Raise Your Hand If You Can't Sleep

Both my hands are up.  I can't sleep. I have been in bed tossing and turning and praying, and imagining beautiful sunsets, bright moonlit beaches, bargaining with angels and yet, it's now 3:00 am and I am wide awake.  Bonus?  I have to work tomorrow  I mean today.  In a few hours as a matter of fact.  Ayyy the work day is going to suck!  My mind just won't shut down.  I realize blogging at this hour won't help either but I was just so tired of all my failed attempts to sleep, that I finally gave up and came here, where everybody knows my name.  Oh! Just realized I have not tried warm milk.  Does that really work?  Hmm, we shall see.  Stay tuned.

Sunday Night Wisdom

More than any other year, this year, the  holidays have a deeper meaning for me.   You see, back in September, my mom suffered a stroke.  That strong, vibrant, go-getter of a woman, my rock, suddenly became helpless.   Luckily, her symptoms were recognized early and we got her to the hospital in time.  The doctors could not pin-point what triggered the stroke.  Days before it happened, we had a scare because my 14 year old nephew was struck by a car while riding his bike.  He hit his head and passed out.  He was not wearing a helmet.  My mom took that very hard.  She was beside herself when she saw him in the ER.  Thankfully, my nephew only had to have a few minor stitches to his face and had bruising and lacerations, but nothing more than that. The doctors say that shock of seeing him bruised, bloody and crying in pain -seriously, he was looking like Rocky Balboa after a fight, could have played a role in her having the stroke.  Everything was/is a guessing game.   The stroke left her with a droopy face, loss of speech and partial paralysis of her right side.  Her prognosis was good though.  With lots of rehab and therapy, she would be back to normal.  But it was going to take a lot of time and effort, and patience.  

Our new normal.  That's what we were dealt with.  Life became a flurry of doctor appointments, rehab sessions, new medication, figuring out schedules between my siblings and I to get her to and from all of these appointments.  It was stressful and anxiety ridden for all of us.  Seeing your mother, who never complains about her health or how tired she is or anything, seeing her having to depend on us for pretty much everything, was difficult for us, I can only imagine how much more difficult it was for her.  But you know, God is awesome.  He hears us and answers our prayers.  Sometimes not in the way we want, but he does answer them.  In my mom's case, within a month she regained use of her right side.  Her speech is almost back to normal, though her face has just the slightest bit of droopiness still.  She's gone back to work and is driving again.  She regained her independence and is so happy for it.

Since all of this happened, I no longer look at holidays or family gatherings as a chore or a burden.  I welcome them.  I embrace them. This Christmas season I have been ALL about it since December 1.  And I take the time to actually enjoy the moments with her, with my siblings, even with people that work my last nerve.  I'm a Christmas caroling fool I tell you.

I cannot describe the feeling of hopelessness and fear that I felt when I heard the voice on the phone telling me, "Your mom is having a stroke"  We were all a mess.  Had it not been for our faith, praying at every second and the support of our family, I honestly don't think my siblings and I would have made it.

So I guess what I'm trying to say in a roundabout way is, savor every moment of every day with your loved ones.  Yes it's trite and yes it's really corny, but it's also very true.

-peace

december 10th-chapter 10

So I've been doing this thing at night.  On December 1st I started reading the book of  Luke in the bible.  Well, online for me.  You see, I lost mine years ago and I never replaced it.  It was my high school bible and was full of bright yellow and pink highlighted passages and scribbled notes.  The pages were fragile, worn, held together only because I had taped and re-taped the binding.  I loved that bible.  Somewhere between my college years and becoming an adult, I lost track of it.  Moreso, because I stopped reading it.  Not because I lost my faith or stopped believing in God, no, it was more of because I lost interest.  Don't get me wrong, I still went to church and for a time I was very active in my church and volunteering with many groups.  I'm a bit embarrassed to admit but I don't really have an excuse for not reading the bible or buying a new one.  I just, didn't.

But I digress.

So yeah, I started reading the book of Luke.  There was a meme or something like that going around Facebook that encouraged you to begin reading it because it has 24 chapters and by December 24th, you'd have read the entire account of Jesus' life.  I thought it was kind of a cool thing to do so I started it.  I am finding that I enjoy it because not only am I getting a "refresher" (I've been out of Catholic school a long, long, long time) but it's forcing me to find that quiet time that all of us need in our lives.  Not necessarily for bible study, it could be anything, as long as you find that time to be alone with your thoughts.  Reading the bible this way has also revived my curiosity with the whole "religion" thing.

