"Mr. Attractive" comes back in the morning to make another mess fixing the plumbing in my ceiling. Oh joy! I'm ready to kick him out before he ever enters the house! Time to run and hide.

Premonitions?

I haven't decided whether I believe in ESP/premonitions. I do know months before the deaths of people who are close to me, I often start having "death dreams".  In my family, every major event (wedding, death etc) was followed with a get-together at my grandma's.  My death dreams usually are in the setting of her home, with dishes of food set up on the table along with paper plates and the usual "easy clean up" items.  The most recent years, the dreams obviously have more deceased persons as featured persons, since my parents, both sets of grandparents, my sister, and other close relatives are deceased.  Before my sister died I started having dreams about grandma. At the time I thought I was just missing grandma who died in 2000.  But, the phone call came about my sister's sudden death. Weeks later, I remembered the "death dreams" and realized they stopped right after I heard about my sister.

Then I started dreaming again recently, about mom, my sister and grandma. Today I learned another close relative died. 

I once knew an old professor emeritus who I was close to emotionally.  I spoke to him on the phone one night and he sounded so very tired. Two nights later I had this strange dream that he called me on the phone (never in real life) and began saying "I'm sorry I had to leave".  As he spoke, his voice got lower and became very garbled, until I couldn't understand, then I couldn't hear him anymore. It felt so bad I immediately woke up; it was 4 a.m.  Within 24 hours I learned he had died that night, right around 4 a.m. 

I never feel I can talk to anyone about my death dreams. Sound too weird. Sound too sad.  No one knows what to say. No one knows whether ESP or premonitions are real. So instead of being open to the idea, they're more likely just to think I'm nuts.

Based on personal experience, I'd say ESP and premonitions *are* real. 

 

A Year Isn't so Long

I'm not one to make New Year's Resolutions. Years just don't start off like that for me. I have hopes and plans of what I'd like my year to be, things I want to accomplish. But sometimes, a year can turn into something you never expected. 

This year has been a very bad year. The worst fear I had: losing my apartment. Why the fear: I've become disabled and know I couldn't physically do moving and packing. My sister was very afraid for me too. The worst thing that happened this year: My sister died unexpectedly, mostly because doctors ignored her complaints of symptoms. 

I've had many other deaths in my life: my parents when I was a teen; my grandparents who I had lived with for 3 years after my parents died; a wise old professor emeritus who befriended me years ago; friends who moved; pets who died.  My grandmother was the matriarch of the family.  She died in 2000. But, my sister - my sister wasn't supposed to be in this list - not yet.

There were bad things that happened before her death, and other things since her death; seems like there's barely time to catch my breath in-between.

A year isn't so long, unless it's been a bad year.

Does a journal talk back?

Anyone who has kept a journal knows somedays you gotta wonder "why am I doing this?"  Why am I talking to myself here? I could go on and on one day, but, why am I doing it? 

Over time, if you give it enough time, you learn journals "talk".  (No, I don't mean to lonely, or is that loony, people!)  Writing answers your own questions, gives you solutions you hadn't thought of 'consciously' (eh, 'conscious', what is THAT anyway, LOL). Problem is, you can't push it, you cannot 'make' your journal speak to you.  Writing out thoughts and problems gives you a new perspective.

Sometimes you won't like your journal's perspective though.

 

The Sky is Falling! The Sky is Falling!

Henny Penny warned us all years ago: "The Sky is Falling!"  Used in every metaphor from space debris to stock market dips/slumps, there's no truer realistic use of this phrase than to allow a plumber into your house. An attractive man with a shiny bald head, he gives no warning before producing a saw with a 4 inch blade and promptly cuts a hole in your dining room ceiling! Plaster falling! Wood splintering! Debris as large as rocks, and as small as pulverized dust spread across the floor in every direction. Yes indeed the sky is falling! What a mess. Added to the insult and assault, this attractive man didn't put down tarp or plastic!! What was he thinking!!!! (or NOT thinking?)  Men, plumbers, yes, they must have listened to the child's story as a kid and taken it literally! "When I grow up, I want to be a plumber so I can make the "sky" really fall - eh eh eh" My only consolation today, watching the man scurry very fast back to his truck, was seeing how the pulverized dust coated his once shiny head, covered the collar of his blue shirt right up to his scrawny neck. I giggled thinking how much that dust would itch for the rest of his day!  Still, he had his revenge, the laugh was still on me, as I returned to the disaster he had calmly made, then left behind.

