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Lighten Up: Day 4

6 Sep

I’ve had a rough week, so I draw a slip with hopes that I will feel better as the project actually intended for me.

Today I draw this slip ~ Take a picture of a flower, maybe frame it

My first thought is: I love taking pictures, and I love flowers. Actually my new thing is allowing myself to buy a bouquet of flowers from the grocery store when I do my shopping every other weekend. It just makes me feel good to smell fresh flowers and to see them in my kitchen. What’s an extra $5 – $10 on the grocery bill?

My second thought is: I am a horrible picture taker. I love to take pictures, but I usually take bad photos.

My third thought is: Oh well, that’s not the point of the exercise so who cares?

So I get to work taking photos of this week’s bouquet stressing about the colors and the lighting…this picture looks horrible. That picture is fuzzy.

Then I finally let it all go.

As I set up for my next shot I eyed the Chiquita watching me. For a moment I watched her watch me. I smiled.

“Aren’t the flowers pretty?”

She giggled.

“Smell the flowers,” I told her, setting the bouquet on the kitchen floor.

She laughed – a big joyous laugh.

Maybe they’re not the best pictures in the world, but what a memory. Laughing with the Chiquita on a trying day and taking these beautiful (in my eyes) photos.

Lighten Up: Day 3

14 Aug

Today I draw this slip ~ Leave a $1.00 on someone’s car/desk (with a note unsigned)

My first thought is: Oh this is an easy one! Good. It’s one I can “get it over with” quickly and painlessly.

My second thought is: What if someone sees me putting this on their car and yells at me to get away from their car?

My third thought is: Maybe this isn’t as easy as I thought it was.

My fourth thought: Omg, you are totally overthinking this.

I get my supplies together. I know what I’m going to do so let’s just start there.

Here is my finished master piece.

I think it looks pretty cool, and I hope someone sees it and is excited to open it, but I’m only imagining myself seeing this on my car and not opening it thinking it’s anthrax.

Now that my project is complete and I sit here typing this post I still can’t decide who to give it to.

Ugh! Why is this so hard?

I would just stick the envelope on some random car in the parking lot across the street from my office building, but it’s actually a rainy day in Chicago.

I decide to go on a walk-a-bout down to the mailbox to brainstorm this a bit. I pass Skinny Jeans’ office and see the office is closed today. Here we go! I can stick the note under the door and they will find it tomorrow morning. What a great plan!

Side note: If you’re wondering about Skinny Jeans, you’re not the only one. I think he may have been working a freelance job because I haven’t seen him for about six months, but I have seen his friend who was in the photo with him. It’s too bad for all of us, I know.

So anyways, I walked back to Skinny Jeans’ office with the envelope in hand. And yes, the lights were still out. Thank goodness. As I walked down the hall I started to think: What if they’re in now? Then what do I do? [Like I can’t just keep walking by.]

I stand outside the door. OK, this is it. I peak inside the dark and peaceful office. I bend down and start to slide the envelope under the door.

Omg.

I suddenly had a brief Office Space moment. That moment when Peter pushes the letter describing his theft from the company under Lumbergh’s office door and then he’s sort of like, shoot, I want the letter back now. I don’t know why, but I sort of did the same thing. As the letter slid off my fingertips I was like: Wait! I want it back!

I tried to slip my fingers under the door in a desperate attempt to get it back. I’m not sure why…I think I was being a perfectionist and I didn’t like the way I slipped the letter under the door…the envelope turned sideways and was therefore vertical. I wanted the envelope facing horizontal so that when the first person walks in the door the ‘Please Open Me’ is facing them.

My take on today’s “Lighten Up” experience: I’m weird and I have serious perfectionist issues. The whole point of the exercise is to get ‘you’ in this case, me, to lighten up, and meanwhile I’m completely stressing myself out. Wow, I have issues. I give myself an F today.

Update: Today I saw one of the workers from Skinny Jeans’ office walking down the hall. He didn’t look all that happy either. I sat at my desk and thought, dude, what is your problem? At least yesterday I was feeling a little blue due to the weather, but today is a beautiful day in Chicago and you got a cute note and a dollar under your door. Can’t you at least smile when you walk down the hall? What is wrong with these people.

Then I remembered that I’m only supposed to be concerned about MY reaction, no one elses. Ugh. And I get another F.

