I hate being sick!

I hate being sick. For the past month I have been battling horrible respiratory sinus stuff. From the top of my head to my stomach, I felt like if someone just ran me over with a bus I would feel better. And yes, when I get sick I turn in to a big baby. I want to lie on the couch and have people take care of me. I want people to feel sorry for me. I want people to go “awe poor baby you’re sick.” But to be honest, nobody really cares when you’re just sick, not in the hospital horrible sick, but just feeling cruddy sick. Your close friends and family take a more than mild interest in the fact that you are sick, asking you how you are doing, telling you to go o the doctor, but overall the world does not care.
I took a few days off to stay home and be sick. Also, I think that my coworkers were beginning to be afraid that I was another Typhoid Mary. Although, well intentioned for my welfare, I received comments like, “wow, I could hear you coughing all the way down in my office”, or “man, you look horrible, should you really be here today?” So that brings me to why people don’t care that you are sick.

So there I was laden down with wonderful drugs, my head no longer feels like it is going to explode, I can actually take a breath without thinking my lungs were going to rip out of my chest and I can finally get some rest. I lie down in my nice soft bed taking Nyquil during the day and am finally dozing off into dreamland, when… the phone rings. No, I don’t have any donations to put out on my porch, thank you for calling. Okay, eyes closing again and… the phone rings, yes I am happy with my phone service, except right now I plan to just rip it out of the wall. Thank you so much, but as of right now, please cancel my phone service so I can get some rest!! Back asleep, doorbell rings. Ignore it. Dogs bark, doorbell rings again, dog barks. Sigh. Get up and go to the door taking my ferocious looking but quite the teddy bear dog with me. A nice looking gentleman was at the door asking if I needed lawn service. He was doing several lawns in the neighborhood and would like to do mine as well. No, thank you I tell him, I have a son and a husband who keep up with all that. At that point I give up and decide to watch a movie. Funny, the phone never rings again. Is it really this busy when no one is home?





Then there are my dogs. They are spoiled rotten, indoor, lay on the bed, have to be petted constantly dogs. The big one, Boomer, tends to be a bit more skittish. I’m guessing since he is somewhat of a German Shepherd that he has that guard dog mentality. The small one, Charlie, doesn’t care what is going on. Most of the time when I am home, he is laying on his back completely passed out on the couch, he couldn’t care less what was going on. So Boomer is watching for everything that is going on. He looks out the front window, and growls at whatever is out there. He jumps up on the bed so he can look out. He growls at the birds, rabbits, wind, dust, I have no idea, he just doesn’t like whatever has come in to his backyard. So now, he wants to go out. I tried to reason with him (if you haven’t noticed in my blogs, but I am always trying to reason with Boomer, he just doesn’t listen) and tell him that I am sick, but he doesn’t care. He goes to the backdoor, then back to my bedroom, then back to the door. I finally get up and let him out and he goes tearing towards the back fence barking his fool head off. I go back to bed. Then I hear him barking at the door. He wants to come back in so he can take care of me. I ignore him. He continues to whine. Then he goes to my bedroom window, and stares at me. If I continue to ignore him, he barks and stares. All the while he has this stupid grin on his face saying, “hey look mom, I’m keeping you safe! I’m a happy dog!”. So I get up and let him back in, just so he can go on guard duty again.

Then there is my awesome family. They try so hard when I am sick. My wonderful husband tells me not to worry about anything, that he and kids will “hold down the fort”. I settle back down in to my bed trying to get some sleep, when I hear a light little knock at my door. “Mommy? I am so sorry to bother you when you’re sick.” Followed by shoulder patting by young girl. “Mommy? Do you know where my other soccer sock is? I don’t remember where I left it. No, don’t get up, I just need to know where it is.” Get up, help young child search for lost sock so she can get to soccer practice. Lay back down to go back to sleep. Light knocking on the door. “Hon? Where is soccer practice today? Are they at the usual place? Sorry to bother you, go back to sleep.” At this point, I’m thinking what’s the point. So let’s try this again. Young daughter and husband have left for soccer practice, going to sleep now. No knock, just door coming open with bright light behind it and older child coming in. “Hey mom? You asleep? Mom? Uh yeah, when’s dinner? Can I get a snack and play on the computer until dad gets home?” I’m thinking, “If you go away, I will let you eat all the junk food you want and juggle knives.” My family tries hard and they do care that I am sick, but life must continue on. I have come to realize that moms, while they get sick, have an internal thing going on that says, the world will not rotate unless I am up taking care of my family.

