IT’S SPRING!  Even though we had a mild winter, I am thrilled that it’s over.  As I’ve said before, the biggest problem with winter here in Texas is the fact that it can be 20° one day and the next it will be 60° and the day after that, it will be 80°.  But, hold on, a day later, or less, the temperature will drop 50°.  Seriously, you come to work wearing clothing for a warm spring-like day and when 5:00pm rolls around, the wind is blowing 30mph from the north and it’s winter again.  I don’t mind the cold but it’s difficult to get acclimated to it when it’s not consistently cold.  You’ve probably heard the joke about if you don’t like the weather in Texas, just wait a minute.  Only, it’s not a joke and it’s not funny.  Personally, my very favorite season is fall.  It usually starts off hot but within a couple of weeks, it’s not too bad.  The evenings and mornings are usually cool and the daytime temperatures are warmer but still a relief from the summer temperatures that we suffered through and survived.  Again.  I love the leaves changing and the way the sunlight angle has changed.  We still have storms but they don’t usually include the tornado warnings and watches that we have during spring and summer.  But, because it is Texas, they can.  We have violent storms during the spring and summer even when there’s no tornado involved.  The watches and warnings used to terrify me but one year, during August, every night for almost two weeks, there would be warning sirens going off after 10:00pm.  I lived alone in my little house with all my dogs and my cat, Fred, and at first, I’d stay up until things calmed down.  Eventually, I realized that there was nothing I could do about a tornado even if it did hit, so I’d just go to sleep listening to the wind, thunder, rain, hail, and sirens blasting away.  During that two week period, we had 1 major tornado that destroyed a large portion of one neighborhood, skipped over my parents’ house and then destroyed another neighborhood.  There was major flooding and a lot of wind damage.  On the day that happened, I was at work…listening to sirens and watching the sky turn green, which means hail and tornadoes are likely…when I noticed that there were things blowing west on one side of the street and east on the other side.  Not good.  And in Texas, if a storm approaches from the east…get ready for some nasty weather.  It’s never good when storms come from that direction.  I got caught in rush hour traffic 3 different times when there were tornadoes on the ground and I’ve never been more afraid than I was then.  One time I was on an overpass in my little Honda Accord Hatchback and the wind was insane and, I realized, it was actually pushing my car sideways toward the edge of the overpass.  That was fun.  Another time, I was stuck in traffic and the hail was huge and pounding my car.  I couldn’t even hear the radio where they had been talking about multiple tornadoes being on the ground.  I was freaking out and even crying.  I had one of the old Motorola box cell phones that actually had a cord going from the box to a regular sized handset and I called my boyfriend, my now husband, and tried to talk to him but because of the hail, neither of us could hear.  Once again, I survived but my car looked like someone had taken a hammer to it.  It’s spring so it’s time to start thinking about storms again.  Yea!  Our house is down in a little valley and it’s survived for 63 years so I feel pretty safe there.  We have a lot of huge old trees though and their roots run shallow because 2″ down you hit clay and we’ve lost a couple during storms so I worry about one crashing through the roof.  But, what can you do?  Work is a different story…we have absolutely nowhere to go if a tornado hits.  So, I freak out a little when the weather gets really bad while I’m here.  I’m going next door to the RaceTrac service station and get in their freezer.  That’s the only plan I have so it will have to do.  Well, that’s enough fun for now.  I’m going home to either create or veg.  Either way, there are no storms predicted for tonight so I’m good.            

