Random Blah, Blah, Blah

Hmmm, what to write about? Not that I have anything in particular that I need to write about which is an interesting change of pace, but I actually have some time which is a rarity these days. Truth be told, I’m sure I could find something better to do with my time but I have a week to deal with that.

I am Las Vegas bound in less than a week for Turkey Day and a visit with my sister. We had some last minute travel issues but they appear to be under control now. My boyfriend is joining us and he got called to a last minute business trip that sort of conflicts with the start of the vacation. We had to redo some airline tickets, then I changed my mother ticket and redid some seating arrangements. I am hoping that travel goes smoothly but there is a part of me that is nervous with the unknown. There is this one astrologer that I have been following for a few years now and surprisingly she is somewhat accurate most of the time. Of course with all predictions there is much speculation but she seems to pin things down pretty well in my opinion. Anyway, the point I feel I need to bring this up is because she talks about November 26th and 27th being the worst travel dates and that happens to be the date I am flying home. With all the changes in airfare last minute, I am hoping that she is wrong on this one.

Since I am headed out to Vegas in a few days, I decided yesterday to go to the cemetery and visit with my father. I had not been since July right before his birthday and part of me has been feeling guilty that I had not gone sooner. The other part of me was dreading the trip as I have been having some daddy issues lately and felt it would be a very emotional visit. All in all though, it was not bad. It was a beautiful day and I decided that I had some time and I wanted to pay my respects.

One year ago I took my father to visit his parents at the cemetery so he could make his peace. Never did I think a year later I would be making a similar trip to different cemetery to visit my own parent. And if you asked me what I had to do to have a conversation with my father 5 years ago, even two years ago, never did I think it would involve a trip to Pinelawn and a conversation with a granite wall.

I brought him a little turkey thing I picked up in the party store as I felt guilty going empty handed and it was my turkey day visit afterall so the props I brought seemed appropriate. To be honest, I am not even sure how the conversation started. My conversation may have started with me saying “I brought you some turkey for Thanksgiving. I know it is not real turkey, but honestly, you haven’t eaten real turkey for Thanksgiving in years now.” You see my father always scheduled an endoscopy prior to Thanksgiving and they did banding on his esophageal varicies. As a result he was not able to eat real food so he was always on a goulash diet of “drool” as my father called it. Everyone had turkey and the fixings but he always had mash potatoes, pastina and maybe some jello or soup pureed so it really did look like “drool”.

I think I then went on to tell him that I tried to make nice with his family but all bets are off as his sister is a bitter old woman- old and alone or not, it is no reason to call up and yell at us as we did nothing to deserve it. I talked about how my brother was so emotional on his wedding and he should have been there. I told him how my mother looked so beautiful and her brother tried his best to dance with her, walk her down the aisle and ensure she did not feel alone but it was still not the same. I told him I was trying my best to get along with my mother but as he knew, she was messy, unorganized and had a serious shopping issue that I gave up trying to rectify. I told him that I had some good things and some bad happen this year and that I hoped that no matter where life took me, he would helped me down the best path possible. I explained that I was doing well at work and that I had made many great achievements. Life had been cruel to me and handed me a shitty hand, but I made the most of it and did not let life get me down and while he was never proud of any of us, he should be very proud of his family and who we all turned out to be.

My father was always concerned what his legacy was going to be, what people were going to remember him by and what he was going to leave behind. When my father passed, my brother saw a necklace medallion that had fingerprints on it. He asked if in addition to the Thumbie we were getting with my father thumb print, we would each give our print to put on a necklace. There are now 5 finger prints on the medallion and on the back my brother had them engrave it “Legacy”. I told my father the other day that my brother had it right, he did leave behind a legacy and in each and every one of us, there was a part of him- in the things we say, the actions, the mannerisms- each one of us has a bit of him inside that will be there for as long as we live. I told him that was his legacy and that he should be very proud of what he has left behind. I told him that life has thrown us all a lot to handle- me especially in the past few years and that he should be proud of who I am and what I have become. It is sad that he saw my life fall apart and will never get to be a part of the rebuilding process, but I told him that I never gave up – even on the toughest of days and he should be real proud of me. He should be real proud of all of us.

