I am unbelievably antsy. 

I want to shed the things I own in order to travel, to drop everything and go.  I think it stems from not having traveled much over the last few years of the “economic downturn”.   I’ve reported before of the lovely trips we used to take with hubs employer...those were good days and good times.  (Remember, not “going” was my reason for getting a dog.) 

I miss spending money sometimes but mostly I miss travel.  I miss seeing new things and I miss the relaxation.  Dare I admit that I miss having room service, a never ending banquet of great tropical food and drink.  Indulgence.  I miss indulgence, darn it.  During those times I HAD to shop to BUY new things to wear, to OWN.

I went to Spain and the Canary Islands in one trip.  I don’t think I appreciated it enough at the time. Send me again, please, and I will show you appreciation like you can’t believe.  I will talk endlessly about it. I will effuse, effervesce even.  

These are the things that are rolling through my quiet days.  How I wish I were getting ready for a big trip.  Anywhere, somewhere.  A change of scenery.  Do you? 

I'm all about change.

Now that I have my great little dog, I am back to walking around in the yard for a little while before I prepare myself for the work day.  It's amazing to me how just adding one small thing can change your entire 24 hours.  The little dog requires some exercise and some stretching as she sleeps in a crate.  She requires some care and some affection in the morning, and hey, who doesn't?  


I wasn't one to get up too much before I had to prepare myself for work or whatever.  I just didn't really like mornings so much.  Being a night person, I stayed up late and then slept until I could no longer stay in bed and get on with it.  I liked it.  


Don't get me wrong, I haven't changed completely but the little dog does mean its different.  I have her to think about and she needs to walk.  Well, I'm not going to let her walk around out there by herself, am I?  She needs to prance and dance for me, to show off a bit, to do her turns and paw at me with her silly little feet.  She really needs a belly rub and a treat would be nice, even if she did just eat her breakfast.  


Point is, I'm down there in the yard, walking around in the early morning sunshine.  It's hitting me on the head, it's beating down on my back, it's warming my shoulders and causing me to squint.  I kind of like it.  

Where'd it go?

You know I am a frustrated gardener, right?  It takes so much time, energy and money to have some great flower beds and I have not a spare of any of those.  Here’s the thing, though...where does my time go? And if my time has taken a hike, what the heck happened to my energy? Money? Well, if I had any, I might be able to tell you where it is.  

I saw a commercial the other day regarding, oh, I don’t know, life insurance maybe.  This woman explains that retirement doesn’t mean stop living.  Now, I’m not retired but her story was she retired on a Friday and on Monday was in class, learning how to be a massage therapist.  She’s now working as a massage therapist.  Isn’t that something? Fantastic, really. 

Where do people find it? The ability to be so motivated at an “advanced” age? Is it something we are born with? Learn? Earn? Get bequeathed, like Aunt Ethel’s lace doily collection? Why can one person be so moved to be moving, changing, evolving and others, eh, just, eh? 

I work with some great women.  Motivated, high energy.  All over 50, some over 60 and they are dynamos.  I can’t figure out how I got mixed up with them on some days, on other days, I’m trying to figure out if I want to be.  I am trying to learn from them...get on that bandwagon and do more.  I feel like I use to do a lot and now, eh.  

I think I use to see women such as these women as those who had something to prove, who couldn’t be happy unless they were achieving something, something to point at to say “See?”.  But I don’t feel that way any more.  I think women such as these, and now I know many in their 20s, in their 30s and 40s...not just their 50s and 60s, who just chose to live it to the fullest. Who get ideas and run with them, and why not? Why should they stop?   Maybe they are more motivated because they have allowed themselves to be; they listen, they respond, they do.  

Would one of you come over and do my flower beds? How about the closets I have yet to finish from last week? A massage? Are any of you learning massage? 

Closets

Last year I saw a post from someone, can’t remember who or where, that had started a project to clean out closets.  I’ve done pretty well with our bedroom closet over the past, oh, I don’t know, five years or so, but the other closets were getting pretty out of hand.  I am not someone who hates to throw things away, but it takes me a while. 

So this weekend, I tackled a couple closets.  “Why two at once?” you might ask and I wish I had an answer for that cause it created a lot of chaos.  I just found I needed to move one thing from Closet A to Closet B but that meant I had to make room in closet B and so it began.  

Closet A had a lot of old pictures from my kids high school days in it.  So,  of course I had to sit down for an hour or so and look at those.  Closet B had some childrens books so, of course, I had to sit down and look through those.  I prepared a box for Goodwill and prepared a bag for trash.  I stacked some things for recycling and re-stacked closet shelves.  I was feeling not so bad about the progress.  I managed to condense some boxes and move some cardboard out.  Good for me.  Until I looked at the guest room bed.  I started placing things that needed yet to be determined on the bed.  Old coats, gloves without mates.  Hangers.  My broken reindeer, which is a sore subject around here, and I can’t seem to get rid of it.  

To add to all this chaos, I also sorta started on Closet C.  I began to wonder how this person who posted that she cleaned one closet a month or whatever it was, did it.  I decided to move some cleaning supplies from Closet A to the laundry room (yes, I agree, the laundry room makes much more sense.  Why would anyone put cleaning supplies in Closet A?) But, I needed to do a little spruce up of the area where the cleaning supplies were going.   What’s that? Two empty laundry detergent jugs? Really?  Well, that’s going to mean they need to be turned upside down in the bathroom sink to make sure I get every last drop of detergent out.  Oh, goodness...look at that toilet, I really need to clean that.  Where are the cleaning supplies again? Why don’t I just go ahead and create room in this bathroom closet here for the cleaning supplies I need in here.  Oh, me oh my.  Is that a load of towels that need to be folded? I’ll just throw them on the guest bed and get back to that later because right now I need to scrub the toilet, make room for cleaning supplies, wipe down the laundry room floor, and good gravy the laundry detergent jug just fell over and now, the detergent I was trying to squeeze out is running down the sink drain so I didn’t get it anyway.  

And there are towels on the bed, on top of the coats and the books I pulled out for the grandchildren but need to clear a space on the end table shelf.  All the while, I am making a mental list of the decorating ideas I am coming up with but have yet to share with hubs, who has walked through the house grumbling about lunch a couple of times.  I have also made a list for him, yet to be sprung, and it begins with my broken reindeer.  I am about to make his day.