End Of Life Care & Other Subjects

Memorial Day weekend….the official kickoff to summer…..the first of three big weekends of the summer. My refrigerator looks like I am having lots of company….when in actuality I am alone with the exception of Bella.  God Bless Bella!

Holidays are for families and couples…..definitely not for singles.  My mom used to make such a big deal out of all the major holidays.  The food she prepared was fit for royalty and enough to feed a third world country. My brother would show up only if he couldn’t come up with a previously used excuse which always broke my mom’s heart.  If it was just the three of us or sometimes we would have good friends join us or I would invite a friend who had no place to be, whatever the case….we had a good time.

There are times that I almost wish she hadn’t made such a big deal of holidays because now as Bella and I sit here by ourselves, the silence is deafening and the loneliness is ………well let’s just say one is the loneliest number that I ever heard.  Great song by Three Dog Night.

I went today to spend extra time with this elderly gentlemen at St. Anne’s.  He has no one. His daughter abandoned him and so he and I have become friends.  I go every Saturday to see him and about once a month or on special occasions I take him lunch. Today I took him lunch. We talked about how lonely holidays are and how we were glad we had each other.  He loves little Bella and she loves him.  I stayed longer than I usually do. We talk about Nascar and the weather and my job and he needles me about the man in my life who is off in Iowa rebuilding it after the tornadoes, one brick at a time.  He likes to tease me by saying he would “give my guy a run for his money” with me if he wasn’t confined to St. Anne’s.  Ya know….I think he would too!  For several hours there were two less lonely people in the world but they still weren’t fans of holidays.

Well this too shall pass and I can start emotionally preparing myself for the July 4th holiday……..oh joy! But I cannot end until I thank all the men and women in the armed forces who fight for our freedom and especially those who have given the ultimate sacrifice for all of us.

Until next time….

In the three plus years I have live at the current address, periodically there is a little Schnauzer that comes to visit me.  When I say comes to visit me, she lives across the cul-de-sac  from me.  She is let outside to do her business without benefit of a tether line or on a leash with owner present. I am not sure why she always finds her way to my condo unless she just knows that I will always help her out, but it is almost like she is lost. She shivers as she stands there.  When I pick her up she is just fine.

Each time she has come to my door, I have picked her up and taken her back to her owner who does not seem one bit concerned that someone else has her dog, in fact, she didn’t even know the dog was missing! My concerns with this whole scenario is first of all my condo backs up to where the coyotes habitat.  I pray for the bunnies, the squirrels and any other little critter that might wander into the path of the coyotes.  Even small dogs would make a good feast for a coyote.  I never let my dog out without a leash and me with her and we never wander too close to the woods.

The other concern I have for this little dog coming over to see me is she might get hit by a car.  Not everyone is as considerate of animals in the neighborhood as I am. I even brake for frogs and turtles that have wandered out of the creek and pond.

Is this woman stupid or does she just not give a damn about her little dog?  About a month ago the dog came over to our driveway and thank God my neighbor was paying attention and didn’t back out and hit the little dog. When the garage door was starting to close in ran the dog and I hear this scratching on my back door. Now think about this, had I not been home the little dog would have been trapped in the garage until my neighbor or I came home as we share the garage.  I picked up the dog and walked back over to her owners home and this time I decided to give her a few pearls of wisdom.

I started out with “did you know there is a leash law in Winnebago County?”  “Did you know there are coyotes roaming these grounds and they eat small animals?”  “Did you know I could report you to the County, and they would take your dog away from you until you went to court and proved to the judge why you should have the dog and then pay a fine?” Why did I get the feeling the dog was sad for me to leave it there?

It wasn’t three weeks later and here comes the dog again! I guess you just can’t fix stupid!!!  Here comes the lady and when she saw I had the dog she started to cry. I wasn’t very nice. The only thing that stopped me from taking the dog to the County was the fact that I didn’t want to think of how scared that dog would be in a strange place,  and in a cage. But on the other hand I don’t want to see that the dog has been attacked by the coyotes either….and it has happened with other dogs where I live. Can I take the woman and put her in a cage at the pound instead?? That’s a thought!

Stay tuned for the continuing saga of me and the schnauzer.

