Slip sliding away

I took delivery delivery of my new car today. The car I looked at and decided to buy last weekend because the car I've had for the last 11 years is costing more in repairs than it's value, on a very regular basis. The time to change cars had come. Actually, it was time to change about 4 years ago which is why Rob & I were looking at car options in the month before he died. Then my life turned inside out and changing cars just didn't rate much more than a passing thought.

I really liked my old car. It was a model with lots of extras. Extras that are not included in my new base model car. My old car was a station wagon, but I always enjoyed driving it, I enjoyed the comfort levels it afforded. My new car is also a station wagon, and although it's 3 years old it has only 22,000 ks on the odometer (13,500 miles) and still has the new car feel to it. It's a sensible car for me to buy, and really, it's very nice.

I kind of enjoyed making this purchase without consultation with anyone else and the eyebrows that raises. Why is it ok for a man to do this but not a woman? I feel irritated in the extreme when I'm considered incapable of making important decisions because of my gender. I'm perfectly capable of researching road tests, resale values, service issues and the like, thank you for your concern.

So, I'm now the owner of one perfectly sensible 4 cylinder station wagon and all I feel is relief that I've managed to negotiate the paper work and finance in what was, and continues to be, a pretty hectic week.

And I feel sad. I've parted with another link to Rob. It was our car. Rob loved it, I loved it. We had some great family road trips in it. Now the tangible link to those memories is gone from my life. I have a car that looks and feels new and has absolutely no link to my husband.

Replacing my car was the right thing to do, and I should have done it well before now, but sometimes doing the right thing is just a little heart wrenching. The life I once had has slipped a little further away.

Lost opportunity

I took Davey to the podiatrist today to have his 6 monthly check-up for his shortened ligaments and muscle sheaths which he does stretching exercises to correct. Happily the stretching exercises and orthotics in his shoes are returning his curled under toes to a state of normalcy.

It was difficult to find an appointment time that suited both the podiatrist and fitted in with our school and family schedules. It still involved a bit of juggling to fit it in (which stressed me, non-one else), but we succeeded and all is well.

After futsal tonight Davey asked me where his Achilles is. I showed him. Oh, he said. That really hurts when I play soccer of futsal.

Damn shame he didn't mention that to the podiatrist huh?

Is cyberspace really taking me into the future?

I've just been friended (there's a new fangled word) on Facebook by people I was a mad 20 something year old with. I feel as though they're from a whole other life. Certainly it was a whole other phase in my life.

Of course I accepted them as friends, and I look forward to finding out about their lives.

Yet there's part of me that wonders if I want to. It feels a little like a backward step. It's a part of my life that I left behind.

Maybe I'm afraid they'll reject me. They're pretty cool characters and ah, my life choices are different to theirs, and I'm a loooooong way from cool. I'm very comfortable with my uncoolness, yet it's funny that I'm suddenly conscious of it with these blasts from my past.

I don't really know why this worries my at all, in all likelihood we'll do our polite catching up then ignore each, so nothing will have changed.

I'm being unfair, but...

Our church had a music night tonight. I worked behind the scenes, as did my Davey who manned the data projector and lights. Zinni sang her heart out in an accapella choir which sounded magnificent as the beauty of 40 combined voices lifted the audience to a place of sheer delight.

Later in the night a man who I find to be quite superficial (this judgement has a bearing on my story) sang a song about relying on Jesus in all things. The only words I can remember of the song are "The widow who sits and cries tears for her loneliness".

I didn't feel gratitude that the song captured my situation. I felt anger. Anger because the man singing has no frigging idea.

Anger because that's not how it is. I don't sit and cry. I DO. My life is about doing, not sitting and moping!

Anger because I know in his mind he's singing about a woman dressed in black, helpless and pathetic. Anger because he doesn't connect me with the term widow. I doubt that many people at church do attach the term widow to me. The stereotype doesn't match my red hair, my humour, my lack of patheticness.

Yet a widow I am. And it makes me angry that this man will use the term that descibes my situation in a song to arouse emotion, yet never once offer an actual widow in his sphere any form of spoken or practical support. I feel anger that he's used a description that applies to me in a way that buys into an incorrect stereotype with no connection to the actual experience.

Did this man do anything wrong? No. He's just an innocent man who is blessed to know not of what he sings.

Me? I guess I'm buying into the stereotype by being a bitter widow!

Proof

My girl is definitely growing up.

I have proof.

She tied the garbage bag in our bin and took it out to the wheely bin. Without being asked.

Woo hoo.

Castellano III

I have just written a short (very short) biography on Rodolfo Enrique Fogwill, an Argentinian author. This was homework for my Spanish III class which I've just started. As this homework was written in Spanish, I'm feeling just a little pleased with myself. It may be midnight, but I have completed my homework!

Ahora sueno. (I'd place the tilda above the n to correctly spell sueno, but I'm not able to make it happen and too tired to care.)

Couch potato communication

It's sunday night. We've had a normal hectic Sunday and Davey and I have both finally collapsed in front of the TV with our laptops. (Zinni hasn't returned from night church yet.) Davey's finishing an assignment that he was meant to finish yesterday, but the lure of friends inviting him to the beach and then a sleepover proved irresistable, while I'm supposedly writing a short biography in Spanish of a South American author. The volume of the TV increased as a segment of ads burst onto the screen. Davey had the remote control and didn't move to hit the mute button. I stretched out my arm with my palm flat so he could hand it to me. Without looking up from his screen Davey picked up the remote and put it into my hand. I pressed the mute button and we both continued doing our respective thing in silence. I love our unspoken synchronicity.

Maisy