Recently in GraceInSmallThings Category

It happened again this morning at 4.  I sat up in bed as soon as I heard it; a rapid fire sort of mini honking - maybe even cheerful  ::honkhonkhonkhonkhonkhonk::  followed by the atrocious honking car alarm.  I got out of bed, cursing, and went to the bulletin board by the front door to grab my keys off the hook.  They weren't there so I felt around in the dark for my purse ::HONKHONKHONKHONKHONK::  By the time I put my fingers on my keys, the alarm had stopped, so I got back in bed, back in my bed between the girls, and tried to sleep even though I knew that soon enough the alarm would go off again.

This happened at the crack of crack a week or so ago, too.  My house is not like most; the front door doesn't face the street, it faces the house next door to us.  To get to my driveway, I have to take a left out the door, head down the walkway, take another left and go through a gate to even really see my van.  Last time it happened, I went outside to the driveway, pushing the unlock button on the remote thing the whole way.  It was so loud, and as I turned the corner and saw my driveway, I saw that my van was all flashing and alive looking.  The alarm finally stopped, I made sure it was unlocked and went back inside.  I don't want to drag this story out, so I'll just say that I ended up going back out three or four more times.  The last time, though, it was my neighbor's car that was going off.  I walked back to my house, saw the front door I'd left openand wondered if someone was out there setting the alarms off on purpose.  You know, to lure people out of their houses so they could sneak in. 

It was a little scary.  And, actually, a pretty stupid idea.  But I was half asleep and it seemed reasonable at the time.

This morning, after I got back in bed and just as I was starting to have those disjointed thoughts that pop up before you fall asleep but when you're still lucid enough to realize that you are about to fall asleep, but then, if you think about it for a beat too long, totally awake again, the honking started.  Again.  This time I grabbed my robe and pulled it on as I went down the hall.  Like Miss Clavel - I ran fast and faster, got the keys and opened my front door to the rain. 

I was more cautious this time.  I shut the door behind me, and walked out into the cold rain.  This time it was the neighbor's car, not mine.   It went off a couple more times, but I stayed in bed and eventually fell back to sleep. 

Did I have a point?  I guess not.  I'm so tired, but I can't sleep.   There's a lot of room for improvement in my life right now. Especially tonight.   Instead of sleeping, I'm beating myself up and doing a really good job of it.  Thinking things like, All my life I've been fighting with this stupid low self esteem and when I finally, finally believe that I'm good enough, I'm hit with the fact that I am not.  It was stupid of me to think I was.  I know better.

I didn't write that looking for a pat on the head.  I wrote it because I knew that writing it would make me read it and think, Whatever, drama queen.  Get over yourself.  I mean, when I'm thinking thoughts like that they have such power over me, but all typed out you can see how thin and weak that kind of thinking is.  Taking it out of my brain sucks the life out of it.  Mostly, anyway.   Nothing is really better, and I'm truly worried about some things that are scaring me very badly.  Real things, not some fictional masked car alarm setter offer.   But I feel better anyway.  Maybe I can sleep now.  It also would do me good to get back on the Grace In Small Things bandwagon. 

1.pretty cupcakes, even if I can only appreciate and not eat them
2.the best sister-in-law ever
3.wine
4.kid art. that one is an old favorite

and 5.my hair has grown a little and I don't suffer from full body cringe (as much) whenever I have to leave the house

When I left the house today, I looked at my camera (it's on the mini bookshelf next to my bed, which isn't where it goes, but I left it there last time I was uploading photos because I am lazy forgetful) and thought about switching bags so I could bring it with me.  I didn't do it, though, so of course there were things I wanted to photograph.  An old, green jump rope coiled on the blacktop at the kids' school, the wooden handles with their green faded and peeling paint, very faint daisies still showing. 1 The boys' bathroom door open, a nasty looking crowbar wedged where a harmless rubber door stopper should be. 2 They wouldn't do that in a jr high or high school, right? 

Other things, too, but I wouldn't have been able to photograph them anyway.  A grandmother sitting at the bus stop with a toddler on her lap, laughing and bouncing him on her lap, like she was playing, but really she was rubbing his shoulders and back because the wind was cold today and he wasn't very bundled up. 3 A young woman in front of a house, walking her fluffy little white dog, bending over to scoop the dog up so that an older woman using a walker could scratch behind its ears and coo at it. 4

I am weakly imitating unphotographable.  In the sincerest form of flattery way, not the plagarist way. 

I'm sick.  Ear ache (prolly will spend part of Valentine's Day at the urgent care getting some drugz), sore throat, cough, fever that is making me loopy.  It's cold and rainy, which is fine, but I really just want to go to bed and I can't quite yet.  Today at lunch, SG made us homemade chicken Pho, which meant we could have all the hot sauce, limes and tamari we wanted, but none of those nasty ass scallions we both hate.  Plus, we had shredded carrots.  It was good.  Really, really good. 5

brought to you by Grace In Small Things (DUDE! click that link and watch the Trader Joe's song.  SG and I were reunited at TJ's, so it will always be my very most favorite grocery store.)

1. Plans for lemonade, made with simple syrup (and probably booze)
2. Discovering that the Trader Joe's gluten free pancake and waffle mix makes bitchen waffles.
3. A quiet house.  For at least another twenty minutes.
4. Plans with my mom for this weekend (even though I'm a rotten daughter and not only didn't get her a birthday gift for her birthday yesterday, but am TAKING money from her to help with expenses that I just can't seem to manage).
5. If, hypothetically, you *just* finished paying off your 2007 income taxes and then went ahead and figured out the 2008 taxes and discovered that someone (not you, but someone you must pay taxes with - you know - in this example) didn't really bother with the whole "withholding" thing, guess what?  The government takes payments!  I have to be grateful for that part; it's seriously all that is keeping my head from exploding.