So it is almost Christmas Eve. It is 11:26pm on the 23rd. I am home alone because as any of you know that have ever worked retail Brian is working until midnight for those that need Scotch tape or just some Scotch. Only kidding. Walgreens doesn't sell liquor anymore but you get the idea. So here I am alone. Watched Kelly Clarkson's Christmas special from last year. As soon as I saw Robin Williams it made me remember he is gone. As I said in my post earlier this week I am overwhelmed by the Holidays. Everything seems to be an emotional roller coaster for me. Work, home, in the car. Everything seems to make me want to cry. And as I have said before not all are tears of sadness but tears none the less. This time of year has always been hard for me. When I was younger I would say I didn't like Christmas but that isn't true I just don't like the feelings that come with Christmas.
Christmas has always been a time of change in my life. I moved out on Christmas in 1991. The same year my grandmother died. And her funeral was on Christmas Eve. Can't really say I moved out that day. I just stopped going home. Well a year later on Christmas my roommate and I moved into a house on the beach that my other grandmother owned. And just to follow the pattern in 2003 Brian and I bought our house we live in today and closed the day after Christmas. Now moving has nothing to do with me liking or disliking or feeling sad around the holidays.
I remember that Christmas in 1991. My friend that I moved in with well I don't know if I can express all the feelings I have about him in one post but we ran the gamut. Love, Hate and everywhere in between. He took me to a Broadway Musical Christmas Show at Ruth Eckerd Hall. It was incredible. I loved the music, the singing the orchestra. I love real music, played by real musicians and songs sung by real singers. Anyway...
My Grandmother my Dad's mom and she passed away just days before Christmas. She was getting ready to go to work at the fish market. Crocheting in her rocking chair that is right behind me tonight. Grandma was Christmas. I can see her in her white coat ushering at church with her Christmas Tree pin that I now own. My prize possession one of my cousins passed on to me after her mom had passed it to her. Grandma had a tree decorated the same every year. Simple, elegant and beautiful. She had these small angel carolers under the tree. I wish I had just one. Makes me sad even now all these years later. She also always made cheese danishes and poppy seed roll and nut rolls and God only knows what else. I have made the cheese danishes and the nut rolls from scratch just like she did. Someday I will pass on these to someone.
This was not the topic I was going to write about tonight. I wanted to talk about family. And how important it is. And how you never know when you or someone you love are the one who will not be here for next year's Christmas Special. Which I guess I have always gotten and tried to share with my brother and sisters. There is no guarentee in life and being together now is all we have for sure. When my mom's mom lived with my mom I would remind my sisters that she would not be around forever and she lived to be 93 there was no reason to cry. We had our whole lives with her until we were all 40 or more. Grandma has been gone for 2 years and my mom's brother that lives 2 doors down from her never stops or calls. 2 doors down. I don't get it. My mom never did anything. The first year at Christmas I thought well he just doesn't want to give us money like Grandma and him used to. I don't care about the money. Then last year after my mom had her stroke I thought surely he would stop by. Now my mom can not walk as far as his house and I know the phone works both ways so it is not all one sided. But what is up. Why do people not realize when it comes down to it that family is what you have and even though you can't pick your parents or siblings I wouldn't trade the one's I have. It just brings me back to 1991 and Grandma Helen just wanted all of her kids and grandkids together for Christmas but everyone is busy. Well guess what a $600 plane ticket to get my sister home and there is a picture on Grandma's front porch on Christmas Eve of the family all but me who was working. I was at the funeral but went back to work afterwards. Retail I tell you. That would be my Grandmother's 4 living children, spouses and 16 of the 17 grand children. Did they all wish they had that one more Christmas with Grandma? Sure but a day late and a dollar short.
So in this day of everyone is so busy why am I the only one that remembers? One sister called tonight to ask why we are having Christmas late at mom's and why everything can't be the way the rest want it. And one has to work on Friday. I am sure that we aren't going to be that late and well this is not up for negotiation. The point of Christmas at mom's is it is last. You don't have anywhere else to go and nothing else to do so we can enjoy each other and open presents and eat together. Isn't that a song? No it is from a tape I listen to to settle my brain at night when my brain won't stop.
