A Colorful Mild Tornado

Yeah, so I feel like I'm the middle of a whirling wind and I'm not quite sure where it's gonna take me - I just know I'm in the midst of change.

Today is my last day at my office at work. I will miss them - they're great people. I am looking forward to the change in my work responsibilities, releasing a lot of pressure. (Mostly my own personal guilt for not doing all of the things I ought to be doing!). I will love working with the people I am joining. My boss's office is pretty much right behind my desk - good thing to see all the good that I do, right? I will begin on Tues since Mon we have off.

And I'm sleepy right now - woke up early when St left to work. Perfect quiet time to write. Gotta wake the kids in a second - although most of this week, they've gotten themselves up. Nice.

I just read my title. Did any of you read it at first thinking it said "tomato?" Was that just because I'm sleepy?

Happy late Valentine's Day to ya'll. Yesterday was a busy day. Just because I had a short time to accomplish the things I wanted to, of course many other little things demanding attention happened at the same time. All were taken care of: Got the office decorated, got payroll posted, got the valentine's finished and distributed, got the spreadsheet reversed, corrected, and re-posted, got the service call in to get our Heat turned back on - and it was done before I left, did our basic ATM reporting and put the service call in to get the front panel fixed so that we could access the necessary items inside (that luckily we can put off til the next day), got the rest of my office items out of the new branch manager's way, and made it to our Valentine's promotion at our Main office on time! That was the first 2 hours of the day. Oh, yes - I also was a little involved in getting our computer system back up and working properly. Whew!

After work, I picked up the kids from lacrosse, dumped 'em off whining about being hungry, ran and got them a rotisserie chicken from the grocery store, came back and waited for St to finish getting ready for our date. We exchanged gifts (he got me some comfy jammies! He got an i-tunes gift card and a vase full of silk gerber daisies...white and red.) Then we had sandwiches at Arby's (romantic, eh?) - then he went to a meeting and I went to the gym. We came home and went to sleep.

Tonight I will be helping a friend move and St will be going to the gym. I think we'll try again for that romantic dinner tomorrow night.

And what to do with my extra day off Monday? At this point, my first answer is SLEEP! I oughtta clean up my office - still untouched since the Christmas Tornado hit.

Alrighty time to start the kid tornado of getting up and making it onto the bus!

Woo-ee!!! We're off!

Answers....and questions.

I found it very interesting that in Stake Conference our visiting General Authority (Elder Callister of the 70's) talked on that very subject! It's a big bad scarey world out there, but all you need to do is Have Faith and keep doing the best you can. Not exactly those words - but to that point. It was very comforting to hear. He also touched on a point I've been mulling over lately: Trials. He said the trials we go through are always unexpected - otherwise they wouldn't be trials. Makes so much sense when he says it! But I have found myself repeating over and over, I just never thought I'd go through this in my life - I just never thought I'd feel this way or have these questions, etc. I guess the trials are such that we are tested in our faith to see if we'll keep having faith. Just how obedient are we going to choose to be? I want to be the good girl, I do. But do I want that more than I want what I want? What do I want (really really want)? Yes, to be happy - but what kind of happy am I wanting? The NOW happy? And is that happy going to be an ETERNAL happy? Or is just that sweet tooth talking that's going to cause a cavity? Do I have enough faith to know? Am I living so that I can be Spiritually in tune to know which is which? What if I'm not. What if I don't want what I feel Heavenly Father wants for me? Do my head and heart always have to be in such conflict? Or even do they have to be in conlfict now? Why can't I have everything I want? (Pouty lip!!!!) I'm having a hard time coming to terms that that just may be the case. On either hand I feel like I'm choosing to lose something that I want. I do need to do my lovely pro's and con's list again. That usually helps me sort out this kind muddle.

At least my last post got me a call from my bro. Not so much that he worried about me. Just wanted to find out how St is doing. Turns out he got to find out for himself - in person!!!! St's job took him to Philly tonight - so Day took advantage of it and went to visit! YEA!!! I am quite looking forward to finding out how that went - and if Sage got to meet Nucle St??? *sigh* I love my family!!!! They are all such really good people!!!!

I surprised me! More than once in the same night.

Well, okay then.... I learned something about myself last night. I have really deep feelings about a certain subject - don't know that I'm ready to share it yet, and I don't even know why that is. Just how it is.

So last night St brings up a subject he's been researching and enjoying getting info on. I came home from Stake Conf session extremely tired and somewhat irrationally grouchy.

#1 Moment: I did have a lady in my ward make a comment that really confused me - made me wonder what kind of gossip she's been listening to - she seemed to think she knew about problems and issues in my family that I only have talked about with some of my closest friends - and she's not one of them, nor is she close friends with any of my close friends. So trying to figure out what she must be thinking rather soured me a little. I guess I just have never felt like I made big enough waves for people to talk about me, or something. It's rather a disconcerting feeling - I never thought that I cared what others think about me. And I still don't to a certain degree. But that people are forming opinions without the proper information about me and my personal life bugs! And then I look at how I reacted and wish I'd said something more clever. I gave her a little response because I was too surprised and too confused as to why she would say that in the first place. It wasn't until I was in my car that I wished I would have called her on the carpet and asked her why she would think that? Goes to show I don't like confrontations and making other people uncomfortable - even if they do it to me.