I finally get better enough to drag myself back to work. I work with a great group of people who came in to say they are so glad that I am back. They are genuine people and I know that they are really glad that I am feeling better. But I walk in to my office and my desk is covered with all sorts of stuff. My boss comes in and says he is glad I feel better, but he didn’t know what to do with some stuff so he put in on my desk. I look through my pile of junk and realize that I don’t think it is worth getting sick. I put in a half a day and decide it was really not worth coming in and looking at the piles and getting depressed. So I tell my boss that I am going to go home and take a nap. He says he was glad that I got to come in for a little while (actually he is probably thinking, wow I’m glad I didn’t have to start digging in to that stuff) and not to worry about anything (because we will just leave it sitting there until you get back). I go back home to the barking dog, the ringing phone and soon the needy children.

But when I think about it, maybe that is there way of saying that I am missed and cared for. I am beginning to realize that people do care (except for maybe the ringing phone people). The dog is all agitated because he knows he has to keep me safe in my weakened state. The family needs me and loves me and they do feel sorry for me. Just another month in my never dull always something life.

My Life

Okay, so my New Year’s life change to write my blog weekly has completely gone by the wayside. There are more than several reasons for that. Mainly writer’s block. I THINK about writing a blog, but then something else comes up. Maybe I’m just way over busy. Anyway you look at it, this idea certainly needs improvement. Thanks to Sheri for hounding me as often as she does. Maybe I’m just the world’s best procrastinator. Hm.. I wonder if there is a competition for that. I’ll have to think about looking in to that someday. So what has caught my attention more than writing my blog in which I know my few readers are on the edge of their seat waiting for a new edition? Life. Plain and simple, it’s the scourge of America. The over scheduled, over worked, my family must do everything and if they don’t then their whole lives will collapse in to one big bowl of jello!! Ooh jello. Oh sorry, back to the subject.

So what has caught my attention? Hm.. Let’s see. First, I changed jobs at the University in January. I actually found out the day before we went on break in December, but with the holiday and the timing of things that are due at my old job, I didn’t move over here until the end of January. So now I am a professional grant writer. Sounds rather impressive if I don’t say so myself. Oh, I just said so. I now spend my days researching companies, writing up summaries on prospective funders, writing grants, tracking trends. It’s actually quite a lot of fun. But it is also something completely different than what I had been doing. That takes some getting used to. Instead of daily deadlines and things, I now have long term deadlines and goals. Makes for a complete mental mind shift. But I am enjoying seeing myself grow and learn. I am also the volunteer treasurer of a nonprofit here in town. Why, I ever said I would do that, is way beyond me. I guess I am just gullible enough to go, why yes, I would be happy to help you, and stress myself out and stay up late at night trying to get your books in order, and stress about getting your bills paid. Oh sorry off the subject. I think one of my new life changing goals should have been to learn to say the word “no”. But I am helping a great organization and that should be a reward in itself, right? Yes, this goes against my life goal of spending more time with my family. But with the support of another friend of mine who has vowed to start doing less and spending more time with family, I am hoping to learn that I can’t save the whole world.

Let’s see… what else. Oh yes. My children. If ever there was an attention grabber it would be them. Or their overscheduled lives. Our evenings for my son have been filled with basketball practice, games all weekend, piano lessons, band competitions, and so forth. Thankfully basketball is now over, but we have started spring football just in time to take its place. My daughter is taking tumbling (gymnastics) but that is in the afternoons, piano lessons and now soccer season has started. Mom’s taxi takes on a whole new meaning when you spend your evenings picking up one child from afterschool and dropping them off at piano lessons, going home to pick up the older child, picking up piano child and dropping off at soccer practice, then dropping of older child at basketball, picking up piano/soccer child and going to parent/teacher conference, picking up basketball child and depositing him at piano lesson, taking piano/soccer/conference child home to eat dinner so they can start on homework, driving back to pick up basketball/piano child and bringing them home so they can have a late dinner and hopefully finish homework in time to go to bed. I figure three hours in a car should get me close to Dallas for some relaxation instead of driving around the west side of Norman. Thankfully that doesn’t happen every day, but at least once a week is a good estimation. This goes along with the whole, my child will not grow up healthy and adjusted if they aren’t doing something every waking moment. But in our household schoolwork comes first, so I am proud to say that they are both making good grades, so it’s not that hard to keep them active. And, by the way, threatening to take away one of their activities turns out to be a great motivator to getting their homework finished.

Then there is your normal, husband working late, two dogs whose greatest worth is for fertilizer in the backyard and a house that usually looks like monkeys have run wild. But isn’t that what makes life worth living? People whose lives are ordered and their house is always clean miss those great moments in life that only chaos can bring. The conversations in the car between siblings that wouldn’t happen otherwise, the small child that comes in with Mom’s shirt on saying, “I don’t think this is mine”, and actually laughing at all the comings and goings. Just another part of my sometimes exciting, rarely dull, but always interesting life.