Fresh off my triumph over college tuition on Friday, I have managed today -- and it's a Sunday -- to completely fuck up my credit card, so much so that I had to email K at school and tell her not to use it today. Ah, the wonder that is me.Enough money stuff, except that I am too embarassed to tell anyone else, so you're it. After I did this stupid thing this morning, I was comforted by trying to convince myself that the worst is behind me, and I have a plan, and at least I don't feel this unhappy being me all the time, like I used to.
I used to. I used to feel that when I could think of something I was good at, I was clutching at straws, trying to hold on with the tips of my claws like that kitten in the "Hang in there!" poster from years back. I was good at my work. My children seemed to be nice people, so I was probably reasonably good at raising them. I was a dutiful daughter and did what I was supposed to do for my parents. It wasn't enough. It was much easier for me to think of all the things I was terrible at -- I'm not going to list them here, but they're rolling around in my head right now -- and despair that anything would ever be different.
But things are different. I fucked up, and life will go on. This is not consuming me; I don't feel like a worthless person, I just feel like I happened to make a mistake. Biiiig difference, let me tell you. I don't feel good about what I did, but I don't feel like jumping off a bridge, either. So listen, if you're ever thinking you might want to try therapy, and you're not sure if you should, take my advice and go for it. I still don't know how it worked, but I know it did.
The Hubs and I went south today to visit his parents. His birthday, as well as his sister's and her husband's, are all in September, and so we have always had the tradition of Birthday Sunday. A few years ago, I gave the MIL license to celebrate my January birthday in September, just to make things easier. So today was Birthday Sunday, but for the first time in 24 years, completely without grandchildren. Three of them are away at college (although one only a half hour from the grandparents) and R is a) having a life, and b) didn't want to be the only one of the "kids" there. Well, it was a very pleasant afternoon; as I mentioned to the MIL at one point, it was very relaxing not having the kids there because this way we could talk about them! And half as many dishes to clear up, and no one jockeying for seats on the couch, and so on.
But the ILs are slowing down some, although they would never admit it. She still puts out a full meal, and, it so happens, always sets a beautiful table. But she made not enough of one thing, and overcooked another, and this is not like her. She still does it all, she just doesn't do it as well as she used to. Also, this was a gift-giving occasion, and although she is well-meaning and generous, she has really never been great at this. I've said it before, I could care less if there are ever gifts, but she does make the effort and always gets it somehow wrong. After all these years, she sees her son as a Medium and not as a Large, and so she gets him beautiful shirts that never fit and have to be returned or else donated somewhere. (And he doesn't go to malls, so he's all for the donating, but I'll exchange it when I can.) And I have yet another purse which I will never use because I have never used a purse like this, ever, in the thirty years I know her and even before. It's a nice purse, just not one I would ever use. It's R's if she wants it, or K's when she comes home in a couple of weeks. At least it's not pink. As for the FIL, I was talking computers with him, along with the brother-in-law, and he gets an awful lot of it but then there's a simple concept he just can't get, and we have to explain around it. The FIL is extremely bright and has always had an amazingly overdeveloped sense of mechanics and even electronics -- he built his own sound studio years ago -- and would so have gotten into computers if they had just surfaced when he was ten years younger. Now, it's a struggle, so that's sad to see.
So, having eaten a full meal at 2:30, I'm not sure whether I had lunch or dinner, and now that it's almost 7:30, I can't decide if I want a meal or a snack or what. K's calling me back in a few minutes, so maybe I'll just wait until after I talk to her and then see what I want. Ooh, peanut butter and jelly. Never out of place. I can even have that while I'm on the phone.
Gotta go.