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Lighten Up: Day 2

12 Aug

Today I draw this slip ~ Draw a picture and mail it to the children’s ward at a hospital

My first thought is: Ooooo, this is a fun one! I love to color! I love this idea!

I take out a blank sheet of paper and my new box of crayons.

Side note: I actually just bought myself a brand new box of crayons because the Chiquita’s crayons are a mess. She loses them – I find crayons in the most random places. Others are rubbed down flat. I hate coloring with flat crayons. And when there are colors missing. Yes, I am high-maintenance about coloring! If I’m going to color I need the full rainbow present and a sharp pointed crayon.

So I sit down to color first thing in the morning. When I’m fresh. This will be fun.

Coloring is actually a very good form of therapy. I was taught this in an out-patient program. I can’t tell you why. I just remember they made a bunch of adults sit on the floor in a circle with a bunch of crayons and draw on a blank sheet of paper. Then we had to go around the room and talk about what we drew, why, and how it made us feel. It was kind of weird, but also very cool.

While I was coloring my picture I decided that because I struggle with anxiety which goes hand-in-hand with depression instead of sending my picture to a children’s ward (even though I care deeply for the children) I would instead send my picture to Good Samaritan Hospital’s Behavioral Health Department. I also enclosed a note of encouragement for any patients who may be struggling at this very moment.

My take on today’s “Lighten Up” experience was that I took a few moments to do something that I enjoy doing – and not just with the Chiquita but for myself – and then I sent it off to people who might really really need something like this right now in order to cope with whatever demons they are struggling with in their life. And that feels pretty darn good! :)

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Lighten Up: Day 1

10 Aug

Today I draw this slip ~ Take a penny (1979), make a wish, & throw it behind you

My first thought is this: The penny – 1979, this is my birth year. The person must know my birth year. As does anyone who graduated with me, but I mean, to actually think this and write this on a piece of paper for me….Hmmm….seems as though it could be a family member?

My second thought is this: Throw it behind me? What if I hit someone in the head?

My third thought: Geez, this is the first day. Stop complaining and just do the damn experiment and write about it for pete’s sake. Then I think, for Francis’s sake and laugh to myself. Oh my gosh, this “Lighten Up” box is making me crack the fuck up.

My fourth thought: Do they even make 1979 pennies and how will I ever find one?

I look in my wallet. I have three pennies; none of which are from 1979, so I just pick one of the pennies.

I take a picture for you all to see/laugh/make fun of. Whatever.

I walk outside. Let’s get this over with.

I work on the train tracks in the suburbs of Chicago so I decide to walk along the train tracks so I can throw my penny on the tracks. I remember doing that as a little kid with my stepdad.

No one is around and it’s surprisingly peaceful. There is a nice, even slightly cool breeze, and I stand there and make my wish. I make two wishes, actually. Is that wrong? I turn around and throw the penny over my head, behind me, and onto the train tracks.

I stand there for a minute and smile. Now that wasn’t so bad.

Then I walk back to the office. Just as I reach the door to my office building I hear a train pass by. I think to myself that it’s God’s way of telling me that He heard me. He got it. And He’ll try. :)

Lighten Up, Francis

10 Aug

Lighten Up, Francis, from the movie Stripes, is one of my favorite movie lines. I’ve honestly never even seen the entire movie; I just know the movie line. My family used to say that to each other when someone was spazzing out about something, which if you’ve been reading my blog you know that can be pretty often since we’re all crazy.

The exact movie quote goes like this:
Psycho: The name’s Francis Soyer, but everybody calls me Psycho. Any of you guys call me Francis, and I’ll kill you.
Leon: Ooooooh.
Psycho: You just made the list, buddy. And I don’t like nobody touching my stuff. So just keep your meat-hooks off. If I catch any of you guys in my stuff, I’ll kill you. Also, I don’t like nobody touching me. Now, any of you homos touch me, and I’ll kill you. Sergeant Hulka: Lighten up, Francis.

Friday afternoon after a hellish week including a very sick and crabby Chiquita, I was acting a bit like Psycho. Our weekend plans had gotten ruined due to having a sick child, and it happens and I get that, but I was a little disappointed so therefore in a bit of a crabby mood despite telling myself all day to just make the best of it and enjoy myself at the wedding we were attending that night. I’ll have a drink, I’ll relax, it’ll be fine…keep repeating to myself.

