Just keeping on

I am so tired. Really tired. I am going to bed in a minute and cuddle under the comforter. Amalia is downstairs hanging out with Abby and Alice and Savvy. I didn't get home till after 8 tonight. Andrea told me that even though I am learning new stuff, that it should be on company time, not on my time. But I am stubborn and I wanted to finish my own pages, not have somebody help me.

I have been busy for the past couple of days -- Thanksgiving, family visiting, work...and then a dear man from our synagogue, George Gaber, died Wednesday night and with Mira and Madi both out of town, I have been doing some phone calling and list-making to help with funeral plans...it is amazing to me how people at Beth Shalom come together and support each other and are so glad to volunteer for whatever is needed...it's really a warm and enveloping community.

I am glad to be a part of it and it feels good to be needed.

And, a wonderful thing...Amalia spotted my purple pashmina (well, faux pashmina, but I love it because I did, after all, buy it from a street display in Paris!) right downstairs hanging over a chair. I have been looking and looking for that all week, and feeling sad that I had lost it...and it feels so cuddly and warm now.

Sweet dreams to me and to you!

Couldn't believe it...

This is how backward Indiana can be. Amalia picked Abby up from school today, and armed with a list, they went to Kroger's together to shop for Thanksgiving. And Amalia had several bottles of wine. They wouldn't let her buy it because Abby was with her! Amalia is TWENTY-FIVE years old! They wouldn't even let Amalia come back by herself to buy the wine.

When I was exclaiming in disbelief on the phone at this story, several of my co-workers said to me that similar things had happened to them or to people they know. That is ridiculous.

Wonder if they stop people from buying tobacco products if a kid is with them, just in case they might hand it to the kid outside the store? Tobacco kills more people than alcohol.

Really Puritan.

Happiness

I'm sitting, going through all the stuff to do today, but meanwhile I am humming, humming and smiling....Amalia is coming home tonight!

It gives me a little prick of sadness that Adam won't be here, too...but I think he is having a good adventure in D.C.

But this morning, driving, I actually got tears in my eyes at the thought of meeting Amalia at the airport tonight!

Can't wait for her to see our living room, with quieter colors, new artwork since she's been home...

Can't wait to have lunch with her and my mom tomorrow...

Can't wait to watch tv and laugh...

I am so grateful for my life today.

This really happened

So, last night, Friday, I stopped after work to pick up some salad stuff at Kroger's to take to Aviva Orenstein and David Szony's house for Shabbat.

It's the end of an intense week, learning my new job duties at the HT, really focusing, forgetting to eat lunch, being so intense that people were asking me if there was something wrong.

So, feeling a little old and tired.

Strolling the produce section at Kroger's.

Suddenly, I spot a guy I THINK I know, and give him a big, friendly smile. Then I get a few feet closer and see --- it is NOT the guy from synagogue that I know. That guy is just a little taller and a little thinner than this guy.

But he is smiling, too.

I said "Oh, we don't know each other, do we? I thought you were this professor I know..."

He, still smiling, said "No, we don't know each other, but I think we should."

I said something inane and laughed and moved on...but I can tell you -- that little encounter left me smiling for a long time! Made my day! No, my week!

I felt younger for quite awhile!

Mind-numbingly tired and sad

Arrived at 7:30 this morning; we're a one-car family till that ignition problem in the van gets fixed. Did one, simple Neighbors page. Only it wasn't so simple, as I learned when Dawn proofed my page and it was full of red marks! And it looked so easy when Mercy did it last week, teaching me. Learned some stuff about compiling a big calendar I'll be doing. Learned more about compiling info for Neighbors pages. Learned that my computer is not set up to print the page to the Output stage, as it should. So that's the tired part.

Heard that Kurt, from the newsroom, has a type of lung cancer -- a really benign kind, if that can be said about lung cancer. So that made people's hearts heavy at work today. I can't stop thinking how unfair it is. Kurt is a kind, decent human being and I hate it that he has to go through that...

Andrea was really nice to me, checking to see if I was doing OK. And it was in the middle of a tough day for her, trying to figure out the phone mess with the phone company guy.

I arranged my new desk, and really like sitting there. But I am just SO TIRED. And I was so embarrassed that when my page got proofed, there were so many little things to fix. Then I didn't leave work till 6:45. I am now sitting like a zombie in front of the TV.

Live and learn. I hope.

Just let that light turn green already!

Me in my office, Friday, Nov. 9. Moving to another desk over the weekend.

The past few days. Well. Learning some stuff about how to do the jobs I am taking over Monday. Talking to a couple of different people about taking over jobs I have been doing for years. Doing my current work. Cleaning up and sorting stuff out from my desk. Trying to figure out why my office phone number will be on Monday (it is changing to 812 331-4349). So, all this was going on Friday, when the computer guys said "Hey, Lynne, we want to use your computer as a guinea pig and see if you can set it up at the new desk and see if everything works ok..." And Carol got teary-eyed, and so did I, at the thought of having shared an office for the past four years and now, not. And I had spaced out that I had to drive to North high school to pick up Abby, who had had to stay late to make up stuff from being sick this week. And Jordie was still sick with bronchitis at home. So, I'm racing at 4:45 p.m. to get to North, get Abby, get her to Alice's house, get to our house and pick up my dish for the potluck at Beth Shalom and stop by my friend and neighbor Laura Gottlieb's to pick up her disk (which she generously was contributing even though she could not attend the potluck) and then to Beth Shalom. And I got stuck in a huge long line of traffice on Patterson Drive! I had to really focus on breathng slowly! I was about to panic! Luckily, beautiful Phyllis Dumes was there at Beth Shalom, totally gracious and setting up, and Mike and Jen Simpson, busily getting table cloths on...and it all turned out so well -- lots of smiling faces, new people, by the time people walked in at 6 the wine was poured, candles were out on the table, challah, dishes, silverware...and even though Anne Steigerwald was sick, she still sent over her Adam with two big jugs of juice...and Michael Simpson set out ice water. Much good food on the tables. Much fun visiting around. Convivial and kind and home-y. Just the way a Shabbat dinner should be.

But I am so glad this week is over. I know next week is going to be challenging and a little sad. No more editorial page work for me, and that's been my baby for years. But new challenges are good and I'm already making lists of what I have to do...

And I am so going to be more observant about Shabbat. I am thinking of it lately as a golden shining space of bliss and I'm not going to let errands and laundry and stuff to do take it away from me any more. I am going to give myself Shabbat. That's a promise.