At my place of employment, my official titles are Branch Operations Manager and Safety Coordinator, both of which are demanding jobs at a branch that averages around $4.5 million in gross sales per month with only 12 onsite employees…there are also quite a few outside salespeople and estimators.  I am also the person that usually does all of the more complicated credits and price adjustments in our system and help others when they run into a problem.  I do receiving.  I help prepare quotes for city bids, fill out and notarize all of the required documents and then submit them.  I print out bid documents and plans for salesmen.  I am the branch I.T. and phone systems person.  I handle the mail and make sure that any vendor invoices that we receive here make it to the correct person at our corporate office.  I handle the freight billings.  I order office, warehouse, and safety supplies and equipment.  I deal with contractors that are doing work here at our branch.  I monitor the cameras that are EVERYWHERE.  If there is an accident and/or injury, I fill out all of the forms and take the person involved down for a drug and alcohol screening.  I help answer phones.  I deal with people that are applying for jobs.  I do branch payroll and keep track of vacations, sick days, bereavement days, jury duty, etc…  Basically, I am a jill of all trades.  I will have been here for 16 years in November.  It is a crazy, sometimes infuriating and frustrating, insanity-inducing, soul and spirit sucking job.  I would rather be doing accounting…which is what I was educated and trained to do and did for over 26 years before I ended up here.  I have been A/R, A/P, full-charge, accounting services manager, assistant to the CFO, assistant controller and controller for manufacturing, wholesale, I.T. start-ups, utilities construction, hospitality management, hotel construction, and retail companies.  I love accounting.  But, I will be 59 at the end of the month.  I honestly don’t want to lose my almost decent salary and insurance, 3 weeks of vacation, 5 days of sick time, and 1 personal holiday in addition to the actual holidays that I’m paid for.  I have a lot of autonomy and I can come and go pretty much as I please.  It’s a 10-minute drive from my house on back roads, and I get to wear jeans and tennis shoes.  But I go home completely drained every single evening.  So, it’s a catch-22…I’m not happy here but I don’t want to go somewhere for less pay, start at the bottom, etc…  So I feel completely stuck and I hate it.  That is why I have to really make myself work on my writing/publishing dream.  I can’t live like this.  I have already given up any hope of retiring and that was before the age of Trump…don’t get me started!  Well, I have to get out of here before I scream and/or hurt someone.  Sorry for the pity party but sometimes you just have to let it out.  I know I’m not the only person in this position so maybe we can commiserate.  *HUGS*     

Some days, we are flooded with inspiration.  Everything we see, hear, or read gives us an idea for our next writing project.  Other days, we can’t even buy an ounce of inspiration.  Everything feels like it’s been done before, written to death, or is just plain stupid.  Sometimes the things that inspire us just come out of the blue.  For example, the other day I saw a news tidbit flash on my EchoShow and it sent my brain into overdrive with ideas for a new project.  The article was about the fact that they had found dinosaur tracks in a Civil War battleground.  My mind started fashioning a story about the Confederacy and the Union joining forces to battle, you guessed it, dinosaurs.  Then, I thought, what about dragons that were awakened by the blood that had been spilled on this particular battlefield?  Then today, as I was heading to a doctor’s appointment, I noticed a curb that had been damaged and it looked like giant claw marks…you know, like a dragon would make.  So, maybe there’s a dragon story or book in my future.  Right now, it’s just percolating and becoming whatever it wants to be.  Maybe it will become something great or it will continue to morph into something a little or a lot different than what it is now.  I’ll just have to wait to see where it leads me.  Ideas like these get me all fired up and excited about creating.  It might lead absolutely nowhere but even if that’s true, it got me excited and got my brain working overtime.  It gave it some exercise which can only bulk up my creative muscles.  And we all need that as often as we can get it.  My best advice to foster creative muscle flexing is to pay attention to everything…your surroundings, the news, magazine articles, overheard conversations, etc…  You might just be surprised at what grabs hold of you and becomes your next project.      