Now for those of you that have not experienced Christmas at my mom's there was always and excess. Excess of food, presents and family. There was always someone that had no where else to go that could not believe a living room so full of family and presents. I remember the year my oldest niece was about 4. She was so excited. She ripped through the presents that she got like crazy and then she went to each adult and asked if she could open their presents. And ripped the paper and had it strewn everywhere. Gifts would be lost in the paper. Money evelopes would be lost and have to be found before the gift wrap would all be thrown out. That is the Christmas I like to remember. Even in the lean years. And there were some pretty lean years. My mom always wanted us to have presents. Something to open. Some special food. I don't know if it is because I am the oldest or if it is because I can not let go of some of these memories but doesn't anyone else remeber how hard she worked for us.
Well it is now Christmas Eve and I have listened to the complete Christmas album while writing and I just remembered one of the things about family I wanted to say back when I wrote that I wouldn't trade my brother or sisters. When we were kids it was one for all and all for one. I am not sure why and I am not saying that my sisters didn't wear my clothes and yes I got mad but I remember so many other times that we did everything together. We would play school, we would go exploring on the beach. We would walk for over a mile to get to the north end of the beach past the houses and look for shells and fish and crabs and whatever else we could find that we had never seen before. Now I am not sure if I have mentioned it before but there are 5 of us. I am the oldest, then my brother, then I have 3 more sisters. There is a 7 year age difference between me and my youngest sister. So we are all close in age. 13 months, 14 months, 13 months and 2 years apart.. Get it we are close. I know I have told the story of us deciding that we are going to swim from the dock across the street from our house to Island Estates. This was a story my uncle had said that he had swam with his friends from the north end to Caledisi Island. So we took it as well if he can I know we can. Oh another great group decision. It was crazy but we had my youngest sister on a raft because we knew she couln't make the trip but we were all going. I didn't realize it was crazy til we were over half way and saw a boat coming and realized how small our heads were and how it may not have been our brightest moment. Another day we were home alone one afternoon and a magazine salesman came to the house. We invited him in. Now we had no money and not really sure what the guy thought but we talked to this guy for quite a while before he left realizing we were not buying what he was selling. There were other decisions we made as a group. Some for good and some not so much. So I wonder where that feeling of all for one and one for all has gone. This last year since mom had her stroke she has not driven. I have been taking her to the grocery and where ever else she needs to go one one of my days off. Now with there being 5 of us that all live within 10 miles of her that we could share some of the responsibilities. And I am not saying never but really. Should I feel like my life is worth less than theirs. My house needs to be cleaned and I don't want to do it. I know it is not always easy and I don't always do it with a smile but I do it. And no I am not trying to be the marter. I just know what is right. And what is right is my mom needs help and company and if it means my house is a mess forever then so be it.
Now it is time to wrap things up. Get it wrap things up. Well both literally and figuretivly I want to be happy for Christmas and enjoy as much as I can and hold back the tears until I am home.
I do not care what I receive as a Christmas gift. I want the people I give a gift to to love the gift I give. I want to go to church, to sing Christmas carols to maybe watch midnight mass from the Vatican on tv and wrap presents. Cry when I hear Silent Night and enjoy my 3 days off in a row.
I know you all are thinking isn't there anything that makes this girl smile. Yes. All these things at one time made me smile. Just remember we don't know if all the people on this year's Christmas special will be on next year. So enjoy them while they are here.
