sure I made the bed right or cringes if I use the dishwasher (um, that's what it's there for, right?) or do something that goes against the way he thinks it should be done.

So, like I said, it was nice to not have to witness that behavior.  Makes me crazy.  Mom and I watched movies, went shopping and cooked a turkey together.  Thanksgiving with the relatives was also good.  I met some new relatives from my grandfather's side that I didn't know about. 

They're building a beautiful custom home in the country.  The son has a pregnant girlfriend that the mom doesn't particularly like.  He tells his mom he doesn't want to marry her, but I think he will.  Plus, he's like 38 or something - since he hasn't knocked up a woman in all this time, it's kind of strange that he got hoodwinked into this one, if it wasn't what he really wanted.

Still, I don't think they'll be too happy a couple.  She's kind of a mouse.  He's social and friendly and cultured.  She barely said five words in the whole five hours we were in her company.  Considering most of us had never met before I can't just chalk it up to awkwardness.  I think she just had nothing to say. 

I always find that sad when someone has nothing to contribute. We talked about sports, politics, religion, books, art, home decor, cooking, real estate, California, Minnesota, weather, dieting, child-rearing....nothing.  I can't wait to see where she stands next Thanksgiving!

I hope ya'll had a fab Thanksgiving.  Mine was really nice, despite all the medical drama.  I had a swell time with the Mom and I even made an effort and visited my friend - you know the one I talk about incessantly?  Yeah, her.  It seems kinda weird to hang with her now.  We don't seem to converse the way we used to.  Every topic somehow bounces back to her husband (who is out of work yet AGAIN).  Still, it's good to keep the lines of communication open, right?

I think work between the Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays should just be a forgotten thing.  Does anyone really get any work done during this time period?  There are four holiday parties on my calendar already and those are just the ones that are work related!  I'm definitely going to keep the holiday prep on the light side this year. 

Still, if my goal is to be not stressed as the holidays approach, I need to get a regular amount of sleep.  It's 2:37am and I'm fading fast.

Where are my archives?  Where is everyone?  What is happening to this site?  Yikes!

I've been patiently  waiting for my 2005 archives to return to TBlog.  They haven't.  It's been over a month. I tried writing the help desk, but the email bounced. 

This is a busy week for me.  I've got a new boss.  Although she seems nice word (on the street) is don't trust her.  I'm starting to see signs of that now.  She's very passive-aggressive.  And, worst of all, she goes along with your suggestions like she agrees, but then she turns around and does the way she wants it.  If it doesn't work out, it's not her fault - somehow it's yours for not ... I don't know ... stopping her? 

I'm wondering - I've been working for some 24 years now and I can count the number of good bosses on one hand.  How is it so many ill-equipped people can be promoted so high?  If I all of a sudden become grossly incompetant, does that mean I will get the opportunity to come in to work for hours a day AND double my current salary?

Goodbye my sweet love.  I barely knew you.  But you made me happy AND you kept me awake on those no sleep days.  I probably never let you know just how much I appreciated all that.  But I did. 

You will be missed and I will be sleepy.

Really, one of the responsibilities of having a blog is posting when you have something you want to say.  Me?  I got nothing. 

Still, I signed on with the hope that inspiration would hit me once I saw the blank screen.  Once again? Nothing. Nada. 

It's probably because I should be sleeping now.  Have an early and busy day ahead of me.  Maybe when it's over I will have witty bon mots to share with you.

Gay bartenders are evil.  They make any normal drink taste so sinfully delicious that you are amazingly unaware that the drink contains alcohol.  Then bing bam boom - half a glass of sangria later you're grabbing the bus boy's bottom and singing "don't cry for me Argentina."

Evil, I say.  Pure evil.

Yet another unexpected hiatus from the Isle.  Sorry.  Earlier this month one of my co-workers committed suicide.  Weird. 

I think there are two reasons people commit suicide.  Either they think no one cares and everyone would be better off if they left this earth or they do it because they hate themselves and want to make someone else suffer. 

But really, what it boils down to is suicide is the ultimate in narcissism.  You throw the lives around you into such turmoil and focus their energy on why you would do such a thing. 

