Category Journal

Lost Friends

Carolyn S. 1 Comment

There are friends in your life who made a huge impact on you. Friends who changed who you were as a person. Friends who were your lifeline through hard times. Friends who were there to celebrate your victories. Friends who you shared once-in-a-lifetime experiences with. Friends who were there through the laughter and the tears. Friends who you thought would always be in your life.

But today – they’re not.

They’re not around for a number of reasons. You no longer work at the same company, so you don’t see them every day like you used to. You moved to a different city or a different state. Your interests changed and you didn’t have enough in common anymore. They had kids and you didn’t. You both grew up and life took priority. All valid life reasons why friendships ended or fizzled.

There are other times where there doesn’t seem to be a reason. One day you’re friends, the next they’ve ghosted you. Those are the ones that really sting. It would be one thing to have a huge fight and exchange hearty “fuck yous”, then that would make sense. But nothing like that happened. It’s like one day you were friends, the next you never existed. Which hurts because these friends helped you through some low points in your life and now that you’ve come out the other side, they’re not around to see that person that you’ve become.

Finally – the worst one and the reason I’m being so introspective today is when your friend passes away. One minute they’re there and the next they’re gone forever. I haven’t lost anyone to COVID-19 thank fucking gawd, but I have lost them to cancer.

My good friend Alex passed away after a long battle with leukemia two years ago tomorrow. I have the reminder in my calendar so I make sure to remember him and to celebrate that friendship even though it’s now lost. He’d probably tell me I was being stupid for being so mushy and making such a big fuss about it. Makes me smile just thinking about it. Miss you, friend.

Is This Thing On?

Carolyn S.

It’s been…checks calendar…two and a half years since I’ve made a blog post.

Whoops.

Photo by Bich Tran on Pexels.com

I’ve had a slight job change – I’m working for the same company, but in a different group, so everything feels fresh and new to me now! I’m also using this as an opportunity to start blogging more and getting back to the person 10 years ago who blogged on a near daily basis.

But what to talk about? In the past I used this space as a way to talk through diet, exercise, and the lack of success with weight loss, so I suppose I could start there.

Typically I would complain about my failures with weight loss, but you want to know the worst part? Starting January 2020, I found my groove with diet and exercise and I was starting to see results. Yes!

Then the pandemic hit.

My fitness outlet of choice (OrangeTheory) closed down and while we had a rower in the house, it wasn’t the same so I fell off the fitness wagon. Over the past year, we outfitted our home exercise equipment so I could do just about anything out of the house: dumbbells, TRX bands, weight bench, etc. The big purchase was getting a treadmill – which the one I wanted finally came back in stock in August so we jumped on it. This spurred on an office makeover where I updated furniture and rearranged the layout so I could fit the treadmill right next to my desk. I don’t use it while I work, but I’m more apt to use it here than in the basement where the rest of the equipment is.

Side note: my husband and I are talking about moving all the basement exercise equipment to our unused spare bedroom so it’s a nicer place to be and would make it more likely that we’d use it. Right now going into the “dungeon” next to the litter boxes doesn’t sound too exciting.

We’d lose the spare bed, but nobody visits us now anyway – if so, it’s a few days per year. So we’re seriously considering it.

My diet had been going SO well too – started WW on January 1, 2020 and had lost 10lbs over the first two months and noticed all the changes the combination of fitness and diet were making to my body.

Then, well, you know.

All the food shortages threw a wrench into things – the staples that allowed me to lose weight without stressing out were impossible to find. Nevermind what the overall stress levels did to my mental well being. Hellooo wine!

Ended up buying whatever was available in the store and I dove into comfort foods and just not caring in general. I mean, we all lived through that time – that shit sucked!

Now, I’m just as heavy as I was when I started my weight loss journey in January 2020. I am running more since I got the treadmill and on New Year’s Day this year I ran a 5k without stopping for the first time since 2015. I’ve also been hitting other running milestones since then, so I’ll take that little success. 🙂

It’s so hard to get the food thing back on track. I’m super tempted to sign up for one of those meal services so I don’t have to think about it because planning menus is THE WORST. I’ll happily eat the same thing for breakfast and lunch, but once dinner hits, all bets are off. I learned how to make really good pizza dough and hot wings over the pandemic, so that’s part of the problem. Like, if I stopped eating like an asshole, I’d probably have a better time of it, so this isn’t a problem with no solution. I’m just unmotivated and lazy and I don’t know how to get myself out of it.

