Category: General

Since I seem to be on a roll of random topics lately, I thought I would discuss one of my current distractions.  My family is a member of Amazon Prime, and with that comes some different benefits, one of which is the ability to watch some TV shows and movies without an additional cost.  I don’t know how big this library is, but since it is Amazon my guess is that it is pretty large.  I also don’t spend a lot of time watching TV and movies these days, but right now I am stuck on one TV show on Amazon Prime.  That show is Unsolved Mysteries.

For those who might not know or who weren’t around for it, Unsolved Mysteries is a TV show where they reenact crimes, unexplained events, ghosts, lost loves – pretty much any mystery that is – yes – unsolved.  I have been playing the show in the background a lot lately while doing other things, and it has brought back a lot of memories for me.  I would watch this show a lot in the late 80s and early 90s as a kid, and for some reason it stuck with me.  I don’t like any bit of scary movies or shows, yet I can sit and watch this.  What’s funny to me is that there are people who think watching Unsolved Mysteries is scarier than any scary movie or TV show.  Maybe it is because the stories are supposed to be real?  I don’t know the answer, but regardless of what others feel about it I enjoy it.  I certainly don’t want to become a part of an unsolved mystery, and I think one of best parts of the show is when mysteries do get solved or are explained.  Unfortunately, they are not always happy endings, but finding a resolution can be helpful.

Perhaps, for me, it will always be an “unsolved mystery” as to why I like the show so much.

When I sometimes stop to think about it, the world is so full of contradictions and hypocrisy.  And, just because I notice it, it does not mean I am above it.  I wanted to share a recent contradiction I have thought about in my life.  It probably isn’t all that serious, and, you might share the same thoughts, but I thought it might be amusing to discuss.

My contradiction today is about bats.  In real life, I am not really a big fan.  I understand they have important roles in the biology of our ecosystem, and that is great, but I don’t need to hang around any.  I had a close encounter with one a few years ago at our house, and that was downright terrifying to me.  We fixed the opening in our attic that caused that close encounter, so all has been well.  However, there is another part of the attic that was recently discovered to have an opening and also evidence of a bat being there.  Again, we are actually planning to have that fixed today, and I haven’t dealt with any bats recently, but still it freaks me out a little that I might see one again.  Yuck.  Bats, you go do your thing away from me and I’ll do mine.

However, I started thinking about it, and then it hit me.  I love the super hero Batman.  All of the Christian Bale Batman movies are so good, and Batman 1989 is my absolute favorite.  I don’t mind seeing the bats in a movie, so why are they so scary in real life?  Honestly, I think the big reason is that real bats can carry rabies and disease, and no one wants that.  For some reason, though, I think it is interesting that I love made up bats but not real ones.  But, I know I am like that for many things – a bag of contradictions.

Today I am going to criticize a little bit – and with that, please keep in mind that this is my opinion and not a bunch of facts I found.

As I have gotten older, I have grown increasingly appalled at some of the slang terms that have developed in our culture.  For example, saying “cray”.  Why would you say that?  Was saying “crazy” and adding that one extra syllable that hard?  Another example is “jelly” instead of jealous – why oh why would you replace a feeling with a condiment?  There are plenty of other examples, but the one that irritates me the most right now is sayings such as “adulting” or “I adulted today”.  This to me has to be about the silliest thing I have heard recently.

When did the word “adult” get transformed into being a verb?  You are either an adult or you are not.  You don’t get to pick and choose throughout the day when you are an adult – it’s a full time role.  Now, your maturity level may differ during the day, and there are certainly moments where you may not be immediately responsible for something, but as an adult there are typically responsibilities around you all of the time.  I also understand that we live in a culture where the lines between adolescence and adulthood are blurred.  Sometimes I don’t always feel like an adult either, although being responsible for another human life has wiped away those feelings for the most part.

Overall, I am not here to say I am better than anyone because I detest this language.  I just don’t get it.  To me, it’s a waste of language and not really that amusing.  If you are an adult, words like “adulting” should not be in your vocabulary, and I hope these terms disappear soon.