I'm not saying this to be mean.  My co-worker suffered from depression, but we thought it was all under control and that she was doing well.  There was a some withdrawal, but her only child was leaving home to attend college and, in light of the circumstances, the sadness seemed normal.

But it's halted her daughter's life.  She's left school and come home to plan a funeral.  Now she blames herself for leaving her mother alone in the first place.  If she'd never left, her mother would still be alive.  Even though her mother left her a note explaining that it wasn't her fault.  But an 18 year old girl leaving home for the first time shouldn't have to deal with that sort of thing, you know?

It just makes me crazy.

It's been a loooong week.  Had my performance evaluation at work on Tuesday and it was mediocre.  I mean, not that I was surprised or anything.  I typically have a really hard time the first six-10 months of any job.  I'm not a jump right in there kind of person.  I like to know what I'm dealing with all around me before I can concentrate on the job at hand.  I like to figure out the people before the job because then you know how to change things and how people will react.

I work with a lot of type A folk.  Which is good because they are the detail people, which is good counter to me.  Details bore me, I'm the big picture, long-range goal kinda gal and I like to concentrate on the effect my work will have, not so much the tweensy details like if there is adequate signage to the bathroom.  But, I recognize the importance of having adequate signage and appreciate that there are people around to remind me of that.  But it's just not on my radar at any given time.

So luckily, my end product has been practically fault-free. But they feel I haven't provided the proper amount of feedback to give assurance that I know what I'm doing.  I can work with that.

I'm not sure I did a wise thing though.  There were a couple of things that were either not directly or even indirectly my fault that I got dinged on.  For example, I was responsible for the information to be provided in this memo.  It was information that could not be supplied until the very last minute before it was needed because it was constantly changing.  I sent the info to the next party in the format it needed to be printed in and said that the final copy would be provided at a certain time.  Said and done.  Then I had to leave for a meeting and my co-worker decided to change the format and I didn't have the chance to see it before it was distributed.  So I got dinged for that.  Also for not doing things no one told me to do and that were not on record of having ever being done.  (Because apparently, my mad psychic skills were the reason for my hiring.) Ding! 

I decided not to say anything and let it slide.  In the whole big pic of my job, they were infintesimally small things to pick out, so my defense probably wouldn't have been worth the effort.  But now I have to deal with things like, "make sure you double check that memo!" 

Still, it is a good job and I really like everyone working there.  And I know they like me and want me to succeed at this job.  But I'll be glad to see the weekend! 

I've mentioned before that I'm having issues with the person formerly known as my best friend.  I'm still not sure where our friendship is headed, but I realized I've now grown accustomed to her absence in my life.  It doesn't hurt anymore, but it does still manage to befuddle me. 

About a month or so ago I get this email that her email account has been letting her send but not receive messages.  Says that apparently she has not received any messages in a couple of months before she noticed the problem.

I happen to know these are not the busiest folks on the planet.  Asleep by nine, up by five.  Work, work, home, eat, pets, tv and early to bed again.  So it's not like she's been so busy that she hasn't had time to check her email.  And she did notice that she was able to send, but not receive messages. 

They have DSL like I do.  Her lovely husband has not had a problem with his email.  And all his IT knowledge (a field in which he earns his pay) was unable to fix this glitch.  Is it wrong that I think he did something to sabotage her email account?  And two months is an awfully long time for her to realize she hadn't heard from her family once, isn't it?

I called her a few weeks back out of the blue.  (I believe when you get the urge to call someone you really should - there's something that person needs to hear from you.)  So I call and we had a brief, impersonal conversation in which she told me she has to be better at being a good friend.  Of course that's the last I've heard from her.

Cut to conversation with my mother.  Seems my father complained to her that I haven't been returning his phone calls.  How does he manage to piss me off without even talking to me?  This is a grown damn man!  You got a problem?  Talk to the person you got the problem with!  And then don't freakin' lie!  I have returned all phone calls except one which I forgot about, but did ring back a week or so later, but didn't leave a message.  It was his cell phone so I know he knew I called.

So I'm thinking - is this one more way for my relationship with my father to shape my relationships with others?  My best friend marries and doesn't call me anymore and so I've pretty much cut her out of my life like a trans fat.  Because I don't want to keep pushing myself on people who don't want to be pushed upon.  Have I done this before?  Yes, several times.