Christmas Eve 1:16AM Merry Christmas
Tuesday, December 23, 2014
Saturday, December 20, 2014
Positivley Overwhelmed
I thought of the subject for today's blog after work the other night. A co-worker was talking about how many purses she has and how she has some with the tags still on them and still in the fancy box she bought it in. How she had to have the hottest color out that season. Then I thought I have 2 purses an everyday one and a black one for dressy occasions. Others are the same with shoes more than they could ever wear or one of every color of the rainbow but me I have have a pair of sneakers, a black pair of sandals a brown pair of sandals, a black pair of flats and a brown pair of flats. How utilitarian of me.Same goes with jewelry. I have my rings, necklace and earrings I wear everyday that I never take off.and I have one sparkly pair of earrings for dressy occasions and that is it. So you ask why do I care.
Well I am not saying that my closets in the house are not full but they are full of different things. In my spare bedroom is boxes of pictures my Aunt Jan took when she was alive. She was my mom's sister and she travelled a lot . When we were kids she went to The Galapagos Islands, Africa, Alaska and China. This would have been back in the 1970's when I don't think many women travelled alone and especially did not take international adventures on their own. Why save them you ask well someone has to and I am that person. I think if no one saves them did they ever exist? Was the tree ever there that fell in the woods that no one heard fall. Of course it was but I still hold on to these things. I also have a box of every children's bible and pocket bible that anyone on my mom's side of the family ever owned. They are old and and some torn but some say when they were received and by whom in the front and some have funeral cards tucked in them from relatives past.. My mother says she has blessed me with these things but what do I do with them. I have a two drawer file cabinet right next to me that is full of papers written by my Aunt Jan as well. When my grandmother sold her house I got all these things. Things no one wants but things I have to save to pass on to someone else. I am not sure who.
Some of these things I have projects in mind for. Scanning the pictures and saving to CD but even then will I be able to get rid of the originals. Don't know. Speaking of photography and being blessed. My Grandmother had a fellow she dated and at one point I was at his house and he had been a pilot and photographer back in the 1940's and he had showed me some of his work. Very cool old aerial pictures of someplace in the mid-west. Well when he passed away his son was not interested and was going to throw them out. Now see I was not friends with this guy did not like him most of the time but I have a box of his photography. This I will one day research where it is from and donate it to a library there so it can be viewed by people that live there. I think these things are worth saving. Just sometimes saving them is an overwhelming task.
The reason this is fresh on my mind is because I have been trying to clean up the clutter in my house and get it ready for Christmas. We used always have people over. Eckerd people mostly (former co-workers of mine). Just seems like time gets away. I am not motivated but when I am I can accomplish anything. Just those times seem to be fewer and farther between lately. I know for most this is a time of family and friends and happy occasions. My brain just doesn't work that way. I want it to be but at the same time I just want to cry. Maybe that is to quick but that is it. Not for anything in particular just watch a sad movie and cry your eyes out. How about Dying Young? If you've seen the movie you get the kind of crying my eyes out I am talking about.
Which leads me to this week at work I was a bit overwhelmed by the words of others about a supervisor that is retiring. She has been in the cable business 30 years. Amazing. But I just realized if I was still working for Eckerd I would be on my 30th year. Oh and I still have 20 more to work. That is really depressing.
Well anyway the supe that is retiring works at night and has been my supervisor. She is sweet and helpful, fun loving. And can she bake. That is going to be missed. Her, "I just felt like baking some red velvet cupcakes for you all." Oh that is something I used to do. That is funny. I just remembered that to. It has been a while. I think sometimes this night shift does it to me. I can not get motivated in the morning before work and when I get home it is after 9pm and I never want to start anything then.
So there I was at work the verge of tears overwhelmed with emotions. And then it was back to the phones 30 calls holding and I was routing and the jobs weren't getting on the techs on their own. So all of this and I was leaving early that day to try to finish up my Christmas shopping or at least put a dent in it. But then I felt that rush of adrenaline that feeling of "Oh my God" I can't handle this. It was silly really. 30 calls holding. It was ok. We take them one at a time and sooner or later they get back to normal. The techs all have work. It isn't like they are sitting there waiting for their next job.But at that minute everything seemed to be too much.
