I am in a slump.
This means that my dogs are not brushed. Crumbs and fuzz-balls adorn the edges of my kitchen floor. My refrigerator overflows with Romaine that has passed its freshness date. A couple of days ago, I threw out about three pounds of raw broccoli that turned yellow and squishy because nobody ever ate it. The kitchen table is littered with mail, crafts, study materials and small electronics. None of these are mine, except possibly a few coupons. Do you know that I actually rejoice when coupons expire so I can throw them away?
I walk into a room. Look. Sigh. Walk away.
Hoodies, dress shirts, baseball caps, sunglasses ooze up in piles from chairs, desks, counters. Speaking of counters, the countertop in front of the toaster oven is always sticky these days. I do wipe it down. I think. Unless I am only doing it in my imagination. That's possible.
I need to vacuum.
I did clean the bathrooms the other day. Then the medicine cabinet fell off the wall. In the boys' bathroom, that is. I wonder if I should call someone, or if Shawn will be able to get to it between business trips. Laura will soon arrive home from college. She will not be pleased if there is no medicine cabinet (read: no mirror) on the wall over her bathroom sink.
I just feel sad all the time. I don't even know why, particularly. Sad and tired with a headache, and slightly sick to my stomach.
My perennials are overtaken with weeds. And I have zero motivation to do anything about it. I think I wish someone would come and mow them all under and just plant grass.
There is fungus growing on the handrail of the steps up to the pool.
Our screens are not yet back on the windows. I should hose them off. Last week was cold and rainy, so I was unmotivated. It wasn't weather to open one's windows to, anyway.
For dinner, I usually come up with something, but often it is bad. I made something the other day that I could barely choke down. It was vaguely like chili, but watery and tasteless. One of my boys said, "This tastes like homemade soup when I have it at other people's houses." I think he was trying to be nice. I laughed while trying to swallow. (This is a post I will not be linking to Facebook.)
Mostly I have been cooking chicken with rice, varying the seasonings and vegetables. The other night I made a version with chicken, rice, broccoli and Parmesan cheese (this was some broccoli that had not yet gone bad before I found it). It was a big hit, but I couldn't eat it because I am allergic to broccoli. I had toast.
Each morning, I get up and make Jon's coffee and send him off to school. Then I go back to bed. I get back up almost in time for whatever appointments or obligations I have, and I usually arrive late, unless it is Wegman's and there is no set time-frame. I do some laundry, wash the dishes everyone else has left for me, read a little (I'm back to reading through the Bible, and I am just starting the parts about King Solomon's reign), maybe walk a dog if the weather is decent. By then Jon is home from school needing snacks and rides to places. By the time I finish carting him around, there is limited time to throw together some chicken and rice... which gets eaten over a long span of evening as different people come home at different times. There have been days when I've washed supper dishes three times.
Sometimes I sit on the sofa and watch Star Trek TNG with Shawn, drinking decaf Earl Grey and eating dark chocolate, waiting for the last boy to come home and eat his dinner so I can finish cleaning up.
After the tea and TV have lulled me into a sleepy state, I realize that I need to wash yet a few more pots, cajole Jon into taking his shower, and let the dogs out one last time before bed. By now it is usually 11, and my final tasks, including my own bedtime routine, always seem to keep me up until midnight. I get excited for every single minute I achieve before midnight. Even getting to bed at 11:59 feels like a major victory. I wonder how I can stay up so late and get so little done.
When my alarm goes off at 6:30, I start all over. It is easier to drag oneself out of bed when one plans to return shortly. On days when I have no obligation, I sometimes sleep until 9:30.
I don't care. I am tired.
I am in a slump.
I never feel good. But lately I have felt worse. Does anybody else ever feel this way?
I read on another blog something about, "Today I will transfigure all things into beauty," and I just want to weep.
5 comments:
"Does anybody else ever feel this way?"
I do, Ruth. Same slump, same sadness. Same going back to bed after I get the big kids to school and I turn on PBS Kids for the little kids. I am so tired all the time.
From your description, I would have thought we live in the same house, too. However, it was not the medicine cabinet that fell off the wall here but the towel bar. I threw it in the back of the cabinet and tried to forget about it. I didn't even think of mentioning it to my husband because he has 1001 home improvement projects to do and we are supposed to put our house on the market this summer.
I hope it makes you feel a little, tiny bit better that someone else is going through something similar. I wouldn't wish for either of us to be so sad so much of the time but it is good to know that someone out there understands.
Thanks for relating, Hope.
I'm trying to dig out.
Yesterday my husband fixed the medicine cabinet and put the screens on the windows. I washed the kitchen floor. I took everything out of the kitchen, vacuumed the loose stuff, used my new Swiffer TWICE... and the second time, the pad got just as black as it had been the first time. So then I got a bucket of hot water and some rags (figured there was enough chemical on the floor from the Swiffer jets), and did the whole thing on my hands and knees the proper way. Finally got it clean.
Today my back is sore again.
I need to garden, but that is so hard on my back. I think maybe I will try to get my husband to take me for a nice Mothers' Day walk at the nature preserve.
And the weeds will live on.
I think it would help if I could embrace who I am, instead of always feeling that I ought to be somebody different, somebody organized and capable and capable of transforming my home into a place of beauty.
Is it the weather? The time of year?? I don't know but I do know exactly what your talking about...the feeling...I'v actually flirted with the "D" word, depression, lately.
I am wrestling with some co-workers and other work related issues at work..the biggest issues I've had to deal with to this point in my working career. It's been overwhelming and has interfered with my whole life, my every waking moment and even many of my sleeping moments as well. God is so good in showing me the way, bringing new ideas, helping me to see things more clearly, calming me, taking away the anger helping me to focus on love, "Love one another as I have loved you" in so many different ways that that one thing -Love one another-has become so prevalent.
But....I'm tired, and so weary of the worry, contemplation, and focus on unhappy things.
I put a bird nest on my deck and love the birds when they come in. I haven't always "loved" the birds but this year they have my full attention and I have taken many pictures. My camera stays on my couch which is right in front of the window that overlooks the bird feeder. We also have a feeder hanging on a tree where this year a rabbit has come to eat the seeds that have dropped to the ground as well as a pair of ducks. I have sat outside under my deck, close to this tree in my deck chair with them. We sometimes look at each other but most of the time just enjoy the outside space together. These animals bring such joy and smiles that I wonder what's wrong with me that the sight of a bird, duck, or rabbit can cause such happiness.
Life and it's issues are overwhelming and my ability to focus on many different things has dramatically decreased over the past months. One thing I am sure of though and am very clear on is that God is here, with me, with us and he is so good! I see his work in my life so clearly and hear him as he talks and leads me. What a precious gift that is .... one that I don't and never want to take for granted.
~Shari
Ugh, you are not alone. This describes me a LOT of the time. No reason for the sadness, the unmotivatedness, the mess... it's just too much. But in the end, the jobs that need to get done WILL get done, eventually, even if not as *timely* as we feel it ought to be.
And get those kids to wash their own bloody dishes! :D
I had written a heartfelt reply to you folks... and then when I went to post it, it vanished. It was one of those things with so much emotion in it, I just could not bring myself to try to write it over again. So suffice it to say: thanks for commenting. I appreciate you.
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