I told my mother last year that I'm tired of putting myself on the line for my father to disappoint me.  Yes, I accept the man that he is, that he's never going to be able to live up to my (low) expectations, but I can't do all the work.  It's time for him to be the grown up.  And because he removed himself from my life without caring how much it hurt me, he's going to have to work a little to get back in.  I'm not cutting him out - I wasn't raised like that - but I'm just not inspired to work that hard at something that's always left me grieving.  Once you've burnt your hand on the stove, you're smart enough to avoid doing it again. 

So I'm re-evaluating how I need to proceed in the course of my relationships.  Do I deliberately hold things back because I don't want to get hurt?  Yes.  I mean, if your own father, whom you adored as a little girl, can drop you off his radar in a split second, how is anyone else supposed to love the real you? 

Do I carry self-hatred around with me?  No.  With everything that is in me, I know that my absence from these two people's lives is a loss to them.  But it's also a loss to me - relationships are an investment of time and emotion and it does something to you when someone shows you that investment was not worth as much to them as it was to you.  That rejection is something you carry inside you like a festering tumor - you don't know it's there until something doesn't feel quite right.

How will I move beyond this?  I have to let myself be vulnerable.  People are always going to hurt me, disappoint me, leave me.  That doesn't mean it was anything I did - IF I'm being true to myself. 

We were never meant to find that sense of completion through another person - people are fallible.  They make errors in judgment.  They are broken. They have many, many flaws, some of which can strike you right out of the blue and leave you so breathless and wounded.  But I have to hold in my heart and my head that there is someone who already loves me so perfectly and completely and passionately that His perfect love can even allow me to accept the imperfectness of those in my life who have hurt me.  I'm having a hard time grasping on to that lately.  I'm so overloaded with so many feelings that sometimes I feel as though I'm just waiting for everything to spill forth and pollute the earth - I am a living, breathing Pandora's box ready to spew the ills of my life on to an unsuspecting world.

My mantra this week: Perfect love casts out fear.  Perfect love casts out fear. Perfect love casts out fear.  I'm so afraid that if I let myself crack, there will be too many pieces scattered about and nothing to put back into a semblance of me.

I guess that is why I've been so angry lately.  A simmering pot of anger on a slow boil.  All that emotion has to come out somehow, and isn't it amazing how anger is .... more acceptable than breaking down.  I'm not a good manager of my anger.  I am, however, extremely good at stifling it....to a point.  And then I'm out of control.  I can stifle a good 5-10 years  - so if this were an Olympic sport, I would so be bringing home the gold.

I guess it is a step forward that I'm realizing this.  Maybe now I take another step forward, and then another.  Maybe it's time I learn how to take refuge in the arms of the one who created me.  Somewhere along the line, I lost the assurance that He could heal what was broken inside me.  I mean heal 100%.  I recognize that I've come this far, but somewhere inside my head I'm saying, "this is best He can do with what He's got."

Hmm. Seems there was a lot brewing inside these past few weeks.  Honestly, I didn't know all this was going to come out until I saw what I was typing.  It's given me a lot to think on this night.

I made it through the heinous month that was September.  Alive.  Yay for me.

It was touch and go for a minute there - it was a crazy work schedule.  Some days I worked from 7am to 11pm.  Include weekends on that chore list and it makes for one cranky Abbie.

But I held it together and now I'm back.  I can honestly say that I hope that I never have to go through that again.  The only thing that kept me from losing it all together was making sure I planned some fun activities on my free time.  I mean it wasn't much - a quick facial here, a walk in the afternoon, stopping for a special treat - you can't live putting all your energy into you work, even if you love your job with a capital L, y'know?

Anyway, I'm glad to be paying some attention to this blog of mine again.  I've missed it and you all.  I'm going to spend the next couple of days reading what ya'll have been up to.  Hope it's all good stuff!

I have to admit, I'm more than a little overtired.  Perhaps that is why so many things have been getting on my nerves recently.  Usually it's just people who make right hand turns from the middle of driving lane, rather than pulling in closer to the curb.  But lately little things people say have been ticking me off.

