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December 26, 2005
:Shhh…Selena is Hibernating:
Christmas was lovely but outside of that it has been a difficult time, at least writing-wise.
I am very discouraged with the whole writing thing. Sometimes I think that I am coming out of it, but then it hits me all over again. I hope though that I am slowly walking my way back from being fed up with writing and other writing-related activities.
Even at my most upset I knew I shouldn’t stop writing and break all writing ties just because of a couple disappointments. But that was exactly what I felt like doing. I just wanted to walk away and be done with the whole da** thing. I am glad though that so far I haven’t succumbed to the urge to throw the baby out with the bath water.
Instead I have resolved to keep writing but perhaps write only for myself for a while – i.e. not submit anything, hardly post to my blog, etc. That way I hope to regain my love of writing.
So, if you don't see me around cyberspace and you’re wondering where I am (not that you would necessarily notice or care), know that I am not gone; I am just hibernating. Maybe I’ll see you in the spring. Maybe in the new year. Only God knows.
… Quotes to walk by…
A few meditations from Morning Notes have been much in my mind this last week or so.
This quote helped me realize that I depend on other people too much, rely too heavily on them behaving/reacting in the way I want them to:
"If I don’t need anything from you, I am free to think of you in peace. The moment I want something from another person, my happiness is compromised."
This quote reminded me that God didn’t put other people in the world to meet my needs and expectations:
"No one owes me anything. No one is obliged to meet my needs. People are people. They are not sexual experiences or career support or a series of well-wishers on my daily rounds."
God put all those other people here for His own reasons, reasons that have nothing to do with me.
Plus all these other people have their own concerns, problems, passions and interests. Their lives aren’t about me. And their lives shouldn’t be.
I don’t even know why the whole thing upset me so much. Even in the moment, I knew my reaction was out of proportion. But I still haven’t been able to shake it off.
So I am keeping to myself for a while and reminding myself not to let my happiness depend on what other people do or don’t do. I am focusing on the above quotes as well as these: "What another person does has no fixed meaning. I interpret behavior as I choose. What do I want it to mean? I perceive others through either my moods or my peace."
And this from today's meditation:
“Repeatedly assessing past performance is failure to concentrate on what can be done now. Today, each time I feel even a slight stab of defeat or disappointment, I will be still and remember that God is not mistaken in loving me."
Now, that is a hopeful thought!
Posted by Selena at 07:40 PM | Comments (0)
December 21, 2005
Quote of the Day/Today’s Meditation
Today’s meditation, again from “Morning Notes: 365 Meditations to Wake You Up" by Hugh Prather:
"I will give peace with my thoughts and cause no harm with my words.
We enter the awareness of many people in the course of the day. With each encounter there is a little exchange, and we leave something behind. This trail, and not our individual accomplishments, is our legacy to the world. At the end of my life, what tracks do I want to look back and see?"
Yeah, I know. I am working on that. That is in fact part of why I have so little to say of late.
Posted by Selena at 08:32 AM | Comments (0)
December 19, 2005
Quote of the Day
Today's quote is
I am with you now"
Believe it or not, that’s from the song “Hand Me Down" by Rob Thomas of Matchbox Twenty.
Posted by Selena at 08:32 PM | Comments (0)
December 18, 2005
Quote of the Day
I have been reading “Morning Notes: 365 Meditations to Wake You Up" by Hugh Prather. It is very good and has been helpful to me.
Today’s meditation is something I have long struggled with:
"If I don’t need anything from you, I am free to think of you in peace.
The moment I want something from another person, my happiness is compromised. Each time I try to influence someone, I set myself up as a victim, because it’s impossible to get perfect cooperation from anyone. Today I will observe that I survive just fine without my expectations being met or my demands obeyed. In fact, in letting go, I am left with the peace that is already mine."
It is hard to live without expectations, not wanting or needing anything from other people. But I keep trying.
I try to remember that people are people and they will sometimes disappoint (just as I often disappoint), but that God is God and God never falls short or gets distracted. He always has my best interests at heart and my needs well in hand, whether I see it or not.
Posted by Selena at 08:46 AM | Comments (0)
December 15, 2005
Wasted Day
I wasted the day away. I spent it either sleeping or staring at my computer, clicking at random, checking the same websites over and over again.
I just haven’t had the energy to do much of anything lately. It’s bad. I need to snap out of it.
:Selena stops to check the actual data:
But wait, as I look back over my day with a more objective eye, I remember that I ran errands, got groceries, got the Christmas tree, decorated the tree, and did a few other things.
OK, so I didn’t get as much done as I would have liked, but it wasn’t a wasted day. I did get some things done. Plus I spent time with my family and even watched half of my favorite Christmas special – “The Year Without a Santa Claus", the one with Cold Miser and Heat Miser in it. (Love it!)
Suddenly, I feel energetic again. Funny how that works.
Posted by Selena at 08:29 PM | Comments (0)
Hooked on Lost
I have become hooked on the TV show “Lost."
I didn’t watch it at all during its first season. I swear I thought it was reality TV until I happened to see Mira Furlan’s face in an episode as I was switching channels.
Then shortly before the second season, hubby bought the DVD set of the first season. We watched the entire season in a ridiculously short span of time. But sadly we didn’t finish it before the second season started.