That is what this time of year feels like to me. Everything is just much too much. Sometimes participating is too much. It is just easier for me to sit quietly and let others do their thing. Because if I participate I will cry and no one gets why. This started off to be about being overwhelmed with stuff and it ends up it is about being overwhelmed with emotions. Yes just for the record. I do get so happy I cry. So it is hard to tell from the outside when I cry if it is sadness or joy. I know.
Example. One of my favorite things is at church Father Devine (isn't that the perfect name for a priest). He always calls the children up after communion that are too young for their own special blessing. I love this. Makes the kids feel special and gets them participating in church. At Christmas he always gives them a candy cane. Well Christmas Eve 10 years ago there I sat with my sister and her husband and their new born baby boy Paul. When he was small, Paul made a kind of giggling noise when he breathed. So throughout church this little baby giggled his way through mass. At the end when Father asked for the children to come up I told my brother-in law to take up Paul in his little Christmas onsie. And Father picked up Paul and showed him off to the church. All the church applauded this new baby only a month old. Made me cry. Just to see that beautiful little boy up there. I still picture it in my head and it brings tears to my eyes. Well the end of Mass and we sing Silent Night. Well I know I have said it before but that is one of those songs that just makes me cry. See. This is how it goes. Through out this time of year. A lot of stuff just brings me to tears. They are not all sad tears but tears none the less.
There are other contributing factors it is not all in my head but I feel like sometimes my mind and body just can't get things together. You would think by the time I get to be this age that I would get it. You know how I work on the inside. No. Still a lot of things that my body does that my brain just can't wrap itself around. I was trying to figure this subject in but in my vow to politeness. I will leave my body out of this blog and just stick with my mind.
So less than a week till Christmas. Shopping today. Hopefully writing this morning will keep the tears back for a while but not really feeling it. At this point a perfect gift for a niece or co-worker could make me cry as well. Not shopping for Brian. He has already bought himself his gift but I am still on the look out for a new purse for me. Yeah my one I carry everyday the handle is getting frayed along the edges and I have only been trying to find one since my birthday in September. So it shows I don't just settle for the first thing that comes along and sometimes I wish when I find something I like that I would buy three of them so that I have back ups for times like this when I really need a new purse and can't find one I like. Well lets hope for the best a few good gifts and maybe no tears. Have a great Christmas.
Well I am not saying that my closets in the house are not full but they are full of different things. In my spare bedroom is boxes of pictures my Aunt Jan took when she was alive. She was my mom's sister and she travelled a lot . When we were kids she went to The Galapagos Islands, Africa, Alaska and China. This would have been back in the 1970's when I don't think many women travelled alone and especially did not take international adventures on their own. Why save them you ask well someone has to and I am that person. I think if no one saves them did they ever exist? Was the tree ever there that fell in the woods that no one heard fall. Of course it was but I still hold on to these things. I also have a box of every children's bible and pocket bible that anyone on my mom's side of the family ever owned. They are old and and some torn but some say when they were received and by whom in the front and some have funeral cards tucked in them from relatives past.. My mother says she has blessed me with these things but what do I do with them. I have a two drawer file cabinet right next to me that is full of papers written by my Aunt Jan as well. When my grandmother sold her house I got all these things. Things no one wants but things I have to save to pass on to someone else. I am not sure who.
Some of these things I have projects in mind for. Scanning the pictures and saving to CD but even then will I be able to get rid of the originals. Don't know. Speaking of photography and being blessed. My Grandmother had a fellow she dated and at one point I was at his house and he had been a pilot and photographer back in the 1940's and he had showed me some of his work. Very cool old aerial pictures of someplace in the mid-west. Well when he passed away his son was not interested and was going to throw them out. Now see I was not friends with this guy did not like him most of the time but I have a box of his photography. This I will one day research where it is from and donate it to a library there so it can be viewed by people that live there. I think these things are worth saving. Just sometimes saving them is an overwhelming task.