I’m not really sure how the rest of my one sided conversation went but I asked him to ensure we all had a safe flight out to Vegas. I thanked him as I just knew he was partly responsible for preventing the bad car accident I almost got into a few weeks ago. I asked him to ensure we had a good holiday as my mom was starting to get depressed and I did not know what to do for her. Her birthday is not until January but she has already decided that she would not be celebrating as it reminded her of the day he died. I told him that he always joked that he would haunt her if she moved on, but she deserved to be happy, move on and have good things in life. I told him that if she ever met anyone, he needed to realize that and be happy for her.

Now that I am done with the daddy issues, I wonder if I should write about anything else. I think I will give myself a 20 minute limit and then call it a night. Of course when I get going on a topic, all bets are off so this should be interesting.

Her comes the blah, blah and random blah leading up to the title of my entry. On the work front, I am kicking ass and taking names. I asked one manager- actually two how their new hires were and I got an ecstatic- “Awesome”. One manager told me that he would give me a pat on the back but this was HR and there would be no inappropriate touching so I should give myself a pat on the back. And I do have to say that I put someone through the background screen in record time. My goal was to clear all non- warehouse positions off my desk before I headed out to Vegas and I have almost succeeded in meeting my goal. I do have three warehouse managers scheduled for interview tomorrow so now I just have to go to bed and pray the general manager likes them.

In relationship land- things have been moving at a very rapid pace but one that I think I have finally prepared myself for. You already know that in August my boyfriend started hinting if I wanted to live with him. It came up a few times and I think we agreed that we would pick that conversation up in January. I need to be here for my mom during the holidays and for her birthday which is also the one year anniversary of my father’s death. (I really can’t believe that almost an entire year has passed) Getting back to my original topic of the living together and the timing of things, some questions came up as to where to live but I guess those are issues that we will address when the timing presents itself. I will say that one of his tenants wants out of their lease and yesterday some conversations that he admits we were not necessarily ready to have came up. Trying to figure out where he wanted to live, whether he wanted to move back into his house or rent it again and continue renting himself came up. This prompted conversations about if I could see myself living in his house one day and if I even liked the house. It then brought up topics of what was going to be the best route to get us to other goals we may set for ourselves, and while we are very much together, we are also very much apart when it comes to making decisions.

As you know I entertain anything and I think this time around, he was more uncomfortable bringing up the topics than I was listening to them. We kind of went around in circles for a bit. I have no problems being in a partnership and making decisions together as a team- something I wish I had in my marriage that I never did and it is so welcoming and inviting to find that mentality in someone I am with. Yet the fact remains, I can’t help him make some of the decisions he has to make and I can’t make them jointly either as we are not yet in a position where we make joint decisions on certain topics- like where to live long term. I could see if we lived together now and figuring out what was the next best thing for our future came up, but we don’t live together so it is kind of awkward that he factors me in when figuring out things and technically while he values my opinion, I really have no say.

I think we left off that he was going to try and find another renter for his house, continue to get a better cash flow by renting himself as his company is about to be bought out and there is still an element of uncertainty in his life. If he can’t find a renter, I think he would entertain the idea of moving back home, but for right now that is not his first choice. As for me, his apartment is small when you factor in more stuff added to the mix, but it is livable- certainly not a long term living arrangement but people do it. If and when the time comes that it makes sense to live together, what matters is that we are stable and happy. I have been through enough in life to know that big beautiful living arrangements and material possessions do not make for a happy life. Sometimes it really is the little things that matter. I would trade in my Mc Mansion (if I had one that is) for happiness any day of the week.

Before I move on and while I am on the topic of living arrangements, there is something that I worried about early on in the living arrangement conversation that I have never had a chance to write about. You see I am extremely anal, set in my ways, organized and particular about the way I like to do things. My boyfriend is the same way- some similar analnesses and some different ones. (And no- I do not think analnesses is a word, but it is now.) Anyway- he does things that annoy me sometimes, but then I stop and think – OK, I am the same way about other things so let it go. Unless we don’t see eye to eye on something, I think oddly enough we work. But spending a weekend here and a night there is far different from living with someone full time. It is at that point where I think things can get better and be a bonding experience and make a couple stronger or it can be the destruction of what once appeared to be a stable and functioning relationship. I think we will be OK, but you never know.

