Flash 55 Friday

No time for "55"

I sat pondering, on just what should i write,
but my thoughts were all jumbled and a fright,
for early in the morning, my two youngest sang,
a tune so chilling it stuck in my brain! Over and
over till I wanted to scream :"Who let the dogs out?
"who,who,who,who,who,who!

Ever get a tune in your head that you just can't shake? Sam and Grace were singing this song with Sam saying "who let the dogs out? and Grace answers in a low voice that sounds like a woof "who,who,who"....it's enough to drive me bonkers since I can't shake it! Hope you all have a rockin' Friday!

Catching up on life.......

"I can only imagine what it will be like, when I walk by Your side...
I can only imagine, what my eyes will see, when Your Face is before me!
I can only imagine. I can only imagine.
Surrounded by Your Glory, what will my heart feel?
Will I dance for you, Jesus? Or in awe of You, be still?
Will I stand in Your presence, or to my knees will I fall?
Will I sing 'Hallelujah!'? Will I be able to speak at all?
I can only imagine! I can only imagine!

I Can Only Imagine - by Mercy Me

Last night at bible study this was the topic of our discussion. We are studying revelations and going over the bible's testimony on those that were privledged to get a glimps of heaven. God is described twice in jewel tones ( reflected rainbow colors) or like a prism. This is a very interesting study and as I went through the chapter all I could think about was the song by Mercy Me "I can Only Imagine". To this day when I hear that song, I get very emotional. Tears are often spilling down my cheeks, and I'm awe struck, and humbled at the thought of being in my HP's presence. I had stepped away from bible study when I entered AA. I was attending meetings every day of the week and was getting overwhelmed by too many things on my plate. What a different perspective I have now. I see and notice things I never would have before. It's like a veil has been lifted from my eyes and God's word is no longer a foreign language but a guide. I love the change. Another area of growth. I'm taking the afternoon off from work. My house is in desperate need of cleaning. I want to open all the windows on this gorgeous day, and let the sun pour in on the hardwood floors. In our bedroom which is the whole second floor of our home the windows face south and the light pours in and you can actually smell the wood of the hardwood floors. Our kitty is often found sunning himself up in our room. So I will clean, run errands, make a nice dinner, maybe bike with the kids....and celebrate a simple awesome life....I hope you are doing the same....:)

Another turn in the road....

I grew up reading. I seriously can't remember a time when I couldn't read. It was my world. I was Laura Ingalls Wilder, and Anne of Green Gables, Nancy Drew, Encyclopedia Brown etc....books that kept my imagination going and filled in what was probably a pretty ordinary suburbia life as a child. A perfect day to me is curling up and reading for hours upon hours. This is not so for two of my children. Both my oldest and our youngest are dyslexic. Both have high IQ's but ask them to spell words or read a novel and it can be pure torture. Alex has gone through years of tutoring. He developed early survival skills and still uses them to this day. He is doing great in school and even likes English now. Our middle child Sam, just needed reading help for one year and he loves to read books. He's a solid B student and manages to keep up and organized where his school work is concerned. Our youngest Gracie is a whole different ball game. Not only is she dyslexic she's also ADD. Now we are going to have her diagnosed on November 9th., but I, her teachers, and her tutor are pretty certain she has both. They often go hand in hand. Sweet, loving, and precocious child, she resembles trying to keep a bird from flying when you work with her. The focus is short, tasks are often unfinished and if they are completed often messy. She is frustrated with her own attemps at learning, and as a mother your heart breaks. How do you let them know how smart, and special, and wonderfully made they are when they can't keep up with most of the kids in the class. Alex was almost 13 when he was diagnosed so the term Dyslexic was a relief to him because then he knew he wasn't stupid, he just needed to learn differently than others. He shows strong skills in both math and foreign language, two areas that can really be tough for dyslexic people. Grace is a bit all over the place. So today I sigh. As a parent I want to give her every opportunity to succeed. She is being tutored twice a week, and has been since she was in kindergarten. I had my suspicions that ADD was lurking around the corner but today as I spoke with her tutor those suspicions became a reality. Now what? How do you give them the best shot that you can? I checked out two books on ADD at the library and the tutor will send items home for us to work on so we can enforce what she is learning at school. Her road will be long, every grade will have to be earned. While friends of hers will sail on buy she will paddle against the current most of her life. This realization would have set me back, back to denial with another drink. The beauty of my program is that I have choices today. I chose to not have my daughter labeled. I chose to raise her strong and confident. To work beside and with her to overcome learning disabilities in order to make her realize that you do not need to be a victim to your circumstances. She will be strong, she will appreciate, and according to God's plan she will grow into the exact person that he has planned her to be....and that makes me happy.....

