sorting myself out...?

phew....things have been kinda nutty lately. there was the getting ready for vacation, then the vacation, applying for jobs, getting back from vacation, getting in trouble at work (again), playing basketball, the constantines show last night, my nan in the hospital, my nan out of the hospital, a trip to cambridge...not counting the things i'm forgetting... so i guess i haven't checked in with myself lately. maybe there's stuff going on in here. cuz there's big stuff.
been to our second wedding of the summer with 2 more in the next 2 months. both of the ones we've been to have been beautiful and lovely and lots of fun and memorable and important, and meaningful and things that we've been so happy to have been a part of. there are also many weddings in the planning stages for next summer. like our own wedding. so lots of big stuff there. big feelings and big talks.
had to say goodbye to one of my favourite places on earth last weekend. sarah's mom's cottage has been sold and we won't be able to make it up again before the closing date. it was really special to have adam, michelle, dan and shannon there to send it off in style. getting good friends together is severely underrated. i love those guys.
getting back from vacation has not been easy. i've been so tired all week that i spent the first few days moving at vacation speed, but that wore off...or at least the pleasant lassitude (i think that's a word, and i think that's what it means...) wore off. things have come up this week. my sister is having a sorta rough time. her baby-daddy (former fiancee and father of her son) lost his job a little while ago and so she's real broke. couldn't make it into town to see our cousin dallas play last night (he's the bass player for the constantines). we're not real rich right now either but we're gonna try to find a little in our budget to help her out every month. wish we could make real contributions though. i honestly believe in the village raising the child idea, and we're a part of ryan's (my nephew) village i guess. he's a pretty great kid too. starting to remember us now.
of course this leads to budgetary frustration and a sense of ... something undefinable large and complicated and negative... and then the career frustrations and self recrimination of a 30 year old man as a lowly retail clerk. i haven't been able to land any promotions at indigo. i'm 0 for 7 in fact. we can throw out a couple of those cuz i probably just applied to early (without enough experience or time on the job at indigo.) and we can throw out a couple more for bad luck or bad timing (somebody better applied, or they just hired another new-to-management type or something, or they just closed a big store and wanted to find a place for the displaced employees before promoting anybody new...) but i'm getting a little frustrated.
actually it might be a moot point these days cuz since i got in trouble a few weeks ago i'm not allowed to apply for any promotions to supervisory roles (99% of all available positions that pay better...) until i prove that i've resolved my anger frustration expression issues...(no set timetable - thanx boss).
in fairness, it would seem that i do have some emotional expression issues. not necessarily news to everybody i'm sure. not necessarily news to me either, just ... a thing.... that i'm now starting to try to work harder at resolving...? runs in the family. partly it's cuz it's taken me 30 years to figure out what things i grew up with aren't normal, and to try to figure out what normal and/or acceptable behaviour is.
speaking of family - my nan went into the hospital early this week cuz she couldn't keep any food down. the suspicion was that a change in her meds had triggered it, but they needed to do some tests, and put her on an iv to get some food into her. turned out the suspicions were correct but it was a little background stresser all week until the tests came back to show no new troubles.
we went to see my nan and grandpa yesterday, and my sister and nephew. (he cheers up my grandparents. me too.) had a decent visit. they were both tired so we didn't stay too long. enough to enjoy their company and to tell them about our plans to get married next august. that was nice. they didn't ask about any church presence at the ceremony so we didn't tell them there wouldn't be any. i think they probably already suspect and are praying for us accordingly.
i had a good talk with fogel last night about a career in teaching. it was pretty reassuring and helpful. it's just so hard to hold onto any certainty about doing it. it's hard to balance the desire to make a life instead of just a living (sometimes it seems like a chasm between making a life instead of just making rent...) with needing some more immediate improvement. i feel like i have some responsibility in the present as well as in the long term, and there seem to be opportunities to increase my income now - not that i'm having much luck in that department. i wish i had some skills that somebody would actually want to use that might be worth something. and it's really hard to walk away from benefits too. what to do what to do what to do....
wow it's busy in here.
actually this was a helpful exercise. sometimes it's good to lay things out and see that actually there are a lot of sticks in this pile. get some perspective. therefore give myself a break. and/or motivate myself...?
here we go. start small. put away the clean laundry that was washed and folded 4 days ago.
yay sunday.