Grief

 Grief is a black hole in your heart. Nothing can fill it. You can't fill it with books, or music, or food. You can't fill it with projects or work. You can distract yourself with those things, bury it for awhile, but it comes back on you when you least expect it.

When grief catches up to you, everything is colored by sadness. Everything hurts. You might smile at some amusing distraction, or even laugh at a joke and then immediately return to aching. The sadness is so great it's like a physical thing that's far bigger than you.

There was a person, who meant so much to you, maybe more than you knew or acknowledged, and now that person is gone from your life. Everything they touched in your life, even things you didn't realize, is now forever changed. 

As a Christian, I believe in an afterlife. I believe that I will see my father again. That doesn't make it hurt less, or lessen that sadness I feel today. The many things that I've thrown at the emptiness in myself have not filled it up at all.

There are many people in the world tonight who are grieving, and I feel for them. I wish them peace, even while I sit here feeling that it is far distant. It is a beautiful thing to have loved someone. Some day that may be a consolation. Tonight, I am just sad.

Last Year; That's Why

 Last year was a very bad year for me. I can back it up to summer of 2021, when my husband resigned from his job. I had been reading books about goal setting and had plans in place to improve our finances, but Hubby hit a wall with burnout and had to step away.

 In September of that year, seeing that he was not yet ready to return to work, I took a second job. A second retail job. If you've ever worked retail, you know how thankless a job it can be. So I had two of them, not both full time, of course, but I was consistently working 50+ hours a week. It was tiring, to say the least. By early 2022, I was winding down, really wanting to get back to one job. 

Then in April, my father passed away from heart failure. The first few weeks after that things sort of seemed to stop. I took a week off from work, then decided I needed the distraction that work provided. Between two jobs, driving kids around, and not really dealing with grief, I hit a breaking point. Things needed to change.

My manager had transferred to a different store in April, and our assistant manager moved up to her position. That left an opening for Assistant Store Manager. I applied, knowing it was a long-shot. What I got out of it was a half hour sit-down discussion with my Regional Manager about my two jobs, what I wanted to accomplish at my full time job, and how to get there. He asked me what I needed to make in order to quit my second job. I had the number for him. He told me I wasn't quite ready to move into management, but we made a plan for me to step up to Department Lead, which would put me in place to move up to Supervisor. 

By the end of the summer, I was the Farm department lead, but still doing the books and other bookkeeper things that belonged to my previous position, as well as a big update of our tax exempt records for customers, which had a six month deadline and I'd already started. I got a raise, but not yet enough to quit job number two.

There was talk about one of the supervisors retiring. She had talked of retiring in June, but it didn't happen. Then it was January, but she suddenly stepped down in November, the day before Thanksgiving(the last work day before Black Friday). So we were down one supervisor. I applied for the job, as well as four other associates from our store. I got the job, put in my notice at the part time job, and started my training. 

Somewhere in all this, I took a week off, where the grief caught up with me and I cried for four days. We went to Michigan for our 20th wedding anniversary, which was a nice trip, but we were both tired. We bought a ridiculous amount of Mackinac fudge. 

After two interviews with the corporate trainer and several training checklists, I have now been officially promoted to Floor Supervisor. I am making enough to support my family. Hubby is talking about going back to work in the Spring, after our youngest gets her driver's license and can get herself to work.

I'm still grieving the loss of my dad. I'm still trying to fill a hole, I think, although nothing can fill it. I'm still seeking something that would make him proud of me or make me feel like I'm not wasting the start he gave me in life or the many things he taught me. 

Writing is my escape plan. It's my focus for where I want my life to go. It's the one thing I can do that really brings me any sort of satisfaction or joy, except maybe music. That's why the 1,000 word per day goal. That's why the outlining.

Blogging and the Super Duper Plans for 2023

 Dear Reader,

After a few years of trying out other blogs, I've decided to revive this one. I still have the blog for my writing, although I'm currently locked out(they were bought out and my sister has the new password). I've also got a blog about my new interest in financial independence and early retirement, commonly known by the acronym of FIRE. I've started and deleted two other blogs as well.

While I'll probably keep all three of the current blogs going for awhile, I'm going to try to keep things centralized here. I can write about anything here, and I like the easy style of blogger.

On to the planning phase of 2023. I like plans. I like to sit down and make goals and plan how to achieve them. The trouble comes in implementing and staying on track. Life has a way of laughing at my plans and throwing curve balls at me until I forget where I was going and how I was going to get there.

Other than blogging, I'm working steadfastly on my writing this year. I've been writing a minimum of 1,000 words a day on my fiction, including outlines. Outlines are also a new things for me. I don't outlining. My pantser self likes to write a story as though I'm reading it, not really knowing where it's going, or at least how it's going to get there. Eventually, that excitement dies down and the story gets to the point where it needs more structure than I've given it. That's where the outlines will come in handy. Granted, the stories are already in the works. The outlines are a guide, something to remind me of where the plots are supposed to be and help me not to drop them.