Warning : Danger up ahead...

This is what I feel like. Like I'm in danger or to be more specific my program is in danger. September was an unusually busy month, and more than once I had to miss a meeting due to family or other obligations. The result is that my program is lacking, I've crossed back into some behaviors that I want to be done with, self doubt is creeping in, decisions are erradict, impulsiveness is present etc.......Danger lies ahead. I've heard so many people talk about this at meetings. That when they aren't actively working their programs and attending meetings they start to turn inward, to turn to their perseived power, walk away from their HP and try to do things on their own. This has happened to me lately. I feel flat. Like my shiny newness is gone. I was so confident that I was working my program to the best that I thought hitting one maybe two meetings a week was enough. I can tell I need more. Thursday evening a gal who I've gotten to know came to the meeting I lead, and confessed that she had relapsed. This lady since I've known her has just glowed. She's two years into the program and now her smile and her spirit are gone. She's frustrated, humiliated, confused, and her face is full of pain. It's at that moment that it hit me. Danger is just a second away. This gal brought this home to me very quickly the other night. Less I get to cocky in my program, because it would only take a second to wash it away. The people with the most sobriety in our club are the ones who regularly attend meetings many times a week. My own sponsor with 21 years of sobriety attends at minimum five meetings a week. I now know why. These keep reminding you where you came from and how little it would take to go back. I don't want to go back. If you have any advice or experience, hope, or wisdom that you can share in regards to the "danger zone" I would love to hear it. Hope you are all having a happy Monday.......

Flash 55 Friday...

Urbanocity

I can't explain why,
towers of metal and glass
quicken my pulse
Most people are repulsed by crowds
but your hub of everyday bodies
and machines acts like blood
flowing through my veins.
Bright lights, restaurant smells,
and culture abound.
A million idiosyncrasies to discover
in a weekend's time,
only leaves me longing for more.......

My husband and I along with our besties are headed to the Twin Cities for the weekend. The last time we went any where without children I was six months pregnant with our second child so I guess we still had children along. I love cities and to me the Twin Cities holds the best of both worlds. Big city life with midwest charm. My husband and I will celebrate 17 years of marriage on Saturday October 2nd. and he will be humoring me in the city because he wants a log cabin on 40 acres in the middle of nowhere. Our road has not been a smooth one, a great deal of that do to my dealing, but for some reason he's still here. For that I am grateful. When we had Alex's birthday party last month, we were all sitting around having coffee and laughing when I looked up and caught my husband staring at me. He had a soft smile on his lips and I'm not sure what he was thinking, but we've made it this far, so I think we can both hang around to see what the next years will bring. Wishing you all a beautiful autumn weekend.....

Autumn color is peaking in central Wisconsin. (I didn't take this picture) but it is the view from Granite Peak, a state park in my hometown. I'm not sure what it is about this season that I love so much. I remember when my husband and I had been dating about 5 months, we would take long walks through the fall leaves in the neighborhood he lived in, and talk about the future. I love how blue the sky is, the smell of dry leaves, the breathtaking color against the dark green of the grass. The nights have been cool, and the moon holds a tint of yellow. This morning as I was backing down the driveway I stopped and looked down our street. Large maple and oak trees create a canopy type feel to the area and the leaves were literally pouring from the trees. It was so beautiful. The kids want to make a leaf pile after school. You know what happens when you do that children from all over the neighborhood start showing up :) There's almost a magical feel to it all. Hope you are all having an awesome week and I will leave you with this poem:

