Sitting on the Pity Potty

That's what my Mom called it, when I would feel sorry for myself, especially and usually when she didn't feel it was warranted. Feelings were generally discouraged in our house, and in her house before us, and so on, down a long line of uptight, do-right, soldier-through Scandanavians and Puritan Europeans. As an adult free to do as I please, I typically alternate between the extremes of being completely disconnected and distanced from my intense emotions, and overwhelmed by them. I wasn't given the proper tools to learn how to cultivate my overactive imagination and rich, melodramatic feelings into healthy growth that I can experience daily without being blown over. What, you ask, brings up these musings? Well, it hasn't exactly been the best of weeks. Good old IRS man got back to us and informed us that to settle our audit, we'll owe the bastards $2400 in back taxes, penalties, and interest. Worse, I fell dramatically on Monday and injured some ligaments and other tender stuff in my foot and ankle (soft tissue damage, they call it, when they don't think anything is broken). Clumsy since the day I was born, my gracelessness produces ever more drastic results as my body ages. I've missed work, I've been on painkillers, and I'm wearing an aircast, one of those funky plastic boots with pumped up air cushions to isolate and support. Notice how the bluish tones above the ankle give way to putrid green on the foot, and if you look really closely, you can see the purple where the blood pooled by my third and fourth toes. Not sure when I'll be able to wear a shoe again. Sexy, eh?

I'm sad that Husby is leaving for Germany in three days, and I'm frustrated that yet again, we are having difficulty coordinating our schedules so that we'll be able to take time off together sometime this year. Meanwhile, good things are happening as well. I've started organizing my files for the second edition of the dog book, giving myself oodles of time to update the book so that it's a fun, easier process than the drastic, life-altering course of the first edition. I've also received the first draft of a manuscript and a contract from my sister-in-law to begin work on co-authoring and editing a book project based on her broken marriage to a pathological liar. I've been able to get my office arranged so that I can focus more time and energy on my talents of writing and photography, making them profitable for my little family unit. It's time we had it a little easier. Time for me to act to make that happen.