Last week was a TERRIBLE week around here. Specifically I’m talking about personally, in this house. It started with the basement flooding and went downhill from there. Yes, downhill. ARGH. That said, I can’t gloss over the fact that, way outside of my house, the church shooting in Charleston happened last week. It broke my heart, not only because of the cold-blooded murder of nine people and the fact that this was, without a doubt, a racially-motivated hate crime and not only because it happened in a place of worship where people are supposed to feel (and BE) safe–our temple has police supervision outside during the High Holidays and I…
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This Week: 1 Melisa: 1/2
This week has Kicked. My. Butt. I’m not talking about your average, run-of-the-mill, short-term butt-kicking. I’m talking about nearly a week’s worth of stress-induced, anxiety-laden, sleep-deprived, frustrating, often tearful minutes that crawled by as if they were hours instead of sixty-second increments. To say out loud that it’s “been a tough week” seems ridiculous to me because it’s such a massive understatement. The cause: too many moving parts in my life, many of which are currently out of my control. At my lowest point earlier in the week, I sobbed heavily into Jim’s arms, stating rather dramatically that I just don’t know why I can’t be a “normal person who…
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Mr. Sandman, Bring Me A Dream. PLEASE.
Take a look at this, an arrangement of just a few of the products that are involved in my pre-bedtime routine. It wasn’t always this way, my having to bring in reinforcements. Way, way back when I was in my twenties, I could brush my teeth, use the bathroom, get into bed, snuggle up to Jim, pull the covers up to my chin (I always loved being cozy under the blankets!) and fall asleep nearly immediately. I’d stay asleep until morning and even if I “only” got seven hours, I felt so well rested! These days, in my midtolate forties (to me, forty-six is not mid- and not late-; it’s…
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Survival Skills
There’s a saying about how Chicago has only two seasons, winter and construction*. My little corner of my western suburb has been experiencing construction year-round for nearly two years now (even through the winter months), thanks to a gutting and extensive reconstruction of a major state route that happens to be one of the few roads that runs through my entire town from all the way north to all the way south. By the way, that state route happens to border my subdivision. The city planners back in the day had absolutely no idea that eventually Naperville would be the fifth largest (by population) city in Illinois and naturally, didn’t…
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Empty Nesting Is Awesome, Except When It’s Not.
I love my life the way it is at this moment. I have one son who graduated from college and supports himself with an actual job, and I have another son who is a college sophomore, living only two hours from home. I work from home. I have the freedom to sleep in if I want, workout for as long as I want, not cook dinner for a whole week if I don’t want to, and most of all, pack a bag and take off to visit friends or accompany Jim on a business trip if I want, with no problem. Many of my friends who still have kids at…
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Playing Horse
Jim and I have been streaming the show “Welcome To Sweden”, which is an NBC sitcom produced by Amy Poehler (among others) and starring her younger brother Greg. It’s about a guy and his Swedish fiancee and the hijinks that ensue when they move from New York back to her home in Sweden. I find it hilarious, sweet, and extremely unique (subtitles!!), by the way, and Jim…does not. Anyway, while watching the show I have noticed Swedish Dala horses in the background. Seeing them on television made me remember the three-inch, red Dala horse that my mom used to have hanging on the living room wall above the couch. When…
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Sometimes It’s Best To Let Other People Make The Decisions, No Matter The Outcome.
I’m easily stressed. This is not news to most of you. It’s mostly because I’m a worrier. And a perfectionist. And…well, need I go on? When I find myself in the middle of a stress spiral as I am this week—for many reasons, all of which have been resolved/finished/taken care of—the part of my brain that normally makes decisions easily just…shuts down. “What do you want for dinner, Melisa?” “I don’t know. I can’t even think about that right now.” “Okay, do you want salad, or how about grilled chicken? Or burgers?” “I don’t know. I don’t care. You pick.” Like THAT. I am also a life-long nail biter, which…
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About That Time My Dog’s Life Was In Danger
Oh, it’s all good now, thank goodness, but things were a little bit dicey earlier this week. Let me explain. On Sunday, Jim and I drove the boys back to Wisconsin and to their respective colleges. While we were gone, my mom called the house and left a voicemail. Apparently she and my dad had left a bag at our house before leaving town. The bag, she said, contained the games they brought along with a “cap”. I heard the message when we returned home and didn’t think much about it other than, “We’ll get that bag to them on our next visit,” like she requested. We were exhausted from…
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Beeeeeeep!
Thanks for calling. Melisa is not here at the moment; she’s busy dealing with the remnants of a day that started out wonderfully with a Dailey Method workout and a LISTEN TO YOUR MOTHER webinar and slowly disintegrated into a seemingly endless grocery shopping trip during which she spent a king’s ransom to restock her pantry and refrigerator with food for the coming week plus Thanksgiving. Her eventual release from the checkout, after feeling judged by her fellow shoppers for how much she had in her cart, resulted in a longer-than-usual drive home due to construction and then an eventful transfer of groceries from the car to the kitchen, during…
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The Parking Garage
No, YOU got a panicked call from your husband a little after 5:00 this morning, right after he arrived at O’Hare airport so he could go on a one-day business trip, and after you asked if he had been in a car accident because he sounded THAT BAD, your chin dropped when he told you that he attached his keys to his laptop bag and then locked it in the car. And YOU talked him down and agreed that since this was a very important trip and he at least still had his phone, he should just go catch his flight (travel light FTW!) and you would bring his spare…