Yesterday I wrote about knowing so today I’m writing about not knowing.  Not knowing can be frightening or exciting…it all depends upon your point of view and how you look at life.  I am one of those people that doesn’t like being in the dark…literally or figuratively.  I have too vivid of an imagination to be alone in a completely dark room.  I imagine the worst things in the darkness and am filled with an overwhelming sense of dread.  It’s not that different for me when there are things that I don’t know but want to know.  Need to know.  I don’t even like surprises.  I am a need to know person.  I am also very empathetic so I can usually sense when someone is holding something back from me or is being less than truthful.  When I sense that, it makes me a bit anxious and sometimes angry.  I have a very bad habit of checking to see what’s been purchased from my Amazon wishlist when my birthday or Christmas is near…like now.  I love learning which is also a way of knowing.  I want to know everything about everything.  That, however, is not possible but I will continue to try.  Sometimes it’s better not to know.  Knowing certain things can hurt us, destroy us, screw with us, break us.  But, sometimes knowing is best.  It can uplift us, amaze us, inspire us, intrigue us, prepare us.  Not knowing makes us curious.  Sometimes that’s good and other times not so much.  The difficult thing is that we have to make the choice between knowing and not knowing without being aware of the repercussions of our choice.  We won’t find those out until after our choice is made.  Like most things in life, it’s a crapshoot…one big gamble.  But we have to take a leap of faith and live with our choices because that’s life which is just one big unknown.   

We all know so many things…intellectually, emotionally, and even physically…but there are more things that we don’t know and most of them, we never will.  My genre, currently, is urban fantasy and there are vampires, witches, and various other fantastical creatures.  Aside from the fact that I enjoy the genre, I like the fact that I can make the majority of the book up.  We all know the lore surrounding vampires but over the years the characteristics and abilities of vampires have changed drastically.  They sparkle, they can go out into the sunlight, they are more human-like, they can reproduce, they can love, etc…  So, for a writer, it’s like a blank canvas that has an almost invisible silhouette drawn on it and I have a full palette of paint to use on it.  I can create entire worlds or take our current world and shape it any way that I want.  I can take everyday ordinary objects and make them magical.  I can do the same with animals or I can create my own.  In my book, Rapture, I took present-day Dallas and gave it a magical underground.  It’s fun.  It’s cathartic.  It gives me freedom when I write.  I wander around that world as I write it and I feel like an explorer because I’m actually seeing it for the first time as I go along.  Somewhere in Rapture, I took a wrong turn and I am not in the place I’d like to be.  That’s why I’m editing and rewriting it…retracing my steps and going off in new directions.  This trip is a bit more difficult than the original one but it’s still an adventure.  So, I am going to eat lunch and then jump back into my adventure.  I’ll see you later when I get back.           

This has been an extraordinarily long week.  I’m still dealing with the aftermath of the cold and because we’ve had flashes of spring here and there, a lot of things are blooming and budding and releasing the devil’s dust…aka pollen…so I’m also fighting allergies.  I’m either coughing, sneezing, blowing my nose, or struggling to breathe.  Sometimes they happen in succession or at the same time.  But the main thing is that I am just sooooo tired.  I am looking forward to some extra sleep this weekend and some creative time between naps.  I am also going to start working on the plans for a virtual birthday party for my dear friend Lauren.  In Succulent Wild World, we occasionally have virtual birthday parties in our Facebook group and even though it might sound a little lame, they are actually a lot of fun.  I want to make this a very special party for her because she deserves it.  She is kind and caring and we have so much in common.  I just want it to be special.  It’s going to be so much fun!  I love to plan for things…parties, trips, creative things…just anything that you can plan.  And I love making lists.  So, I’m going to be having fun from beginning to end.  So, I am closing for now and I will catch with you tomorrow.

In SARK’s Succulent Wild World, there is a thing called “being in the Lovelight.”  Each week someone is chosen by the current recipient and all of SWW heaps love, encouragement, and praise upon them.  The recipient of the Lovelight shares things with them about themselves, their life, their creative life, and whatever else comes to mind.  So we get to know each other very well.  And this week, I am the lucky Lovelight recipient and it has been truly awesome.  Everyone deserves to have this experience on a regular basis in their life.  Who doesn’t need to to be appreciated, loved, encouraged, and praised?  That’s one of the reasons that I like to give compliments to random strangers.  It literally takes only seconds to tell someone that you love their blouse, earrings, cologne, or how they wear their hair, etc…  I just enjoy doing it and seeing them smile.  It makes me feel good too so it’s a win-win kind of thing.  And it costs you nothing at all.  And, after working in retail when I was younger, I try to be respectful toward all customer service people like store clerks, fast food clerks and waiters/waitresses with whom I come into contact because I know how much crap they have to put up with from people.  In the past, if I was out on a date and they were rude to anyone that waited on us, I was done with them.  There wasn’t a second date because I think that kind of rudeness is very telling about someone and their true personality.  I mean, how hard is it to just be civil to someone?  Life’s hard enough, so just choose to be nice to people.  Or at least don’t go out of your way to be rude.  Just try.  It’s not that difficult.