I guess my biggest problem is that I’m still feeling the weight of stress about the pandemic and how everything in my life has been put on hold. I’m lucky that my job was already remote before all this happened, my husband’s job pivoted to being remote, and we both stayed healthy throughout the past year. But I’m missing travel and visiting family and it’s hard to get motivated again.

I guess that’s enough for an update. Maybe I’ll write more than once every few years going forward. 😀

Halfway

Carolyn S.

Well, my big “I’m gonna blog more!” plan for my sabbatical has fallen by the wayside because it’s been a month and a half between posts and I’m halfway done with my sabbatical. Whoops.

Looking at my rough list of “to-dos” from my last post, I have gotten some things done:

Major tree and shrub removal: This one happened the very first day of my sabbatical and I wrote about it in my last post.

Replacing the last two sets of windows on the house: They look amazing! Was a much smoother and clean process than I was anticipating – kudos to the Pella Window crew! If I were more organized, I would have taken before and after photos. Whoops.

Constructing a garden shed: Well, we have the shed, obviously, but it’s been sitting in it’s boxes in the garage since I bought it. The plan is to have the location prepped before the 4th of July week (dug out, leveled, sand and pea rock laid down). Why that week? My sister is planning on coming up for a few days that week and she’s willing to help me put it up (weather permitting, more on that below).

Painting: HAH. Absolutely zero of that happened. 😦

Having my mom stay with me for a week: I went down to the farm on Mother’s Day and brought Mom back to my house. We had a great time – went shopping, talked a lot, and she spent a ton of time looking out the back windows on the yard and pond watching all the wildlife. Also, I watched more local news and Wheel of Fortune than I have in decades. 😀

Landscaping: I’ve been working on clearing out all the landscaping rock in the garden bed next to the garage SINCE MOTHER’S DAY. Why is it taking so long? Because to get the rock out, the ground has to be dry – so about two days after the last rain is ideal. Problem is there’s been only two or three days where those conditions have happened – otherwise it rains every other day, or in the case of the past week, it’s rained EVERY DAY. ARGH!

Once the rock is out, there’s a stump we need to dig out, but the soil can be damp when we tackle that, so it’s not as crucial to be dry for two days in a row. Then I’ll plant my hydrangeas and get some new edging and mulch down then that project will be DONE.

Electrical work: Still haven’t done this one.

Designing Tim’s studio space: Well, we had the plan, but then he was focusing on his illustration and comics work full-time for a month or so and in the interests of saving money, we put this project on pause. Plus, he has a desk at a local studio with other comic artists, so he’s been spending a lot of time there working so having a better space here wasn’t a necessity.

Dialing in my nutrition/exercise plan: HAH.

I’ll clarify: HAHAHAHAH.

In all seriousness, I’ve been doing really well at CrossFit. I did my first (half) Murph on Memorial Day in the 90+ degree heat and did a lot better than I expected. I’ve also been setting some PRs on my weight lifting (bench press, front squat, back squat, etc.) and now that summer is here, we’re doing more running, which has been great even though I’m the slowest one there.

Nutrition-wise, I haven’t done anything. I’m in a funk and my motivation and drive to make meaningful changes is at zero right now. Which results in me wrapping myself in a warm blanket of comfort foods and making bad choices. It’s times like this where I wish I had that friend that I could talk to when things are low. But, after being rejected by the last friend I trusted with my troubles, I don’t bother anyone with my business anymore. Which is fine – all you can really rely on is yourself, right? And I know what some of you are thinking: “get a therapist” – I’d censor myself there too because I don’t feel comfortable talking to a virtual stranger about those things. I’m sure it works for other people, but in my experience it wouldn’t help. Maybe I should get one of those old-fashioned paper journals where I can sort out my thoughts. 🤔

ANYHOO.

Back to the nutrition thing: I’m going to try and make small, incremental changes to my eating and drinking habits and hope that this gradual change is the key to success. Especially since the “RAWR NO EXCUSES” method that I’ve tried in the past fails miserably.

Still haven’t made any plans for a weekend trip, so that part probably won’t happen – but who knows.

Now if it would just stop raining!