The reason this is fresh on my mind is because I have been trying to clean up the clutter in my house and get it ready for Christmas. We used always have people over. Eckerd people mostly (former co-workers of mine). Just seems like time gets away. I am not motivated but when I am I can accomplish anything. Just those times seem to be fewer and farther between lately. I know for most this is a time of family and friends and happy occasions. My brain just doesn't work that way. I want it to be but at the same time I just want to cry. Maybe that is to quick but that is it. Not for anything in particular just watch a sad movie and cry your eyes out. How about Dying Young? If you've seen the movie you get the kind of crying my eyes out I am talking about.
Which leads me to this week at work I was a bit overwhelmed by the words of others about a supervisor that is retiring. She has been in the cable business 30 years. Amazing. But I just realized if I was still working for Eckerd I would be on my 30th year. Oh and I still have 20 more to work. That is really depressing.
Well anyway the supe that is retiring works at night and has been my supervisor. She is sweet and helpful, fun loving. And can she bake. That is going to be missed. Her, "I just felt like baking some red velvet cupcakes for you all." Oh that is something I used to do. That is funny. I just remembered that to. It has been a while. I think sometimes this night shift does it to me. I can not get motivated in the morning before work and when I get home it is after 9pm and I never want to start anything then.
So there I was at work the verge of tears overwhelmed with emotions. And then it was back to the phones 30 calls holding and I was routing and the jobs weren't getting on the techs on their own. So all of this and I was leaving early that day to try to finish up my Christmas shopping or at least put a dent in it. But then I felt that rush of adrenaline that feeling of "Oh my God" I can't handle this. It was silly really. 30 calls holding. It was ok. We take them one at a time and sooner or later they get back to normal. The techs all have work. It isn't like they are sitting there waiting for their next job.But at that minute everything seemed to be too much.
That is what this time of year feels like to me. Everything is just much too much. Sometimes participating is too much. It is just easier for me to sit quietly and let others do their thing. Because if I participate I will cry and no one gets why. This started off to be about being overwhelmed with stuff and it ends up it is about being overwhelmed with emotions. Yes just for the record. I do get so happy I cry. So it is hard to tell from the outside when I cry if it is sadness or joy. I know.
Example. One of my favorite things is at church Father Devine (isn't that the perfect name for a priest). He always calls the children up after communion that are too young for their own special blessing. I love this. Makes the kids feel special and gets them participating in church. At Christmas he always gives them a candy cane. Well Christmas Eve 10 years ago there I sat with my sister and her husband and their new born baby boy Paul. When he was small, Paul made a kind of giggling noise when he breathed. So throughout church this little baby giggled his way through mass. At the end when Father asked for the children to come up I told my brother-in law to take up Paul in his little Christmas onsie. And Father picked up Paul and showed him off to the church. All the church applauded this new baby only a month old. Made me cry. Just to see that beautiful little boy up there. I still picture it in my head and it brings tears to my eyes. Well the end of Mass and we sing Silent Night. Well I know I have said it before but that is one of those songs that just makes me cry. See. This is how it goes. Through out this time of year. A lot of stuff just brings me to tears. They are not all sad tears but tears none the less.
There are other contributing factors it is not all in my head but I feel like sometimes my mind and body just can't get things together. You would think by the time I get to be this age that I would get it. You know how I work on the inside. No. Still a lot of things that my body does that my brain just can't wrap itself around. I was trying to figure this subject in but in my vow to politeness. I will leave my body out of this blog and just stick with my mind.
So less than a week till Christmas. Shopping today. Hopefully writing this morning will keep the tears back for a while but not really feeling it. At this point a perfect gift for a niece or co-worker could make me cry as well. Not shopping for Brian. He has already bought himself his gift but I am still on the look out for a new purse for me. Yeah my one I carry everyday the handle is getting frayed along the edges and I have only been trying to find one since my birthday in September. So it shows I don't just settle for the first thing that comes along and sometimes I wish when I find something I like that I would buy three of them so that I have back ups for times like this when I really need a new purse and can't find one I like. Well lets hope for the best a few good gifts and maybe no tears. Have a great Christmas.
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