I came home and found a package at my back door. Since the Chiquita’s birthday just passed I thought maybe one of our neighbors dropped off a gift for her as we live in a tight-knit neighborhood. Because we were racing to the wedding I picked the gift bag up and set it on the kitchen counter.

Hubs comes into the kitchen and says, “What’s that bag?”

“How should I know?” I respond, annoyed at the question. Just annoyed in general at the day.

Now so I don’t sound like a complete A-hole, I lied in the paragraph above. I lied out of pure laziness. My husband actually got home first. He found the gift bag at the back door. He picked it up, came inside the house, and I’m not even joking, he set the bag on the back stairs. So, how the story actually goes is that I was irritated that I walked in the back door and found the gift bag sitting on the stairs. Like you managed to pick up the package, open the door and walk inside. Why not follow through and bring the package upstairs?

I digress; men do things that I just don’t understand. So, that’s another reason I was so annoyed and being such an A-hole. I’m not a see-thru bags mind-reader, honey. How am I supposed to know what it is?

He looks at me and looks at the bag.

“I don’t know,” I say again, feeling a little guilty about my attitude. Enjoy the night, I repeat to myself. Stop trying to start fights with your husband! “I’m guessing it’s something for Eva.”

“That’s what I thought, but from who?” He grabs the bag and decides to dig in.

Here is what is inside the bag.

For Me.

So here is when Psycho Francis explodes out of me.

“What the fuck is this?!?” I shout at the top of my lungs, my cat jumping off the kitchen bar stool and running to the living room to hide. I think my husband wanted to run and hide, too, but instead he stood there looking at me. I could almost read his thoughts which was something like: OMG, now she’s going to freak out. And I get to deal with it. Thanks a lot!

“What?” He innocently asked. “I don’t even get what it is.”

“What the fuck is this!?!” I scream again. I pull everything out of the gift bag. There is no card. There is only this note.

“Don’t you get it?” I say to Hubs. “Don’t you get that someone obviously thinks I’m a pretty big asshole in need of serious help?! Like who would take the time to do this for me? Don’t they know I can run my own life just fine? And I do go to therapy! God! I don’t need any special help from anyone else.”

I pull out the notes that are inside the “Lighten Up” jar, and I start to read them aloud.

I scream some more. “What is this shit?!? Someone got this stupid idea off Pinterest, I know it, that’s why I hate that stupid website. Stupid Pinterest!”

My husband doesn’t say much, but he encourages me to calm down and go get ready for the wedding. “We’ll talk about it later,” he keeps repeating. I guess he thinks if he keeps repeating it maybe I’ll eventually shut up and listen, but instead I just keep walking around the 1st floor of my house screaming expletives.

I’m not sure why I was so angry about this little “gift” that someone mysteriously dropped off….well, I do know why. Because they were secretive about it. Almost like they knew if they handed it to me in person I’d be like ‘What the fuck is this piece of crap’ which I never would say out loud to their face, I mean, I would think it, but I’m not rude! I would smile and accept the gift, but probably think the person was an asshole for giving it to me.

But, they didn’t even take the chance for me to think they are an asshole. They knew this would rattle my cage so they mysteriously dropped it off at my house anonymously. Someone mysteriously drop me off a million dollars would you, not some “Lighten Up” jar with a bunch of “great” ideas about how I’m suddenly supposed to become a happy-go-lucky person.

And you know what, what is so wrong with me anyways? The world can’t be full of cheerleaders. I remember my mom telling me: ‘the world needs ditch diggers, too.’ So, there, the world has to have some glass half-empties right? Well, that’s me. So deal with it! And frankly, I don’t view myself as pessimistic, I view myself as realistic. See, it’s all how you spin it….

Anyways, so fear not whoever made me this very creative and heartfelt “Lighten Up” box. I don’t hate you. Anymore. I’ve since calmed down enough to look at the positives in my little Pinterest project and to be thankful to whomever took the time to think of me and make me such a special gift.

So, my gift to you is such. I will pull pieces of paper from my “Lighten Up” box, and I will do what they say. I will then write-up my experiences so you can see for yourself that I’m not the asshole, that actually the rest of the world is the asshole.

I’d love it if you, my readers, would follow along and try some of these on your own, too. Let me know how your experiences and/or interactions go. Let’s all “Lighten Up” together. ;)

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