"A Marvelous Day"

My sweet perfect Grandma Robinson passed away this morning. She was my love, my mother, my teacher, my sounding board, my connection to faith, and one of my very best friends. She told family and friends all day yesterday with smiles on her face “Today is a marvelous day”.

Day 50

I would assume that I have this whole thing licked and that I will never again be hit with the urge to smoke. It feels like its over. However my cousin had been quit for 3 months before she broke down. Like with any addiction, all it takes is once and you are back to practicing the habit as if you had never quit. So I am trying to stay vigilant and guarded. I have no idea how long it will take before I feel "safe" or like I can trust myself. It was just last week that I sat on Beth's patio and wanted one so bad, and at that moment I regretted quitting because just "One" smoke in the Autumn air would have rocked um out. But instead....I went in.

EGGS

I read an article all about eggs and the good ones are almost all used up by age 35. I am not OLD enough to have discarded all my good Eggs. Time, and clocks, and big hands and tons of pressure. Annie and I had eggs for breakfast. My egg didn’t... drop yet this month. Will it ever again? I found the shell of an egg on the ground outside today. Isent that weird? Suddenly EGGS, they are everywhere. They are all I can think about. What the hell is the matter with me? I Googled EGGS in order to be able to visually express how I feel. But now I feel shame for my panic and embarrassment for what could be considered desperateness. Maybe it is. Or maybe its because whatever I am feeling it feels insanely private (but I can't figure out why) therefore going against all my instincts to share it on the internet. I am going to anyways. All of a sudden my monthly inconvenience is a lifeline to my future and I feel it slipping away and I am scared to death. I cry about it sometimes. It's horrible all those times I was angry at my Eggs for getting in the way of my life and now they are the only way to continue it. I feel great big guilt for resenting them when I was 13 and 24 and 31.

Girlfriend In a Coma

Annie got sick last weekend or maybe it was the weekend before. It was this whole thing where we ended up in the ER on a weekend night. It cost a ton of money, kept us up until one in the morning and the Dr. diagnosed her with seizures which I knew was ridiculous, all though if she were to drop into a seizure it wouldn’t really surprise me. Not much could surprise me at this point (not that I am calling on the fates to teach me a lesson). I sometimes expect to wake up and find my little girlfriend in a coma (which reminds me of a fabulous song), so I poke at her and wait for her to react by getting up, sighing and then walking to the end of bed before collapsing in exhaustion again. Anyway Annie started limping a few days ago and won’t jump up on anything…even me, which should make me happy but really doesn’t because it means she is hurting. I feel bad for her because with her allergies acting up it’s been over a month since she felt decent. I am worried that it is something serious and at the same time preying that I won’t have to fork out another chunk of my savings. It all makes me feel sorry for myself and for Anna Banana.

My New Favorite Thing

Sleeping in a new house for the first week was really nerve wracking but I expected it to get better with a little time. Instead I have spent the last four months planning escape routes for me and Annie in case the Boogie Man decided to make an appearance. To say that I have missed only a few hours of sleep while worrying about every single little noise I heard would be an understatement. I have also considered what would happen if there were a fire while we slept. Or what if the Boogie Man or a fire happened while I was at work and Annie were trapped in the house? And that my friends, is where my story begins, with worry and upset for four long months.
So, last week Annie wakes up in the middle of the night, and starts barking in her “OMG there is someone in our freakin house” voice and goes bellowing down the stairs and into our TV room. From a dead sleep I sat straight up, heart pounding, eyes wide, befuddled and disoriented. I had run through this scenario a million times in my head, I knew exactly what to do.
In complete panic I said out loud “OH MY GOD. OKAY, THIS IS IT, ITS HAPPENING” as I threw the covers off of me and jumped out of bed. I then grabbed my sweat pants and pulled them on, fumbled for my keys and cell phone on the night stand, turned on the lamp and slipped my feet into some flip flops. You may be thinking “Wow, all that, I would just get out of the house” but you should know that I had this so well planned that all these things took place in about a 5 second time span. I was awesomely fast, like a trained fire fighter getting into his fire truck and I am now pretty proud of myself. Anyways, I then go flying down the stairs (really I was running with super freak speed), and landed in the TV room where Annie was now sitting with total patience. I did not yet see the intruder but I knew he was there. I then said in my loud “I am totally not freaking kidding you better get your ass over here and mind me” voice, “ANNIE COME HERE”. Of course she didn’t because she’s Annie and to date has yet to come to me except when bribed with treats. Why would I think a serial killer in our house would make any difference to her? This was about the time that I realized Annie was totally calm and there was in fact no one in our house. I sat down on the stairs and stared at my dog who was now licking herself. And there I was, one o’clock in the morning, my sweat pants on backwards, sitting on my stairs with keys, cell phone, and the total quietness of my empty house. This was the low point. I had to make a change. Obviously I was not going to quit worrying about it and something had to be done. And so the decision was made, I needed to get an alarm system.
Yesterday my new alarm/fire system was installed. There are motion sensors and wires and smoke detectors. It’s a real dream. I was so excited that I was not going to get killed last night that I couldn’t sleep. I am in love. I love this thing so much that every time I arm and disarm it I giggle. And when I woke up at 3:00 am for a potty break, I purposely tripped the alarm, just so I could turn it off. It was loud and woke Annie up and she made her annoyed stop waking me up noise. Ahhh sweet revenge for not coming to me when I asked.

Beck

My little (I think he is 3 or 4 years old) cousin came up to me last night and pointing at a cup I was holding said "Texie, can I have one of your sunflower seeds?" I said "Oh these are just the shells I have spit out; you don't want one of these they are gross." He then covered his mouth and with a worried expression whispered "I ate two of them". I smiled and said to his Mom "Beckett ate two shells out of my spit cup". She closed her eyes and quickly replied "Yeah I heard I'm just processing."

Day 18

It has now been 18 days since I last smoked. It was one of the hardest things I have ever done, I had to quit taking Chantix because it turned me into a crazy lady. The second I quit taking the Chantix all of the nicotine withdrawls came flooding on in, but I decided that no matter what I was not going to smoke. I was always afraid of quitting "Cold Turkey" because it sounded like torture. And it certainly was. The first week was offal. But it was not as bad as I always made it out to be. Now I am in week 3 without a cigarette and everything seems better. I think I can do this and I am so excited that I already have really.
I have a new found belief that there is nothing a pack of Jolly Ranchers and Davids Sunflower seeds cannot get me through if they could get me through that first week.
So its kinda lame that I am bragging like this but...yea me...I did it....well, I mean I probably did it.