We didn’t want to watch them out of order, so we decided to wait until the reruns of season two before watching again. Then a friend told me you could download the episodes via I-Tunes for about $2 a pop. Yee-haw!
We downloaded and watched the nine season-two episodes in a matter of days. We watched the last one (“What Kate Did") Tuesday night, thinking “This is great! We are caught up. We can start watching them live tomorrow."
Wednesday at 9pm rolled around. I was so excited to finally be up-to-date and watching “Lost" live as it airs. But then none of the “previously on" scenes were from the last episode. I started to get that bad feeling. Then the episode began, and yes of course I had seen this scene. It quickly became clear that this was a repeat.
I was so disappointed.
I got on the web to try to find out when the next new episode airs and I couldn’t find it anywhere.
Uggh. No “Battlestar Galatica" (until January), no “Lost" (until ?), no “Firefly." What’s a girl supposed to do? There is truly nothing worth watching on TV right now. Well, except for maybe Rick Springfield’s return to “General Hospital." Now that is must-see TV for an 80’s girl like me!
Posted by Selena at 03:52 PM | Comments (0)
December 09, 2005
Column’s Up
My latest column is up.
You can check it out at here.
It was the last one I had in the queue so I guess I better finish and submit the one I have been working on.
Posted by Selena at 04:35 PM | Comments (0)
December 08, 2005
Quote of the Day/Tea
“For best results – drink more tea."
Of course, this was on a sign at Teaism. (They make good chai.) The sign fits both the place and my life.
I would estimate that right now I have about ten different kinds of tea in my pantry. And that’s only if you don’t count the kinds I only have one teabag of. There is a whole cup of assorted, random tea bags next to the various boxes of tea. And I would have more, but I am trying to cut back. ;) My shopping list has several more types of tea that I am currently out of but I am trying to wait until there is more room on the shelf before buying them.
Now sipping: Celestial Seasonings Decaf Mandarin Orchard Green Tea (hot). Yum.
Posted by Selena at 07:55 PM | Comments (0)
December 06, 2005
Mac Love
A while back my husband needed a new laptop and decided to get a Mac instead of a PC. Soon after, he began going on incessantly about how much better Macs are. I would roll my eyes and mutter versions of “OK, honey, that’s great" and “Whatever you say, dear."
Then my laptop started to go. Truth be told, the poor thing is very old. The hinge is so busted up that I started leaving it in the open position because whenever I tried to open or close it little pieces would fall off.
So, hubby started talking about how he was going to get me a Mac PowerBook for Christmas. When I told this to a colleague at work the response was, “Oh, he must love you very much." My response: Yeah, OK, whatever. Who knew love was measured in Macs?! (Work colleague is a Mac Lover in case you couldn’t tell.)
Anyway, I needed a new laptop sooner than expected, so I got an early Christmas present – a very lovely, very fast, more-memory-than-I-could-ever-possibly use, Mac PowerBook G4.
For the first day or so, I was stressed out and overwhelmed by the change-over: getting used to the Mac way, figuring out how to sync it with my Pocket PC, that kind of thing.
But now…I am feeling the Mac Love.
:)
Posted by Selena at 09:22 PM | Comments (0)
December 05, 2005
First Bad Review
I just got my first bad review. It is kind of exciting.
It is of “The Gribbit" and it is at Tangent Online.
It’s actually my first review of any kind.
Bad review or good review, it’s still pretty cool.
Posted by Selena at 09:32 PM | Comments (2)
Too Tired
I was so asleep this morning I nearly stabbed the wrong cat.
Seriously.
I got up at 7am as usual, fed the cats then got out the insulin and syringes to give Charlie his morning shot. I filled the syringe and knelt down to stab the cat. I was petting the cat in preparation for the pinching of skin that precedes the shot then I looked down and saw that the fur was white-grey instead of black. I realized I had the wrong cat. So I moved over and gave the shot to the diabetic cat (Charlie) instead of poor, fat, but not diabetic Kathryn.
Goodness what an awful mishap that would have been! I am a bit startled and terrified at how close I came to giving an insulin shot to the wrong cat.
Let that be a lesson to you - beware of sleepy people wielding syringes.
And make sure you are fully awake before administering medications.
Posted by Selena at 09:12 PM | Comments (0)
December 04, 2005
Winter Isn’t My Season
There is an Anna Nalick lyric: "Winter just wasn’t my season." It hit home because winter has never been my season.
I hate the cold. Cold weather makes me want to hibernate, do nothing but lie in bed under a stack of quilts and sleep until spring. Too bad that is not really an option.
It is barely December and already it seems like my energy level is failing and all I want to do is sleep. At first I thought maybe I was sick, coming down with the flu or something. But then I remembered. Suddenly it all made sense. It is too cold to do anything, go anywhere.
As much as I want to hibernate, that is probably not the best thing for me. I need to start writing again; I have hardly done anything since I finished NaNo. I need to write a new column; I only have one left in the queue. I need to exercise so that when I have my cholesterol checked again in January it won’t still be too high.
How am I going to do any of that when they are predicting snow for tomorrow?
By sheer force of will and grace of God, I guess.
Posted by Selena at 09:11 PM | Comments (1)