5 Weeks Later....

So it's been 5 weeks since I joined the gym and I can proudly say I have been attending faithfully! Except for the week I spent at the lake (well...10 days there actually) I've gone at least 3x a week and sometimes 4. And the week at the lake I did a lot of walking and swimming (actually swam across the lake 3 times...with my noodle of course!) So I've been pretty active ~ more so than in a long time!

I've only managed to drop 5 pounds, but my shape is changing. Not dramatically - but enough to encourage me to keep at it! I have to drive right by the gym each afternoon when I leave work so it's hard to not go. Yesterday I drove right by and then turned around and went back. Good girl, Lora!

I plug in my earphones and watch Dr. Phil while I'm on the treadmill and then move on to the machines. There are people bigger than me and smaller than me so I don't feel all that self-conscious. Back in the day when you went to the gym it was a fashion parade. You know - the high cut leotards, tight, leg-warmers and headbands. (see pic!) Thanks goodness we've progressed to being more dedicated to our health than our outfits!

Yesterday I read a quote on Spark-People from a member that said "I am a work in progress...and if I want to progress - I have to work!" That's gonna' be my new mantra!

Last Saturday I went to the beach with my youngest daughter. It was so much fun! We brought some lunch and spread out our towels and soaked up the sunshine in between dips in the lake because it was so hot! Tuesday night I went out to dinner with my 2 sisters and sister-in-law. We found a nice restaurant overlooking the lake and ate outside. I just love summer! And last night I went yet once again to the lake with 6 of my old high school friends to a nice outdoor restaurant that overlooked the harbour. I grew up less than 10 minutes from Lake Ontario and yet never seem to get there enough. And now 3 times in one week! Yoohoo!

I can't believe it's almost August. Where has the summer gone? I ave 2 more trips to the cottage (this on a smaller lake - not one of the Great Lakes!) my class reunion and then my daughter's wedding. And then the night air will start getting a nip in it, the leaves will begin to turn color and I'll find myself wearing a sweater to work. I love fall too - but fall always comes with winter on it's heels...and we all know how I hate snow!

But until then - I'm going to enjoy the sunshine!

Happy Dad's Day and other ramblings...

It's Father's Day and guess where I am? Sitting in my office at work.....killing time. I had to visit a church today on this side of town (1/2 hour from home) for a volunteer recruitment gig and had a big lapse between services so I came here.

It's quiet...and it's nice to get to visit with the volunteers that come here on weekends. I never really get to meet the folks who come during the hours I'm not here except on the phone - so this is nice. Except that I'm wearing a skirt and high heels and all I can think about is getting them off and jumping into my shorts and flip flops!

We're having the family over for a picnic this afternoon. Hubby is setting up the big blowup water slide we bought last year for the kids and the weather is supposed to cooperate!

So.....on Friday I drove past the gym that is down the street from where I work for the umpteenth time and decided this time that I would stop in and check out that special they have going for summer. An hour later I walked out with a 2 year contract and a promise from the 102 pound gal that talked me into it - that in 4-6 weeks she's have me seeing results.

Heaven knows I certainly have some motivating factors in my life to make me want to do this. Um...wait a minute. I think I've been saying that for several years now.... but really - I do! My Class reunion is coming up in August and I can't possibly skip it. It's being hosted at my house! We have the big yard - pavilion - outdoor bathroom and kitchen - so we can easily accommodate everyone.... So there's motivator #1. Then there's my daughter's wedding in September. When the other 2 got married 4 years ago (in a double wedding) I vowed I would lose weight. I thought I'd lost enough to at least look okay - but when the pictures came back - I looked like a giant blueberry. So the Sept. wedding is motivator #2. Moving on to #3 - this one is a ways off - but I'm hoping that it will keep me accountable for any weight I do manage to take off. My sisters and I are going to Florida again in March. To celebrate another milestone birthday like we did last fall.

So I'm hoping to keep me relationship with afore mentioned gym. I'm in it for 2 years - so I'd better! Besides - flashbacks from my traumatic shopping trip last week to buy a swimsuit should keep me going.