As far as word count goes, a thousand words a day is one full draft of a fantasy novel a year, or four to six other novels. Should I get tired of my fantasy book, I can move on to another story idea and keep going. There are endless ideas and words to be expressed, and this is probably the most exciting plan I have for this year.

Another of my plans is to organize my life. I'm not talking minimalism here, but there are places where we could stand to cut back. The less stuff you have to deal with, the easier it is to take it in hand. This includes cleaning schedules, budgeting and monetary goal setting, and just downsizing the "stuff" component in general. 

I'm also open to challenges and experiments, so if you happen to have a suggestion, feel free to comment or contact me.

Thanks and Happy New Year!

 

P.S. Tomorrow is my Grandma's 91st birthday. Happy Birthday Grandma!

Writing and Editing

Dear Reader,

It's a sad thing to feel like I've kept up this blog better than ever and then realize that I haven't actually posted in seven months.

So far, 2018 is a year of changes. I have a new, full-time job at a farm store. I finished the first draft of the novel I've been writing on and off for about 13 years(8 if you don't count the 5 years I hardly touched it after my youngest child was born). I rewrote most of it last year, but I'm still counting back to the early days.

I have also started up an online editing business, which has two clients, a website, and a scant social media presence that I really should work on increasing.

Now that the first draft of the mainstream fiction novel is done, I'm working on the murder mystery I started a couple years ago. I'm a little disappointed to see that I haven't written nearly as much as I thought I had, but I'm fairly pleased with what's there. I know who the killer is, am working on the motive, and am slowly accepting that this genre may require an outline. I am not a fan of outlines.

The best part about mysteries, which I have toyed with in fanfics, is foreshadowing. Unlike live-posted fanfic updates, I get to go back through this book and add things. Misdirection, clues, more questions than answers -- all of these things are fun to work with. That is, until I get to the end and have to wrap it all up. But that's so far in the future I don't even worry about it.

Take care, Reader.

Until next time.....


P.S. I put a daily serial story on my author website during Lent. That was also a blast.

First Snow! and other things.....

Dear Reader,

It is snowing in central Wisconsin!  Husband has the day off and he took me to breakfast at Denny's.  Very filling breakfast, but the food was only so-so.  When we left the restaurant, it had just started snowing, but I didn't count it until we got home and found that it was snowing here too.

I like first snows because they're pretty and they don't stick.  I'm really not ready for winter driving.

In other news, my asthma is flaring up.  Recent mold exposure caused two attacks this week.  My lungs hate me right now.  The good news is that my rescue inhaler works.  I also got to try out the local clinic's health portal website.  My doctor is prompt in replying to messages. 

I've decided that I much prefer this blogging platform to Weebly.  It loads faster and allows me to change the title of a post more easily.  My author page is through Weebly, so I'm sort of stuck with it for author blogging, at least for now. 

I'm going to try to write something now.  I have a scene I may adapt and place into chapter eleven of my novel-in-progress.  I'm not sure yet that it will fit, but I'll know in an hour or so.

Take care, Reader!

Wow, This Blog is Still Here

Dear Reader,

I was thinking about this blog tonight, and I decided to see if it still exists in cyberspace.  Well, what do you know? It does!

Previously, at Patronized Saint.....

I was doing the P90X workouts, I believe.  Tony Horton did not kill me.  I couldn't hack Phase C and a bunch of personal stuff hit me about that time so I gave up on it. 

This poor blog has been more neglected than ever, partly because I've switched my focus to writing.  This year I'm hitting it hard, and I have a blog on my author page which gets slightly more attention than this one does.

I think I'll keep this blog though.  I like it.  I may even remember to come and post on it once in a blue moon.

Phase B

Dear Reader,

I have survived phase A of my P90 program.  I am still not following the nutritional plan, but I have managed to lose 3/4" from my waist, which though small, is encouraging.  I have given up desserts for Lent, so that should help with my extra evening calorie fight.  I feel stronger, and my legs are more toned.  That's a good start.

Phase B is underway and it's challenging, but not impossible.  The first day, I felt like I was in pretty good shape, but the workouts still kicked my butt.  I have found that the mixed martial arts moves are still my favorite.  Once I get the hang of them, I really enjoy them and they're the moves I feel most confident doing.  My favorites from phase A are still in the mix, but stepped up a bit with added moves. 

There is a lot more jumping around in month two(plyometrics, I guess they're called) and a lot more planking moves.  So far I'm able to at least hold a plank and do a couple of half push-ups.  I am trying not to think of what I'll have to do in the phase C exercises.

I still like this program, although I am using my exercise inhaler for this second month.  For some reason, the sculpting video causes more breathing issues.  My muscles are all stiff and sore and my knees hurt a bit, but I still feel pretty good and if I can avoid injury and illness, I think I'll be able to keep with it to the end of the program.