I feel like I have a lot of interests.  Some might even describe me as a “renaissance” individual – one who is curious about many things and dabbles in a variety of activities.  I don’t see anything wrong with that label, but there would be some who challenge the notion that because of it I can’t focus or become very well versed about a few particular subjects.  I get that, but I think everyone gets to choose how they spend their free time, as long as it doesn’t hurt themselves or others.

However, there are some interests that I would say I am at “expert” level.  One of those is going to concerts.

Attending concerts is something I have been doing since sometime in high school.  I go to enough of them that I have kept a list of concerts I have seen, and the list is pretty long.  I probably haven’t even done that great of a job keeping track, but if you look at my list, I have seen almost 80 different groups or performers.  Of those, some of them I have seen multiple times.  This spring alone I have already been to four events, and a few more are planned in the near future.  I don’t know if obsessed is the right word, but it is definitely a place where a lot of my money goes.

What is it about me and live music/performance?  I don’t know.  Perhaps it is one of the few ways that I actually do a good job of living in the moment.  Perhaps it is a way to get out and see others and the world and get out of my own head.  There are probably many reasons for my interest in attending concerts.  So, assuming no big changes, I look for my list to keep on expanding.

As I write this entry, it has been over a week since we have had air conditioning.  At this time of the year, that may not always be a big deal, but we have had several days over 90 degrees Fahrenheit, and they were pretty darn uncomfortable.  There was a night spent in a different location.  There was a night spent in the basement.  I wasn’t so much worried about my husband and me, but I could hardly stand seeing my little one so restless and unable to sleep.  Luckily, we did get a new air conditioner installed yesterday, so now we can go back to enjoying the luxury I pretty much took for granted.

And that is the key thing for me – taking it for granted.  When you think about it, air conditioning has not been around that long, and it is something that not a lot of people even have.  Not only have I enjoyed air conditioning all of my life, but I am pretty sure I am more intolerant of extremes in temperature because of it.  Air conditioning has made me wimpy, but I still look at it as a necessity.

Experiencing life without air conditioning when it is nice to have it has definitely been a case of not knowing what you have until it’s gone.  And boy, did I miss it.  Right now, I am all about gratitude for it and understanding that it is a luxury that most people don’t have.  I’m pretty lucky.  My guess is that life will go on and I will forget about it, but I hope not.  I hope that this helps me to expand my gratitude and focus more on all of the things that I take for granted.  Air conditioning is only one of many, many things I am fortunate enough to have in my life.

To start off, I wanted to note that I think the clarity I am looking for is beginning to head my way, but I am not going to focus on that today.  Today I want to switch gears and talk about something new that I am very excited about.  It is called The Great Courses Plus, and I am thrilled about having this in my life.  Let me explain.

The Great Courses is a company that I found out about through my subscription to National Geographic magazine.  In general, they produce college courses from reputable professors that you can buy and consume on your own schedule.  When I first heard of them, you would have to buy an entire course, and the DVDs and/or transcripts would be mailed to you.  I have ordered several courses from them, but it was when I felt I had the time to get through all of the lectures of the course.  I was also picky about the courses I chose – I would only pick courses in which I thought I would enjoy all of the lectures, not just a few of the topics.  The courses also tended to be pricy, but there were usually a lot of sales that made them more affordable.

Even though The Great Courses had some limitations, I really enjoyed their mission and supported what they were doing.  But now with The Great Courses Plus, I am inspired all over again.  The Great Courses Plus is a service where you pay a monthly or yearly fee, and you can access any course or lecture you want during that time.  Nothing gets sent to you, you just watch the lectures whenever you feel like it.  What a great idea!  I signed up for this immediately, and I am beginning to enjoy the benefits of not having to commit to only a few courses.  The topics cover so many things – travel, history, food, music, art, literature, science, cooking, math, and on and on.  I am so looking forward to using this subscription, and I encourage you to check it out as well.