Most of the girls that I grew up with did not want to grow up to be like their mom. And I was 1 of them. A lot of the reason for me was the very contentious relationship that we had from the day that I was born until I was 31 years old. She could have been the spokesmodel for the traditional 60’s stay at home housewife/mom. She spent most of my childhood looking for ways to get me in trouble with my dad because I was a daddy’s girl and I think that she was jealous of that. But, the kicker is that she pushed me to fill in for her when my dad went to the farm or to visit his mother or to run errands. So it was basically her fault that he and I were so close. She also felt the need to protect my brother, who was her very obvious favorite child, from my dad. If dad was going to the farm or out on one of his jobs, mom wouldn’t let my brother go because he might get hurt so I was sent in his place. That sent a pretty clear message. And if I did even the tiniest thing wrong, mom could barely wait for dad to come home so she could tattle on me. One time when I was in my early 20s when I was an assistant manager at Hasting’s Records in the mall, I stayed late to help someone put the price stickers on the new arrivals and then put everything out in the bins. When we finally finished, as a thank you, she gave me joint. I actually gave it back to her but when I got home I found it in my bag. I had never smoked pot at that point even though most of the people I hung out with did. I kind of freaked out and started to flush it but then I thought that I might try it at some point so I hid it in the back of my jewelry box and actually forgot about it. Then a few months later on a Sunday after my parents had left for church, my brother wakes me up and tells me that I am dead. Mom decided she wanted to borrow a necklace and got into my jewelry box. I know for a fact that the necklace was right there on top of everything but as per usual she took the opportunity to snoop. And she had to tell dad. As soon as they got home, I was called into the dining room for a talk. My dad told me how disappointed he was and pretty much followed the generic script of multiple after school specials. I told them how I ended up with it and that it had been in there for months. My dad told me that pot was too expensive for someone to just give it to me. I started to tell him that pot wasn’t that expensive but realized that would be a bear trap that I’d be setting for myself so I kept my mouth shut. Mom was loving it. She told me that she only told him because she was worried that I was starting down a wrong path and I needed to be set straight. Well, gee thanks, mom. As luck would have it, about a month later, I was in my 18 year old brother’s truck and lo and behold, there was a quart Baggie full of pot. Oh, mom, look what I found. And guess who’s selling and smoking pot. Do you think she told my dad? Of course she didn’t. She flushed it and it was never mentioned again. I guess she wasn’t too concerned about him going down the wrong path. So there was a very definite and obvious double standard. And I spent 31 years dealing with it. And then when I was 31, I was at my parents’ house and she and I were alone. Completely out of left field she asked me a very personal question that about which I would have normally lied my ass off. For some reason I thought just screw it and answered honestly. I waited for the blow up but it didn’t come she just told me to be careful and that was it. I knew that was her apology for all of the hell that she had put me through and I accepted it as such. From that day forward, we were good. And my brother kind of lost his shine in her eyes because of a few things that he had done. She told me how proud she was of me for being so independent and self sufficient after my divorce from my extremely abusive first husband. We had about 15 good years before her Alzheimer’s diagnosis and her rapid decline. Even though she didn’t know who I was, she was always so happy to see me and was funny and loving. But she was kind of mean to my brother. I felt sorry for him. My favorite photo of her is from when she was in the care facility. She looks happy. I miss mom a lot and I still talk to her. It will be 10 years on October 1st since she passed. It seems like it was much longer ago than that.

