Foraging For Answers and Finding Blessings

7/29/22

Well Hello Wonderful Being!

Can you tell me, or at least yourself, three things that are wonderful about you?  I know there are countless reasons why you’re amazing you, but we’ll just get started with the first three you can think of.  Maybe you’d care to share one (or three!) in the comment section below?  C’mon, brag on yourself a little, you’re worthy of seeing and sharing the good in you!!!!

Hmmmm, let’s see if I can do this . . .

1. I (imperfectly – not all the time) am learning to keep the faith in a God who is greater than all my experiences, fears and ‘issues’.
2. I try to be honest with myself and others, and ask the same of them, too, even knowing I might not like their response.  (And I know that sometimes what we think is honesty may not necessarily be the truth, and it’s not intended to be a lie.)
3. Learning to accept being imperfect and love myself anyway, so therefore I’m getting better at allowing others to be their true self while learning to love them like they deserve.           (See?  I am growing up!!!  Woo hoo and hallelujah:))

On a ‘reason to smile’ side, I recently found two items (on different days) on a bench at the park that I usually leave blessings for others’ to find.  One was a magic wand, and the other an item similar to what I frequently leave, but not exactly like what I’ve left recently.  Woo-hoo!   

This past week has been about pushing myself a bit more to discover if I’m on the right track with all I hope for, and convincing myself I’m worthy and capable of doing right by it all (or will be soon).

But first, it’s also been an eventful week!  A couple of the ‘highlights’ are: I had food poisoning; The boiler/water heater in my house quit working and it’s taking a week to get fixed.  This means I have to let a male of our species whom I don’t know into the house, and try to believe he has the integrity to do the job right.  I asked him to look at something else when he was here the first time and found out there’s some (perhaps extensive) plumbing work that needs to be done, too. So another male I don’t know will be entering this domain in about a week.  (Trust don’t come easy yet.)  

(Hope to reign in the stress induced feeding frenzy soon!) 

Also, a real friend, ‘M’, is going through a rough time right now, and perhaps for the first time ever I’ve been able to be the type of friend for her that I’ve been trying to become – being available for her for as long as necessary (hopefully), willing to listen (A LOT), and being a bitch (with a Christian undertone, of course!) (ahem) as needed :).  Thank God, she understands where I’m coming from with the snark and will even laugh at some of the ways I’m trying to get her to keep from flogging herself no matter what decisions she makes.  

Have no idea where this ‘Inner Bitch With a Purpose’ is coming from.  M is just as surprised as I am with this latest attitude development, and she’s actually thanked me a few times for it, says she loves it!

As to facing another fear, went to see my favorite local band over the weekend.  Haven’t been to see them for about a year, since I was triggered by a song they played and ended up running off. (Initially wrote about it in the post “Triggers and Self Care dated 8/16/21; and a recent post dated 6/24/22,  “Love & Faith & My Dog’s Got My Back”.)  

I had something else to do so could only stay for a short time, which ended up being a good thing since I went after the bout with food poisoning.  Thought the ailment was completely over but ended feeling a bit weak and with the heat there were several dizzy spells.  The goal became to just not do a face splat!  But I loved being there, enjoyed the music, and was given a couple of reasons to hope (I think!).  One being, I didn’t have that strong inclination to run away once I got there.  (Yay!)  There was conversation going on around me but didn’t know what it was about since I was so focused on trying to stay vertical and all, then was able to walk without weaving (hopefully 🤢 :)) when it was time to leave. 

Something else happened this week that I’ll probably get into with the next post; it showed me how much I’m changing in regards to self worth.  

It’s funny (sort of?), but I haven’t had an opportunity to write for a couple of days and in this moment I can’t remember, specifically, what that last sentence was referring to.  (The joy of D.I.D.!)

I’ve been too atwitter with the other things going on to focus on this.  I’ll just wrap it up by saying, the boiler repair man is finishing the fix, and I now have hot water!!!!  Huzzah!  And I’ve been helping my older, visually impaired friend with her ailing cat.  Today we took the beautiful beast to the vet to have him euthanized. 

Rough start to the day – and then we went back to her apartment so I could clean it up and pack up the cat supplies for her.  Did it as a friend, with no expectation of any reciprocation.  (And I didn’t get resentful or anything! I am growing UP!  THANK GOD {and Pearl}, I’m learning to love well!  Hallelujah!)  Besides, she’s been here for me, too.  So it was a complete surprise when she told me – oh wait,  have to explain the backstory first . . .

I had a 1998 Saturn SL (which stands for ‘sans luxury’, I think :)) for close to 20 years and put over 250,000 miles on it.  I loved that car!  It had rack and pinion steering, standard trans and brakes, and I had to turn cranks to work the windows!  I LOVED it – until it left me stranded three or four times over the course of a year, with the last time in a rough area in a very large city.  At that point I knew it was time to give the poor thing a rest.  So when I bought a newer vehicle this friend asked if she could park the Saturn in her driveway to make it look like someone was at her house, for security reasons.  I gave it to her and it’s been languishing there for several years now (and it looks like it!).  

Today we got to talking about the car and since she no longer lives there she mentioned they were trying to figure out what to do with it.  Off hand, I said I missed it and would like to get it running again if possible.  (It would get up to 40 m.p.g.,  and it’ll never rust!!)   

She just called to tell me she told her son about our conversation, and he said that it appeared the title was never officially transferred so they would give it back, and they’d pay to have it towed!  How awesome!  Now, all I have to do is find someone who can work on it.  (That was already an issue back when I chose to go newer – there weren’t many mechanics who knew what to with such a basic car anymore.)  

I was just going to ask if one of you could refer someone then thought: ‘What if someone from afar does – can you imagine the reaction from my friend when I’d try to tell her, with a straight face, that they would be paying to have it towed to somewhere hundreds of miles away?’  Hmm, do I dare to, anyway, as a joke?   It juuust might take her mind off of her missing her cat 😉

Been waiting for a good time to use the song, “The Devil Went Down To Georgia” by Charlie Daniels.  I wore out the album it’s on, “Million Mile Reflections” because I loved the whole thing so much.  (Although I just checked the track listing on-line and I don’t remember any of the other songs; can I blame the D.I.D. again?)  Even though this isn’t exactly what the song is about of course, it does remind me of going toe-to-toe with my own devils these last too many years, overcoming the hells of childhood and marriage.  I do believe and claim to be finally letting my faith in God and self vanquish the pathetic s.o.b.s.  Praying that if you have your own demons to conquer that you, too, stay encouraged and are well on your way to VICTORY.  Amen!