#2 Moment: So having set the stage to my emotional state... Without any kind of preamble or greeting St calls me in to show my the results of his research that he's excited about (if you can call it that). He begins showing me video clippings and I find myself resisting his enthusiasm and find myself getting angrier. And after a few minute Mt. Lisa blew her top! I lectured him about using his time for his family briefly and just told him that the subject he was showing just made me angry and I didn't see any point in it and I didn't like it. I rather caught him off guard. Caught me off guard too. So I had to think about it and figure out why I don't like it and why I got angry. I did feel quite bad about exploding at St, so before I figured myself out I did apologize to him for being tired and extremely grouchy. So why would I explode at some random subject matter? I realized this subject is one I subconsciously avoid thinking about because it's one of those that makes me feel unsafe, and insecure. It's one of those things that just seems so huge and momentous that I, just being one tiny little person in the world, am helpless. Like a twig in a Hurricane. It's one of those We Need to Change the World issues that make me tired before I even begin to think about it. Yes, this world is broken and there is a lot of evil and I feel like on these subjects the expectation is for me to pick up my sword and shield and devote my entire life to crusading, converting, educating and putting in 150% and still it wouldn't even come close to being enough to resolve the issue!!! I would be snuffed out quite quickly because I am just a little guy in the scheme of things. I know there are some out there who are crusaders and believe that ONE can make a difference. I applaud them. I say good for you! I don't have the energy to devote to that when I'm just trying to hold my own little tiny spec of dust corner in the world together. It's not in me to fight for something like that - and I feel like there is an expectation for me to do so. And that helpless feeling makes me angry. I don't like it - I don't want it. And then when I have this information thrown at me and I DON'T want to do something about it, follows the guilt! I have enough guilt for not getting my visiting teaching done! I don't need to feel guilty for not saving the world either!!!! I don't want to be angry - but how can you not be when you see powerful evil?!!

So I've always handled these kinds of issues by just kind of blowing them off with a wave of my hand and saying "whatever" and have avoided confrontations. I avoid stating an opinion on these volatile subjects. I care deeply about the evil in the world - pick any subject and you'll find it in great force out there. So if I dig in and do my very best to do my part in keeping the commandments and the Gospel principles and really trying to help my family along the same path....that's my part in this world. This is my contribution to the world that I hope is enough. I have great deep feelings, but I repress them because I don't see an appropriate or possible outlet for them. So, I tuck it away in a corner of my mind with a note to self: address later at a different season in life. And that season may be in my next life. I'm willing to just leave it sitting there in the corner gathering dust.

Deja Vu. Just had a glimmer of recollection of having a kind of conversation with my sister about this quite a long time ago. I guess every once in a while it has to be revisited. I'll discuss this with St. now that I figured out why I bombed him.

Poor guy didn't know what hit him.

So much So little!

So I really wanted to write earlier....now I've forgotten what it was. I'm excited about our snow fall we got! We actually got my favorite floaty fat flakes! It overrides the gloom of the rainy morning. Especially because it decided to get into a bigger dump - I love heavy rains. Then it slushed and then snowed! It's been a pretty great day. Despite bickering kids, husband going out of town for a few days (I need a breather!), and the flat tire that appeared today. I got my tire pressure buzzer going off yesterday - I'm so used to it happening from normal weather changes that I thought I could wait until Monday to go get some more air. A fellow driver pointed it out right after church as we were heading home. We made it to the garage and St changed it over to my spare before he left - so I wasn't too late to my appointment with the bishop. We just chat every once in a while to make sure I'm still alive. He's a really cool guy. (He also said there have been a few requests for me in other positions and he won't let me go -from the YW's - unless I want to.) I think not yet. Interesting that he is apparently letting my choose. I feel like Heavenly Father is letting me be very in charge of myself right now.... either He's testing me or He trusts me - or both. I'm trying to be a good girl and trying to do what I oughtta. Funny how when we don't want to be the ones making decisions about life matters, He makes sure that we do. I can see Him just raising His hands at me and saying, "Don't blame me!" I'm laughing as I say this because it is such my nature to want to blame someone else if I don't like how things are going. I think He wants me to take accountability for my life or something. Just like a loving parent to "torture" their child. Speaking of which- I ought to be torturing my own right now. TV doesn't need to be on, despite what they think!

You know, I was really blessed to have St there to change my tire! St had a couple of opportunities to not be around during that time: he could've worked and earned about $500 today, but he chose to attend church instead. And then he wanted to leave church early to get a head start for his traveling. He's got a new job in conjunction with his current one. Both allowing for flexibility which he values. This one is with a window company - he's learning the install part now and can work into the management area if he would like to. The owners are having him utilize some contacts that he has in the Park City area to see if they can get a foot in the door there. We discussed him leaving so he wouldn't be driving in the dark - especially with the snowfall we're getting. He decided to stay. The blessing about waiting - besides being able to be there to help me - was that the snow stopped within an hour after leaving here. If he'd have left earlier he would have been in snow in some of the worst spots down the I-15. Turns out better to have left later, despite the darkness. I told him he would be blessed and watched out over if he would do what he ought to do - besides he should get his full money's worth by attending all of his church meetings, if we wanted to look at the financial aspects. :)

So it was a nice day. I'll go play Mother now.