October's Bright Blue Weather
by Helen Hunt Jackson

O sun and skies and clouds of June
And flowers of June together,
Ye cannot rival for one hour
October's bright blue weather;

When loud the bumblebee makes haste,
Belated, thriftless vagrant,
And goldenrod is dying fast,
And lanes with grapes are fragrant;

When gentians roll their fringes tight,
To save them for the morning,
And chestnuts fall from satin burs
Without a sound of warning;

When on the ground red apples lie
In piles like jewels shining,
And redder still on old stone walls
Are leaves of woodbine twining;

When all the lovely wayside things
Their white-winged seeds are sowing,
And in the fields, still green and fair,
Late aftermaths are growing;

When springs run low, and on the brooks
In idle, golden freighting,
Bright leaves sink noiseless in the hush
Of woods, for winter waiting;

When comrades seek sweet country haunt
By twos and twos together,
And count like misers hour by hour
October's bright blue weather.

O sun and skies and flowers of June,
Count all your boasts together,
Love loveth best of all the year
October's bright blue weather.

Being Selfish.....

A few weeks ago I did a post on helping a friend. I felt really good about helping this person. He seemed much more upbeat after we spoke but then....he started calling more, and because I wanted to be nice I would take his calls and patiently answer his questions. Now there's been no advancements or "suggestions" made by this person but I started to get that queasy feeling in my stomach. You know the one that sends the signal to the brain that something just isn't right. Now my sponsor and his sponsor knew that we had talked. My sponsor did not say much when I told her of our meeting. So when I called her last week to seek guidance she was not surprised. "Remember when I asked you not to sponsor anyone until you were through the twelve steps?" she said. I replied, "Yes, but I wasn't sponsoring, I was just helping, and I thought we were suppose to help other alcoholics". To which she replied, "We are, but the person who sought you out is male, and wanting to be codependent on someone else, you know the "easier softer way"?....Now I knew why I was having that queasy feeling. My gut was telling me this wasn't right. In my usual fashion, I rushed in to help, but didn't consider the consequences! Am I alcoholic or what! (lol) So my sponsor asked, "What are you going to do about it?" Darn I was hoping she would talk to his sponsor (me being the coward that I am) and since that wasn't going to happen I needed a solution. First I took the advice she gave: Be selfish, yes selfish in your recovery. You have worked very hard these past months, you have been open to change, you have grown, not without dealing with a lot of pain and you have a long way to go. He's stuck and he wants to ride on your coat tails and being alcoholic you think you can save him, and you will let him tag along because your mind will tell you you can carry both of you until finally he drags you down, and sooner or later alcohol will be right around the corner. I will not sit back and watch this happen." It had never crossed my mind that this could happen. I just thought I was helping, never realizing that I could put my own recovery in danger. My sponsor and I talked a while and decided that I should call him, be direct, explain that I needed to take care of myself, and that he needs to be working his own program with his sponsor. So of course I was chicken at first but then picked up the phone and took care of business so I thought. We had a nice talk and I spoke my peace. He said things were going better, that he had been meeting with his sponsor and thanked me for my time. So I go on my merry little way for a day and then on Friday find a message on my cell phone from him. He was giving me his email address asking that we stay in touch. Enough, I deleted his call. I had made myself clear so i thought. But then there's a side that still wants to help.......but then I got mad. Hey no one made it easy for me. I've done my work, now it's time for him to do his! I finally understood what "being selfish" in your recovery means. I will not jepordize all that I've worked for. I needed to set the boundaries, and do it now. So I went to my Saturday morning meeting and of course he was there. I said "hello" politely, asked him how things were going, and then went and sat by my sponsor. I know my body language was pretty stiff but I wanted my point accross. I did not answer his phone call, nor did I add in his email. This journey has been the hardest one I have walked. I will not risk it being undone. I can pray for this person, but I will not carry him. My HP walks beside me, to make this path possible. I guess there is a time to be selfish, and my time is now......