Most people, including myself, don’t need expensive, elaborate material things to be happy.  Sure, those things are nice to have but they aren’t necessities…we can be content without them.  I’ve always said that as far as money is concerned, I don’t need millions of dollars…I would just like to have enough money to finish paying off the house and get it into tip-top shape, buy new cars, and not to have to worry that 1 emergency could wipe us out financially.  Now, if I ever win the Powerball, I’ll do those things, plus buy a house on a huge plot of land and rescue dogs, cats, and any other animal that needs to be loved.  That would definitely make me ecstatic.  But back to reality.  I personally don’t care all that much about clothes or shoes.  I don’t need an expensive car or a mansion.  My biggest splurges have been on electronics…iPads, laptops, gaming systems, etc…  I’m an early adopter.  But I don’t NEED those things.  I need my husband, my family, my friends, and our fur-children.  I need a decent car that runs so I can get to work and to my other destinations.  I also need our house because I absolutely adore it and the acre of land it’s on.  It’s just outside the historical area of our city and our house was built in 1956.  A lot of the properties have the main house and what they used to call a mother-in-law house.  There are huge old trees everywhere and because we have channels behind and on 1 side of the property and a ton of foliage between us and our neighbors, it’s like living in the country but it’s in the middle of a thriving Dallas suburb.  There are the usual squirrels, possums, and raccoons but there are also sitings of foxes and coyotes.  Our yard is usually filled with cardinals, blue jays, mockingbirds, doves, crows, and the occasional hawk.  Our former neighbors had chickens, goats, horses, peacocks, and other assorted barnyard critters, oh, and a barn.  The properties are still partially zoned for agricultural use.  We have a magnolia tree, crepe myrtles, Jessamine, honeysuckle, wisteria, and lavender all over our yard.  We also grow a lot of tomatoes, peppers, okra, squash, and various other vegetables.  We also have herbs and other savory treats…rosemary, lemongrass, sage, basil, thyme, mint, chives, garlic, and, of course, catnip for the cats.  We have blackberry bushes and a fig tree.  And we have a 40,000-gallon pool…it’s huge and it was a major score for Rick because he loves to swim.  We had a lot of great parties that were centered around it.  We have a glider and firepit beside it.  I like to sit out there or be in the pool at night during the summer when the bats are in our area.  I love to watch them swooping around catching mosquitos and other flying insects.  They get so close to you that you can feel the swoosh of their wings as they fly by.  It’s amazing.  We also have a lot of butterflies, dragonflies, and honeybees that spend time in our yard, so sitting out there is a pretty magical experience.  And my writing room which, as I’ve said before, is tiny and crowded but it has 2 large windows with wonderful views of the side and back yards.  Plus, it’s extremely private.  I can get completely lost in there.  It is my Magical Writing Haven.  And our home…it’s pretty magical as well.  So, that’s my home sweet home.  Stop on by sometime.                    

After having a DST hangover yesterday, aside from a headache caused by the stormy weather that’s just flirting with us while playing hard to get, I feel pretty good….which is a surprise.  As I said in my post from yesterday, the effects of the time change usually hit me hard for a couple of weeks.  I think that part of the reason I’m actually feeling okay is that this cold is finally on its way out of my body.  I actually feel a bit inspired so I’m planning to get out of here early so I can do something creative later.  Mondays aren’t usually my creative days.  Usually, I just want to go home and veg because Monday is a beat down.  Today hasn’t been too bad at all though.  I’ve gotten things done and I don’t feel too badly beaten up by the day.  And Dave, my work-husband that has an annoying tendency of keeping me here much later than I’d like some nights, has already left.  Yea!  The way that it usually happens is that I’ll be getting ready to leave and he suddenly remembers something that just has to be done then.  But, he is so ADD and OCD that he can’t just do what he is supposed to be doing…he starts this and then that and finishes something else and then 30 minutes, or more, later he gives me the thing that he told me he needed me to do for him.  Other times he just talks…and talks and talks and you can’t get him to shut up.  But I love him to death.  We’re allies here in this oftentimes hellish place.  He is either making me crazy or keeping me sane.  Just like my real husband, Rick.  And Dave helps me take care of our colony of feral cats.  Anyway, I’d better get moving so I can go create something!