I swear....I'm getting to the point where I should be needing to take a Valium before that kind of a shopping trip. Not that I take Valium - but it sure would've helped! Anyway - found a suit that helped camouflage my lesser features (or maybe "greater" would be a more fitting desciptor?) forked over the money and left. That probably explains the reason my car turned into the parking lot of the gym last Friday.

I'll keep you posted.

Happy Father's Day ~ enjoy!

Saying Goodbye When You Don't Want To....

Shortly after I wrote my last post one of those life altering events occurred in my life...the kind that causes you to mark time in a before and after mode. As I get older my life seems to get categorized into chunks of time. Like before and after the month I lost my parents. Or before and after my husband died. And now it's been divided even further. Into before and after my brother-in-law took his own life.

No one knew the pain and torment he was going through. Until it was too late. The saga began with his disappearance..a week of searching....and my sister finding him moments before he put a gun into his mouth and ended his torment.

And now we are all left with the all of the unanswerable questions that plague the survivors after a suicide. Our lives have been shaken to the core. We walk through our days in a fog as we try to manage our grief. So many emotions. Guilt... Sadness... Anger... Denial... My brother-in-law was my late husband's best friend. Way before my sister and I came into their lives.

This is one of those time where words aren't flowing as easily as they usually do. I just felt the need to explain my absence and ask for a few prayers. For my sister. For her three children.

Thanks...

Thinking of My Mother....

Yesterday was a rather surreal day. It was one of those days where God was working behind the scenes but revealed enough of Himself to let me know He was there. I'll preface with a little history....

The year was 1976. I was a freshman in college and dirt poor. All college students are, right? Mother's Day was coming up and I wanted to give my mom something special but had no money. So I wrote her a poem. Hokey....yes. But it was from the heart. Really. I typed it up on my little manual typewriter (there were no word processors back then) on several half-sheets of onion skin typing paper and taped them all together to make a scroll. She loved it.

Flash forward to 1997. Mom has just died and my sisters and I are standing in her bedroom trying to absorb her lingering scent, touch her clothes, handle the pretty figurines on her dresser...anything to connect with her somehow while her essence is still in this room. In a few short hours we will go to her calling hours with my dad.

I open the top middle drawer on her bureau and there I find a bunch of letters and notes and cards all held together with a rubber band. Some letters from my dad, a note to the tooth fairy from my little sister, various cards from over the years.....and my little scrolled poem from that Mother's Day 21 years before. I read it through my tears and clutch it to my heart. The words I'd penned meant even more now. Now that I was a mother myself. Now that she was gone.

I stuff it quickly in my purse because we are late and head off to the funeral home. I think of putting the little scroll in with her in the casket but decide to keep it. Between viewings we head off to a restaurant with the aunts and uncles for dinner. It is there that I realize it is gone! I call the funeral home frantically and ask them to check for it. I go through the restaurant with a fine tooth comb. I search my car. It's nowhere and in the delicacy of my grief at that moment I feel utterly crushed. That night I drive back to the parking lot of the restaurant and search with a flash light. Nothing. It's gone. Forever.

There was reporter in our local paper at that time named Carol Ritter. She wrote a folksy column about everyday happenings and often specialized in helping her readers locate things. An old recipe, a certain antique...stuff like that. So I write to her and plead my case. Could she please ask her readers to watch out for my little scroll if the found it? And if someone had found it - could they please send it back to me? She didn't answer my letter so after a week or so I called and left a message. I received a call back on my answering machine the next day. Very curt and to the point. "I don't do last and found anymore." For several years after that, I couldn't look at her picture next to her column without being a little mad.

Flash forward another thirteen years. Last month I am at my organization's annual fundraising gala. Because I am one of the key staff members, hubby and I are seated at the table with the guest speakers. One of the speakers, who does the auction part of the evening is none other than- Carol Ritter! All of the memories come rushing back. Here I am sitting face to face with this woman and I want so bad to tell her about my little scroll. And how she could've helped but she didn't. But I don't. Because that was so long ago and I know she wouldn't remember anyway. Besides, I'd come to terms with the fact that the words I'd penned those many years ago were lost and it really wasn't her fault. So I'm cordial and I smile and make small talk. But the little scroll has once again found a way into the corners of my mind and I think of it...and mom.