Relaxing Deceptions - part 3

 I think the deception-becoming-obsession of these "games" is why I always liked my small box of crayons the best. You knew where you stood with crayons. You knew all the greenish colors would be grouped with greens, all the pink shades with pinks next door to all the reddish ones lined up with only reds. The blues lived with blues, and whether bright or dull you'd find all the yellows together. And oranges were always next to the yellow group. There were only those very few that didn't seem to have a true "home" in there (at least in my understanding), those being gold, silver, and white. But their places always seemed quite moveable, without any skill needed, no hours spent in "trying" to get them into a certain spot, no obsession to take over either. You knew you could dump the whole box on the floor, but not have any trouble putting them back in their groups, too. You knew crayons looked better unused and with their wrappers left un-torn. You knew if you decided to taste one (one you didn't use much), that crayons would always taste like wax. You knew they'd break if you stepped or sat on them. You knew they always "worked right" whether it was a sunny or rainy day, and without one second of ever having to hold your breath!             

After the year I've had this year, I need a box of trusty crayons. No more snow globes with fake-flecks, no more silver-beads from 5-cent gum ball machines.  No more Pick-Up-Sticks that have pointy sharp ends that hurt! And no more "House of Cards" that WILL fall.  I just want to sprawl on the floor on my belly with a big blank sheet where MY creation will begin with one small crayon, building, stretching across the paper in whatever direction I want. I need a box of crayons!

 

 

Relaxing Deceptions - part two

This might have been when I arrived at the age of Pick-Up-Sticks. Remember those? A brightly colored tall can held a few dozen fat tooth-pick like sticks, except they were very long sticks, a fat group that easily filled a child's hand.They used to be wood sticks, but now they are made of plastic. We always played on the floor, standing tall with raised hand to dump them out. Starting as a group they'd fall into immediate chaos, most landing in a zig-zag pile, others laying singly. Then, carefully, we'd try our "skill" at using one stick to ever  slowly, so slowly, move another stick out away from the others, but without moving anything else! We'd hold our breath, so air wouldn't make others "accidentally" move. And when they did, as most times they would, the player would even yell "that was an accident!"  The truth was though, it was next to impossible to NOT have another stick move, stuck in that imbroglio as they were! But, how could we kids know that fact! No, the "game" became an obsession, trying with all our might to now make these items NOT move, or at least make them move HOW we wanted them to move (while NOT moving any others!). It wasn't an accident that we couldn't do it; the obsession to try was because we couldn't make those damn sticks do what we wanted.  And because we couldn't win!                

Pick-Up-Sticks is like the old game "House of Cards".  But, I think the card name is more HONEST!  You know by the name what will win! You already KNOW that the cards WILL move, no matter how steady you make your hand or how you brace it. The house WILL sway when only one-story high, it WILL fall no matter how hard you held your breath!  It WON'T be a sturdy house, it WON'T let you add new "rooms" or "floors", and it WON'T be any different when it falls than those fake-flakes on Santa's shoulders, the silvery-beads to fill eyes, or the jumbled mess of Pick-Up-Sticks after falling from a 3 foot tall person.    [continued next entry]      

 

 

Relaxing Obsessions

Snow Globes, Pick-Up-Sticks, and Crayons -1st entry in 3 parts

Snow globes are meant to be ever-so peaceful. The flakes and flecks float, dance, mingle, fall, ever-falling. Such a gentle nudge can start the dance all over again, falling, falling, down, down. It's deceiving though. What looks at a glance as so peaceful, relaxing, can lead to obsession!  The first snow globe I had was of Santa with his sleigh (I still have it, the fluid long ago leaked out). It has a white covered little brush-looking thing meant to be a snow-covered tree near Santa's sleigh. I turned that globe upside down or shook it, watching the flakes fall.  They would fall on the tree and sleigh in a heap. Upside down, sh-ake again. They would cover Santa's head and shoulders. Shh-ake again, they would fall helter-skelter everywhere.  I'd spend hours trying to get the flecks to fall where I wanted them to go. I finally realized I had no control where those fake-flakes landed, or how few, how many landed where. But the obsession to try had already consumed hours.          Snow globes are like those bead-face cards you got from pin-ball machines. Enclosed in plastic, with a pre-drawn figure on a card-board backing, there'd be 4-8 beads you'd have to try to make fill in little holes for eyes, nose, mouth...maybe a ball on the end of their hat (or tail if it was an animal figure). Slowly, ever so slowly, you'd tilt that card, this way and that, trying to get each ball into its spot. Slowly, oh yes, ever so slowly, the obsession begins. Just like snow globes. And maybe with skill, but more luck, you get those dumb balls to all stay in their little holes all at the same time!     [continued next entry]