As I've gotten older, especially the last 5 or so years,  I've had doubts and unsettling thoughts that at times kept me away from going to church (other times it was just my plain laziness that kept me away).  I'm a bit embarrassed to admit this but this is my truth.  And so, I welcomed the opportunity to revisit the word of God and hopefully, come out of this with a renewed spirit.

I know religion and God and faith are not everyone's cup of tea, and that's okay.   I just like to change it up from time to time.  Let's face it, how many of my bad dates, break-up stories can you take? Am I right?

It's way past my bedtime, 6:00 a.m. is going to come really fast.

Sweet dreams bloggies.

Peace.

I Can't Sleep

As much as I try to go to bed at a decent hour, I just can't.  Case in point, it's 11:45 p.m. and I'm not in bed yet.  Instead I'm sitting at my desk thinking about why I'm not asleep and scolding myself because 6:00 a.m. is going to come really fast.  But I can't help it.  I do my best thinking in the middle of the night, I top it off with a glass of worry and viola! A full blown bout of insomnia kicks in.  It doesn't happen every night, but lately it's been more frequent.  I've been slammed at work since November and here we are 3 days into December and it's only going to get worse.  I'm grateful though, to have a job to go to every day.

In other news, what's up with John Legend's new lyrics to "Baby It's Cold Outside"? Have y'all heard it yet?  Let me preface by saying that I LOVE John Legend, I love his music and his voice, he's a great composer.  But he really goofed it up with this remake.  It's a Christmas song for goodness sake! (see what I did there)  I don't get all these politically correct remakes.  I'm not going to post the new lyrics but let's just say that they suck.  There is nothing wrong with the original version.  I read somewhere that the change was brought about because the original lyrics border on the edge of date rape.  I'm sorry what? Date.Rape.  That has got to be the most ridiculous  things I have ever heard.  And let me tell you, I've heard some doozies.  Never in my life did I think the lyrics to that song were offensive or inappropriate or worse still, that it alluded to date rape.  I mean I was beside myself when I read about it and then again after I listened to the new version.  And apparently I still am since I'm up blogging about it at midnight.  What say you bloggers?

You know something else that's on my mind?  Him.  I miss him so much.  Especially during these holidays.  Thanksgiving was great and all but inside, I was hurting.  This is the first time in almost 6 years that we were not be in touch.  But you know, even though it feels like someone is stabbing my heart and pangs of hunger for him overcome me, even still, I know I made the right decision and I don't regret it.  I'm super proud of myself.  It was a long time coming.

Alright, now that I've gotten that out of the way, how about those Texans baby?  I'm not a huge football fan, but I do love when the Texans win and I especially LOVE when they beat the pesky Patriots.  Which by my accounts, had not happened since oh, sometime in 2009!  What a win for the good guys!  It was like Houston had just won the Superbowl the way everyone was celebrating here.  Aww good times.

Thanks to whoever is reading this and got this far.  I'm glad I could entertain you.  Don't forget the to tip on the way out.

Eyes are getting heavy, I hope it means I will fall asleep quickly.  Sweet dreams bloggies.

hello december

the last month of the year
the last month of this decade
please be good to me December
please be kind.
thirty-one days left
gonna make them
amazing.

Life Happens

I haven't written anything in a very long time.  Nothing significant happened to cause me to stop, I just did one day.   And I never looked back.   I'm surprised I still know how.  Oh I know, anyone can string words together to form a sentence, but only a few have the gift to be able to tell a story with those words, to write something that touches your soul, or speaks to you in such a way that it may cause you to gasp or to laugh out loud, maybe even to cry.  I used to write like that.  It feels like a lifetime ago.  I wish I could say that something catastrophic or something incredibly amazing happened in my life that caused me to stop but no, nothing like that.  I could say that life happened.  But again no.  I mean life did happen but nothing that would prevent me from doing something that I used to love; to write.  On the contrary, so much has happened in my life that I should have written a novel or ten by now.  And so this marks the return of myself, as I used to know her.  The girl with the gift of story telling, of poetry writing  -however hideous it may be.  The return of the girl who loves to love, who is a hopeless romantic and a girl that will always search for that fairy tale ending.  I guess that is why I am a writer, because I want to tell a story that is relatable to you.

So, here's to a more concerted effort to write, to publish, to find that happy ending.

Cheers!

Crave

i love

you
still
always

my entire being

aches for you

i know better 

i deserve better
but my heart
won't listen to reason
and so
my insatiating hunger for you
goes on.