So now it's yesterday. I am cleaning out some stuff in the basement in anticipation of our future move. I lug out my old hope chest that has not been opened in over 16 years - since the last move. It's all dusty and musty but I plod through it and spend way more time than I need to - handling all it's contents gently as I revisit the past. Old corsages from proms...love letters from the guy I almost married....pay stubs from my first job back in 1973 (I was making $1.65 an hour!)...lots of loose pictures....notes scratched on napkins......matchbooks....a notebook with magazine pictures taped to its pages of furniture that I wanted to decorate my house with when I married aforementioned boyfriend. Ghastly stuff in lime green and orange! (it was the 70's - what can I say?)

Then way back in the corner of the bottom drawer I find a wad of notebook paper all crumbled up. There are two sheets and one is torn in half. Something I must've meant to throw away at one time but decided not to and stuffed it into the hope chest. As I gently unroll the wad I see that it is the rough draft of the poem I'd written for mom 34 years ago! It was all there - every line! I thought I'd never see those words again! Reminiscent of the last time I came across that poem - I clutch the wad of paper to my heart and whisper a thank you to God.

The surreal part of it all....that after all these years I'd run into Carol Ritter again and think about the poem once more. That this would all happen so very close to Mother' Day....and that I would find my precious poem....on the eve of the anniversary of Mom's death. You see, she went to be with Jesus 13 years ago today. And I miss her so very much.

So here's the poem. A little hokey (like I mentioned) but I was only 18....

A Prayer for Mother's Day

Not a day goes by I do not pray

And thank the Lord above

For the mother that he's given me

Her thoughts, her words, her love.

I thank Him for the way she has

Of making each day brighter

Understanding all my cares and fears

So that my burdens might be lighter.

And I thank Him for the times we have

To sit and talk a while

Whether arguing or whispering

Through tears or through a smile.

And then I'll sit and think a bit

Of How she'll give and never take

How she'll do it in her children's names

and for her children's' sake.

Then I'll think of all the worries

And the problems she must bear

But there's always time enough for us

Time enough to care.

And she never seems too busy

Never seems too worn

To lend an ear or helping hand

Whenever I'm forlorn.

She'll just look at me and smile

And then through loving eyes

She'll answer all my questions

All the who's - the what's - the whys.

And I'll just sit and listen

When all at once I'll see

There's not a greater friend in all the world

As this woman here by me.

For there's no one I trust more than her

In who I can confide

And know that through the thick of it

She'll be ever at my side.

No one else could be so patient

No one else could be so true

No one else could ever understand

The way that mothers do.

So I'll repent for all the wasted times

In vain I always fought her

And will remember always God

She's my mother - I'm her daughter.

And though others may spend all their lives

Searching the whole world round

The mother that they're looking for

Has already been found.

And maybe when she read this

She'll cry and make a fuss

But that's just another of her special ways

Of saying she loves us.

And I can't think of a better time

Or a better way to say

How very much she means to me

Than on her special day.

So here's to a Happy Mother's Day

May God hold you in his palm

And may you never have to ask me

Just how much I love you, Mom!

Call Me Old-fashioned...."

Is it just me or is anyone else a bit flabbergasted at the "graceful" return of Tiger Woods? Almost reminiscent of the Clinton debacle... where my innocent little girls learned what "oral sex" was. Gheesh!

I'm all for restoring a repentant sinner. I'm certainly not perfect and have made my share of mistakes. But it's a little disheartening to consider our society has reached the point where we are willing to "overlook" pretty blatant indiscretions and just get back to business as usual.

Consider these recent headlines: "

Tiger Woods gets best wishes from his jilted porn star Joselyn James"

"Tiger Woods lost his moral compass - not his swing!"

"Tiger Woods wife Elin not to attend Masters"

There was a time when a person's moral character would make or break them. That's the mantra I repeated to my daughters over and over as they were growing up. Especially when Bill and Monica were taking over the headlines.

I'm a little scared for our society.

The House That Love Built.....