Financial wise, I think we are both responsible and have it in us to set common goals- financial or otherwise and stick to them, discussing any needed deviations along the way. But finances are a concern. Life has taught me to be more cautious with my spending and well, he is a bit more free with his earned dollar. Granted, he probably makes three times my salary at this point so there will always be a discrepancy from that stand point. I guess time will tell how that will factor in but the thing that I worry about that may or may not be a bit silly is his analnesses with his spreadsheets and in particular his spreadsheet for his finances.

I have yet to see the aforementioned spreadsheet nor at this point it is my business nor do I have a need to see it, but he did mention in passing that his ex-wife could not grasp it. He tried to show her a few times but she never got it and always messed it up or could not follow how it was done. My mom calls me “down to the penny Jenny” because when I was trying to teach her to do her bills this year, I would stop and go over every last thing until I got the balance to match down to the penny. It is comforting to find someone that is also “down to the penny”, but while he has this spreadsheet he created that downloads this and that, I do it the old fashion way- with my paper checkbook register. I match it up with what is on the computer and then play with the numbers until I have reconciled my checkbook balance with that of the bank. (A skill by the way that I think I learned in high school or some class, but a skill I think if valuable for everyone to learn at some point in their life). Well, the long winded point I am trying to get at is that the spreadsheet scares me a bit. What if his ex was not stupid or couldn’t grasp it? What if the creator of the spreadsheet made it so elaborate that even the financially stable at heart will have issue with it? Will he then get equally annoyed at my inability to follow his analnesses? (There I used the word again!)

OK, now that we have discussed living situations, finances and other uncomfortable topics of conversations- let’s push the envelope even further and talk babies. Yep- babies! I just told you that my boyfriend appeared to be extremely uncomfortable talking about living situations yet some things that should be awkward for him to mention are not- hence the topic of baby talk. A few months back the topic of having a kid by accident would have probably freaked him out yet somewhere along the line, I think he decided I would be a suitable mother to his children. We have danced around the topic from time to time as it came up in conversation. Usually we would joke about stuff and if something more serious came of it, then we would entertain the point in question.

Now that I think of it, we were driving to Pennsylvania Columbus Day weekend and got stuck in traffic. Somehow the topic of kids came up. It has been the running joke that his balding head was like a magic ball and could predict the future. As I had much uncertainty in my life this year, I jokingly rubbed his head one day and asked where I would be in 5 years. He told me that I would be living in Georgia. I would marry some rich doctor and I would have 12 kids with him. He would have tons of money and I would have a beautiful mansion, yet I would be unhappy with him because the sex would be bad. So every now and then the joke about the 12 kids in Georgia comes up.

Perhaps the conversation was started by bringing up the 12 kids I was going to have or that he was going to have. One silly stuck in traffic topic led to another and then before you knew it, I was throwing it back at him asking him what he planned to name his 12 kids. He came up with some awful names and when I asked him to be serious for a moment, he got annoyed and told me he was not ready to think about that right now. So as a side note, we go from that 3 or 4 weeks ago, to something more recent that may have had him prepared to talk about that more seriously.

I think we were sitting in Weight Watchers together trying to figure out how to get more points. He came up with a crazy idea so I told him that I would just have to have kids so I could get nursing points or something to that effect. One comment leads to another and while I am not really sure how, I asked what was the cut off age at which he would not consider having kids. He told me 44. I then asked him what would be the age at which he would consider having kids- his reply was 37. I just stopped for a moment and in a high pitched voice said, “37, that is next year.” He looked at me and said, “I know- I am ready to have kids.” He reads my blog from time to time and knows that in the past, I have questioned whether he was serious or joking at times about certain topics. With that in mind, he then said as a follow up, “I know you question whether or not I am serious sometimes- I want you to know that I am very serious. I am ready to have kids and I think you would make a good mother.”