I have been up for about an hour already this morning.  One of the first things I did was exercise, and today included a “high intensity interval training” workout.  A lot of people have heard of this, which is also known simply as “HIIT”.  Regardless of what you call it, it certainly lived up to its name – my heart was pumping, and it felt like it was high intensity to me.

As I finished the workout, I started thinking about the term “high intensity”, and I started to realize that it seems to describe my life right now.  The last few weeks have been very busy, and if you have read my last few posts, you know this is understandably so.  However, I began to think that this “high intensity” can only last so long.  “High intensity” can be great for short intervals, just like in the exercise workout, but it does not seem all that healthy for sustained periods of time.

Of course, the question becomes, how do I ease into a less intense schedule?  That is what I have challenged myself to think about today.  Of course, I think some of the activity will naturally slow down because the last few weeks have not been typical.  But, this seems like a good time to reflect on my life.  Are there activities I need to say no to?  Are there activities I need to do less of?  What are my priorities and what can be left out if there isn’t enough time?  When and where does down time fit in?  What makes sense for my family?  I am sure I could ask even more questions, but I think this is a good start.

One thing I do know, however, is that I believe everyone needs time for rest.  There has to be time to just “be” and not have to worry about getting something done.  I know my days are better when I find this time, and I hope you can find some too.

I have spent several posts talking about different topics related to grief, and I am going to spend at least one more entry on it.

One of the things that I really struggle with when someone important to you dies is how quickly it seems like the rest of the world just moves on.  Here you are, trying to make sense of the death, trying to make sense of the world, trying to make sense of anything, and it seems like everyone around you is living like nothing ever happened.  It makes me worry that others are not taking the time to grieve and mourn like I am.  It can be a very sad way of thinking.

What I have to remember, though, is that everyone grieves differently.  And, everyone grieves for different people or relationships.  After all, how many people do I know that have lost someone, and they probably couldn’t understand why people like me continue to move on with life like nothing ever happened?  That perception can go both ways.

I think the key here is compassion, and what I am talking about is only one small part of compassion.  It includes accepting where you are in your grief process and also understanding that others might be in a different place in their grief.  Looking at the bigger picture, everyone you interact with probably grieves certain things or people, so in some ways, we are really all in the same boat.  I am using this situation as a reminder to be compassionate to everyone, because I do not know what grief they carry with them.  I have to get better at remembering that the feelings I have may be my own, but in general they are feelings that other people have too.  And, that alone can also help in processing grief.

In my last entry, I shared some of my thoughts on grief.  In this entry, I want to touch on a tangent of that, which I am calling comfort.  To me, comfort includes things and experiences that make me feel better and/or let me express any emotions I am currently having.  At this point, I am not judging my list of comforts, but here are some that I use: watching comedy or anything funny, listening to music, walking, exercising, sleeping, or eating.  For the most part, this list seems ok to me, but I am trying to work on the comfort eating part, since I feel that emotional eating is probably not healthy for me.

There are probably many more things I could list that bring me comfort, as well as others that help to comfort others.  These can include spending time with others, going to church, getting out in nature, dancing, painting, creating, and the list goes on.  As you can imagine, comfort comes in many forms, but my hope is that everyone finds comfort in activities that are healthy for them.  While it seems obvious as I write it, people can turn to harmful things for comfort, and that can lead to even more issues.

Regardless of what healthy types of comfort you choose, I hope you also make the time for them.  Sometimes it can be a challenge to take the time for yourself and allow yourself any comfort.  Some people also use “busy ness” as a way to avoid taking any time to feel the emotions that they have.  I truly think it is important to find your comforts and use them when needed.  Even the stresses of everyday life make is necessary to find comfort on a regular basis.  What do you do to help bring comfort into your life?

At this point in my blog, I tend to write entries a few weeks ahead of when they are posted.  This morning’s entry will probably not show up online for awhile, but it will be short.  As of the date I wrote this, my mother in law passed away unexpectedly yesterday.  Right now, there are really no words to describe what is going on in my family.  And so, another grieving process begins.