For example, I was in the bookstore the other day and there was a couple there.  The man was looking over the just released books and had a couple in his hand.  Their body language was such that I didn't really think they were a couple of longstanding. He's looking.  She's talking.  She says, "The reason I don't read much is because I never know what book to pick.  How do you know if a book is good or not?"

Um. Duh!  And this was a woman old enough to know better.  Mid to late 40s.  So in forty years of living she never heard of the New York Times Book Review? Never heard word of mouth from friends or co-workers?  never thought to stop in a library?  Never watched a freakin' episode of Oprah? 

The thing that bothered me most was here she was alluding to that fact that she would love to read, but was kept from this activity merely because she couldn't find a good book. 

Really, it's the attitude that bothers me most.  I don't want to be one of those people sitting on the edge of the pool wondering if the water is cold or warm.  I just want to jump in! 

The other thing I hear people say all the time is "I can't retire - I don't know what I'd do all day.  I'd get bored." You know, there's a whole gigantic world out there.  It's screaming with a million things to do.  Learn French.  Teach your cat to do the hokey pokey.  Mountain climb.  Be a movie extra.  Learn a whole new trade.  Eat bon bons and watch old Katharine Hepburn movies.  Take a trip to Rome.  Seriously, I think it would be the saddest day in my life if the best thing I could think of to do with my day is work.  And I like my job.  But it's the thing I do so I can do other stuff.  Letting you job become your life is a sorry thing indeed.  Promise you won't let that happen to you?

Only 2 more days left in my crazy month!  I can't wait to sit down and read what ya'll have been up to!

Sorry I haven't written in a while.  September is going to be a very busy month for me.  I'm down to doing just the essentials.  These next two weeks are going to be crazy hectic and I'll probably lose what is left of my wits.

I'll be back in full force after October 3.  Until then take care!

I've not felt much like writing lately.  Don't know why.  Just feeling sort of blue.  But I will be back and I will snap myself out it soon - a person can only wallow just so long!

Although I love my new job, it does take a lot out of spiritually and emotionally.  I've got to recharge!

Tonight I was very privileged to sit in a room with very educated people.  People who grew up in low income families who heard the world tell them they should not aim too high in life, but should merely try to keep their heads above water and try not to get arrested.

I used to think that these were stories of the past that we would share with future generations as we celebrated the fact that all those stereotypes were behind us now.  But it is not so.

We are not near where we should be at this day and age.  There are people who think that minorities are taking the spaces in colleges and jobs that should be held by whites.  That we are being handed these opportunities because of laws and ordinances.  This is a belief based in bigotry of the worst kind.  It is bigotry because it makes the base assumption that no one of color in education or an occupation is qualified to be there.  It is also bigoted because it makes the assumption that the white students are qualified to be there. 

The fact of the matter is programs like Affirmative Action came to be because not just qualified, but over-qualified people of color were being turned down for jobs, looked over for promotions and denied entry into schools because those in positions of power chose to believe a stereotype, rather than the truth.

Tonight I listened to men and women who are independent and educated talk about the things they had been told by ignorant people.  As high school students, these people had excellent grades, amazing test scores, strong communication and social skills, yet because of the color of their skin or the sound of their last name, these students were ignored by administrators in their educational pursuits.  

How many people have we passed over who could have contributed something valuable to society?  Did we encourage the woman who wanted to be a doctor to be an english teacher instead?  Did we ignore the Hispanic child with a knack for politics, or push the Asian kid with a head full of poetry toward the mathematics department?  What do we miss out on when we ignore the individual and based our world on narrowmindedness?

I have the belief that whenever we do something evil to someone else, we destroy that person's destiny to do good in our lives.  On the grand scale, when a person kills another, perhaps they kill the one who will pull the killer's child from in front of a speeding car.  On a day-to-day basis, I think if we inflict a wound on another person's spirit, we damage our own spirits in response.  We can only live in as much joy as we're willing to give.  That which we hold close to our chests denies us the pleasure of sharing.

Always choose to lift someone up, rather than bring them down.  It is not our job to impose limits on how high others can soar, but to make sure they are prepared for the journey in the best possible way.