Lately I've had writer's cramp. Have ya' noticed? Used to be my blog posts would begin forming in my head no matter where was or what I was doing. Reminds me of my late brother-in-law...he wrote a column for a local newspaper and often times in the midst of an activity he'd start staring off in the distance and one of hi s kids would say..."I sense a future column in the works!"

The past few months though, for me, have been somewhat dry in the idea process. I guess with the new job and the house in its final stages - my mind has been (shall we say...) pre-occupied. We've been working on the house for so long now (we broke ground in April of 2007!) that some of the walls already need re-painting! I often walk through the rooms (none of which are completely finished yet) and try to imagine us living there. I can't tell you how many times I've stepped into the new shower - closed my eyes - and pretended it was all done and I was really in there for a shower. Is that weird? (C'mon I know you guys must do weird things like that too...right?)

I keep bringing over little things to make it home-like (as much as it can be in the midst of sawhorses and ladders and buckets of tools...) like this little red lamp that I put on an old table in the master bedroom. Or the lace curtains I hung up in the bathroom that has the aforementioned shower - but no toilet or sinks yet. There is a single wine goblet in one of the cupboards in the kitchen (still no counter tops mind you) and an old chair that we found on the side of the road last fall that I knew would be perfect in the guest room. I sit on that chair sometimes too (eyes closed of course) and pretend that the room is finished.

Sometimes, when I start feeling impatient and get a little grumpy because the house is taking so l-o-n-g - I have to remind myself how lucky I am to be able to be able to be "starting over" at this phase in my life with everything all new and different. I never really had a lot of new stuff. We always made do with other people's cast offs and were thankful that they were at least "new" to us. To be able to actually pick out things the way I want them - that reflect me and who I am and what I love has been a real treat. So if it's taking longer than I expected (and those of you who have been following me for some time know exactly how long that has been!)then I can wait a little more.

Underneath the drywall in the kitchen - written between the existing studs on the old backer wall is a note I scrawled in marker to inspire hubby & I as we worked.

It reads: Don't focus on the destination so much....that you forget to enjoy the journey.

Someday...many, many years from now - some young couple may be tearing apart the walls in a remodeling project and find the note. Perhaps they will wonder about us....and the house that love built...

Wnter Warmth....

I'm sitting here at my desk - have finished my newsletter, returned all necessary phone calls, reviewed the residents' charts and had my obligatory cup of coffee. And decided to post on my blog....haven't been able to do that as regularly as I'd like.

The sun is shining right now and it almost feels like spring! The other day as I was walking to my car in the morning I actually heard birds chirping! Even though there is still a foot of snow in some places around here - I do believe that we are turning the page on a new season.

I love spring! It signifies the end of winter and is the prelude to summer. (I love summer even better!) When late hubby was still here, on the first real sunny day of spring - we would open the garage door and position our chase lounges so that we were blocked from the wind but sitting smack in the middle of the sunlight - turn the radio on and close our eyes and pretend we were sitting on some exotic beach somewhere.

Neither of us were fans of the snow and cold.

When the kids were younger we decorated our finished basement in a beach theme. Painted the walls a sand color - installed an aqua carpet and hung pictures of beaches, light houses and seashells all around. It was our escape from winter get-away. One time we set up the patio umbrella table down there, cranked up the kerosene heater so it felt warm and almost humid, and lit some coconut candles. I made a macaroni salad and hubby pulled the gas grill under an eave outside and cooked some hot dogs. With a jar of dill pickles and a bag of chips we had our own little picnic with the kids - smack dab in the middle of February.

Those were good times!

I miss that the girls are all grown up now. And I miss that I seem to be so busy these days that I don't give into the spontaneity that used to be such a big part of my life. So two weeks ago I decided to have snow day with my 5 year old grandson. We bundled up and went over to the new house where grandpa was working. First we had a snowball war. Then we followed deer tracks into the woods. We hiked down the path that leads to the swamp (and I got a soaker!) We built a snowman with a fat orange carrot for a nose and real charcoal chunks for his eyes and mouth. We gathered wood and made a big roaring campfire that we sat at as we munched on crackers and let our wet mittens dry on a branch nearby.

At one point the little guy looked up at me with his big round blue eyes and said "Gramma - this is the funnest thing ever!"

These are still good times....!