Hi readers,

I had an interesting happening this week that I would like to share. For the first time I was openly criticized on my Facebook page about what I have been posting.  As some of you know I have started drinking and selling Visalus.  Without going into a commercial in this post about Visalus, it is a very high vitamin/protein meal replacement drink.  Every morning since I started with this product I have posted which variety I made for myself and then once a week I would report any weight loss that I might have had as a result of drinking this for to meals a day. For me just to do that one step is a big deal for me because I am very sensitive about my weight.  It hasn’t been good for about twenty years and I am trying to change that along with helping my health.

Along with my Visalus postings, I also from time to time post little things that are currently making me quite happy. Yes the posts revolve around  a relationship I am  in that brings me great joy, and some of the posts revolve songs that make me feel good!

Someone who I have patronized her business for five or six years and thought we were friends besides, had the audacity to get on my Facebook page and tell me that they were sick and tired of hearing about what I ate every day and the weight I was losing along with my endearments regarding my relationship and the music that I like. She also told me she was going to unfriend me on Facebook. I truly was blown away that this person I called friend would  attack me in such a manner. Many times as she was doing my nails we shared sorrows in our life and troubles and problems.  I truly tried to be supportive of her and even when I moved away from her city, I still drove back there to get my nails done when needed. How dare she!

Ladies and gentlemen, it is your prerogative to delete posts of mine that you don’t like and you can even unfriend me and take me out of your contacts list for email.  That is totally your right.  But it is also my right to be able to write about whatever trips my trigger without your permission as you can without my permission.

Those who know me well know that my life has had little to cheer about in the last thirty years.  The last five or six years have been really hard and taken its toll on me.  Now that I have some happy and positive things happening in my life – I DARE YOU – yes I DARE YOU to rain on my parade.  I have worked hard top make those things happen. I chose to WANT to be happy and I am working diligently towards inner peace and happiness as a goal. With this being said…… I wish you all peace.

Until next time……….

It’s New Years eve, I am sipping on a sapphire martini  and blogging.  Sounds exciting doesn’t it? I have said it before and I will say it again holidays are for families and couples.  If you do not fit into one of these groups life can be challenging, depressing and lonely to name just a few.

I have found myself trying to invent new ways to spend each holiday. I have sworn off weddings, “showers”,  and any social activities that I even remotely feel awkward or out of place because I am solo.  People do not understand my thinking on this but it is much more comfortable for me to be home with my dog, Bella, and my laptop, than be the fifth person at a table for four. If one more person says to me “oh you won’t be alone, you will be with all of us”, they had better duck as I am going to come out swinging. They haven’t a clue how I feel! Usually the person who says this has never been alone a day in their life.  In most cases they have gone from kindergarten to marriage  and  in many cases from marriage number one to marriage number two and even more. These individuals would not begin to know what my life or anyone like me, is like. How I got to be still solo this late in my life is a whole other story.  In fact it is the subject of my first novel based on the events of my life, currently in the works.

In years past I have sat home, watched some television and gone to bed early to avoid  any self pity that could creep in. Sleeping is a great way to avoid life and any pain that life throws at you OR you allow it to throw at you.  Yes I know we allow ourselves to feel different emotions. We allow ourselves to be happy, sad, angry, depressed and any other emotion out there.  On the other hand we have the ability to stop any emotion.

I have spent most of my life in situations that were not in my comfort zone.  A great deal of my life has involved confrontation either between me and someone or refereeing confrontation between other people.   Just in the last six months I have made some life changing decisions regarding all of this.  The first and most important one is to live as peacefully within MY comfort zone as I possibly can.  This means not allowing others to force me out of my comfort zone or making me feel any emotion regarding myself that I don’t give myself permission to feel.  Only I can allow others to do that. I have spent most of my life allowing other people to make me feel less, not whole, inadequate and in some cases like I was a freak in a side show somewhere. If I do not allow them to make me feel angry, sad, inadequate or whatever, then I do not have to feel that.  I can feel any way I want to. That’s empowering!!!  If I want to stay home – guess what – I can!!! No one can make me feel bad for doing it either!

Yes you have guessed it….. that last paragraph is my New Years resolution.  I AM GOING TO STRIVE TO LIVE MY LIFE WITHIN MY COMFORT ZONE FEELING ONLY THE EMOTIONS THAT I ALLOW MY SELF TO FEEL!!! I am not going to allow anyone to make me feel about myself ANYTHING I don’t want to feel.  I strongly feel this will help me conquer my stress, achieve a goal or two and and help keep me on the path I need to be on to survive.

With that being said…….I wish you all a very Happy, Healthy New Year and a peaceful existence.