Truth be told, I was not really sure how I should react to that. Part of me was a bit in shock. Woman usually have the baby blues- not men so the role reversal took me for a surprise, but beyond that, while there was a time when I wanted nothing more than to have children, I really thought I had gotten to a point where that was not an option. I had also made peace with the fact that if I did not have kids by the time I was 34, I never would and it would be OK. Well here I am- 34, starting completely over in so many areas of my life and I figured by the time kids came up I would be old and shriveled so it would be a non-issue. I mean talk about putting the cart before the horse.

I guess I should tell you that my boyfriend told me that he realizes that from time to time he was pushes things or “jumps too far ahead” as he puts it. He then told me he would drop it but he wanted me to know where he stood on the issue and if I ever was ready to bring it up, he was ready to discuss it. At this point, he said he would drop it and not bring it up until I was ready. Well I don’t know that 24 hours constitutes “ready” but the next morning he brought it up again. He thinks from reading my blog entries that I get freaked out about things like this and while there was a time I probably would have anxiety over things or feel rushed, I have had several months to mentally adjust my thinking, accept possibilities and reopen doors that I thought had been locked forever. I have also come to accept this “forward thinking” if you will from him. While I think that certain topics may be premature, I do welcome his thoughts and I never want him to feel he has to hold back or restrict what is on his mind on my account.

That being said, he started the next morning with “I know you are not ready to discuss this but when you are…….” He really wanted me to know he was serious about all this. So while he was spilling his guts to me, I asked him to explain the timeline of events he had all planned out. Obviously there are some flaws or missing pieces (unless those he did not want to share) but he figures that in January we will have the moving in conversation (which oh my God- January is here in no time at all). Then he will work on possibly a new job at some point next year. He figures that by this time next year we should consider having a kid together because he is ready and thinks a year from now would be good timing for such a life altering event. As for me, I kind of thought other things might be pre-requisites to this conversation like….. I don’t know….maybe the living together conversation. I’m not saying people need to get married to start families, nor do I think that should be a reason to do so, but it is a bit odd that he lives one place, I am still temporarily living with my mom and yet he thinks the timing would be good to have a baby. He is not ready to consider names seriously because that is a conversation he is not comfortable or ready for yet and he was completely uncomfortable having the living arrangement conversation yesterday, yet having babies together is completely comfortable- go figure. Good luck making sense of this one because I sure as hell can not.

The one thing I know is that when I am ready for certain things, I will know it. I am cautious and will always take things at a slower pace. He likes to jump the gun and rush things. I have a good head on my shoulders but am also mindful that when I make decisions in my life and for the rebuilding of my future, I need to know that I am making them for the right reasons- not because it seems like the next logical step, not because I am desirous of a new living arrangement that does not include my mother’s house and not because it is what everyone else does. When I make those decisions, it needs to be because it is what I want and what is right for me. I think sometimes what hold me back is that I need to take a step back and really evaluate if I am doing things for the right reasons and not the wrong ones. In the past I moved in with my ex because I hated living at home. I thought living with someone else and getting married was the solution to a better way of life. Look how well that one turned out for me. This time around, I want once again to have a new roof over my head, but I need to know I am doing it because it is the right thing or what I truly want to do and not because it is a change of scenery or a better place to live.

In the end, I am a firm believer in things happening for a reason. I am also a believer in the fact that there is a higher power and that perhaps there is a plan greater than my own in store for me. If and when things are meant to happen, I believe they will and when I get where it is meant for me to be, then I will know it is because I was meant to be there. It may take some time for the destination of life’s journey to reveal itself, but little by little, step by step and day by day, I will get there.

And with that, I have far exceeded my 20 minute cutoff time. I doubt I will have time to write again this week but at least I leave for Vegas feeling that I have finally brought everyone up to date with the journey of my life and my quest to find the hidden rainbow at the end. Little by little I have seen glimpses of the colors throughout the year. Let us just hope that with each moment of passing time, the colors become more vivid and illuminate my days more and more.


I wish everyone a safe and happy holiday. Be mindful of the good you have in your life and never for a moment forget to count the many blessings we all too often take for granted. When life throws you a curveball, remember, sometimes it is the littlest things in life that make the journey worth the trek.


Happy Thanksgiving everyone!


Until I write again……….