Thoughts

Sometimes if the mail in my mailbox is disappointing, I just put it back in and give it another day or two to be better. Shouldn't we all have that opportunity to improve? 

My sister and I were talking the other day about learning to enjoy the middle of a transition. Instead of focusing on where we're going, learning to truly enjoy where we are. I'm not very good at this, but I want to be.

If the shirt I want to wear is wrinkled, I use my flat iron to iron it. It's a little dangerous because I'm often still wearing the shirt, but I've had less issues with this method than the actual iron which I'm pretty sure is colluding with the cheese drawer to murder me. 


One of my favorite things about summer is not wearing pants at home. It poses some issues, however. The other night my dinner plate was hot so I put my napkin on my lap to keep from burning my legs, but then I didn't have either the napkin or pants to wipe my dirty hands on. I considered using a cat, but remembered that time I kissed a cat's forehead after applying lip gloss and figured the results would be similar. 

I recently hired someone at work to replace an employee who left. The position is writing and managing contracts. Within the first 2 days I realized this new person can't write...  She truly doesn't understand the basic rules of grammar. That's the punchline. I'm not exactly sure what the joke is but people keep laughing when I tell them this.  

I got off the bus the other day near my office and looked up. Normally I look down to make sure I don't trip, but something drew my eyes up. 

I need to remember to look up more. 

I've been thinking a lot about the phrase "What would you do today if you weren't afraid?" I'm afraid of so much. It's interesting because people at work know me as unafraid, but at work I have mostly worked out that things are unlikely to kill me so I just sort of steamroll through the tough moments. That's not to say I never get anxious about work, but it's different than my anxiety about falling off the cliff I'm nowhere near the edge of but might possibly accidentally trip and fall down to my death/impalement. I want to be the person who doesn't let fear stop me, but in the last year I've learned a lot of about how bad I am at managing stress and how bad I feel when I'm not... and that gives me a lot of fear. About fear. 

That's the awesomeness about my anxiety disorder. I'm mostly anxious about being anxious. 

We all have really interesting opinions of ourselves based on the lies we let our brains tell us. Today at lunch I mentioned that I'm not very good at negotiating for myself and my brunch companions gave me 3 examples of how that's not true. I could only think of 1 example to support my theory and yet I have tricked myself into that 1 example being a truth that I am not good at this. My therapist and I have been talking about things like this. I use the phrase "I like to believe that I am [x]... but I guess I'm not." When [x] is neither good nor bad, why do I hold so dearly to the belief in it? 

I went on a hike the other day and a lizard about the size of those little pink pencil erasers we used to get in grade school jumped onto the path in front of me and I shrieked. The lizard and I then proceeded to walk together for about 10 or so yards... his little legs scrambling to stay in front of me while I coached him to just bail out into the weeds. 

A friend (who shall remain nameless) and I were recently in a tourist town in California. In one of those kitchy little shops full of trinkets there was a penny smashing machine. My friend requested $.50 and a penny which I provided out of curiosity that the friend WANTED a smashed penny. When the penny emerged, it was not the design desired and this conversation happened:

Me: Well, if you'd read the directions, then this wouldn't have happened.  

Friend: Do you have another $.50? And a penny?  

Me: No. That's all I have.  

Friend: Really? You're barely even looking in your purse. You're sure? 

Me: Seriously. I didn't bring my whole bottom-of-the-purse coin collection on the trip. I down-sized. Do you want me to buy you ice cream instead?  

Friend: (pout) 

Stranger: Here you go. Pay it forward.  

Friend: Oh my god. We just annoyed a stranger into giving us $.50.  

Me: No, YOU annoyed a stranger.  

Friend: Give her this dollar.  

Me: YOU give her the dollar. I'm out of here.... 

My friend then got the preferred design on the smashed penny and I was given the rejected one.... I guess for my efforts...  and I was told to never tell this story. 

I try to be a good friend.