2001-07-08 - 1:04 a.m.
A muddled abbreviation of the past few days

Very little comment from me lately ... I've had much to do and discuss.

The 4th of July was a blast as always. I drove down on the 3rd and slept in my old bed, with the puppy on the floor near me and my cat at my feet. Ahhh, bliss. I woke early enough to spend a few hours reading and enjoying things before Mom could enlist me in her cooking efforts. After making enough smoked turkey, roast beef, baked potato salad, lemon pie, devilled eggs, baked beans, and pea salad to feed an army, we went and lounged around outside until five o'clock or so. Many poppers and various small fireworks were consumed during this period! *grin* Then the guests arrived, chaos was served, and we ate dinner and had conversation. Once this phase wrapped up it was beginning to get dark, and the real show began. Oooh. Ahhh. Spectacular, as usual.

I drove home late to prepare for the 5th; I had to work. Fortunately, my blessed boss let me take 3 hours vacation time in the morning for recuperation. I arrived tennish and went out house-measuring again until lunch. After grabbing a burger, I spent four hours putting the floorplans into the computer. Then I was dismissed an hour early, and rushed home to seize the weekend.

Argh. Friday was meant to be my day of do-nothing relaxation (Jocasta could not come this week) so I woke a bit later than usual, flipped some pancakes, and settled in at the computer. It was not to be. In between calls and surprise visits, I lost at least five hours of quality fun time. Ah well. Socialization is just as important, I guess. =)

And today ... Today I woke up earlier than I should have, dressed much too warmly, and drove down for my haircut appointment. Honestly, what was I thinking when I put on jeans and a black t-shirt? It's July. Oregon might still have crisp mornings and evenings this time of year, but we've hit the Dry Season, and that means almighty blazing afternoons. The heat was intense enough on the drive home around four this afternoon, that I nearly dozed off in my car. Damn Freon. I can't afford to refill it to get my AC working. It's rather scary being so hot and sweaty and unable to bring your body temperature down, that you nearly pass out, especially in a moving vehicle. I did roll the windows down, but it didn't help much.

*yawn* That's a factual summary, more or less.

Emotions? Thoughts? My mother told our hair stylist today that all I needed was a man in my life to round things off perfectly. Thanks, Mom. Then she read me the traditional lecture on how I'll never meet men if I don't find a good church in the area and start getting involved in activities. I think what brought this on is that the kids who were 8th graders in our youth group when I graduated high school, are starting to get married, one of them just last week; not to mention the older ones; most of them are now young community pillars, of course, heavily involved in the church and reproducing like mad. (This is what all the conversations on the 4th were about: several families in our church, all friends, catching up on gossip).

It isn't the right time for me. But nonetheless all these engagements and weddings and births and otherwise occupied happy couples make me feel sometimes as though I'm only half a person. It's not true, really, I know that; but it still saps at my self-esteem. I feel like some of my nerve-endings have come loose and are dangling in the wind; a constant ache I can't attend to.

Good little Christian girls are supposed to pray to God and look up to their daddies, and feel fulfilled until the certain day the Right Man leads them to the altar.

I wish it were that easy.