It's okay, you can laugh

Years ago my mother's mantra to me was this-
Laugh and the world laughs with you. Cry and you cry alone.
'Course she's the one who used to sing Cry Baby to me whenever I did cry.
Which was a lot when I was a kid. But whatever.

Earlier this month we attended my husbands annual holiday party.
Yes, it is held after the holidays. And it is held on a Wednesday night.
I'm guessing his boss gets a cheaper better rate for the banquet room that we use.
It is a more relaxed atmosphere to be honest. It's 30 people in plain clothes, no rank and no uniforms.
Nice conversation with nice people in a nice restaurant with nice food.
It was a nice night :)
Once it wraps up and people start grabbing their coats it's time for the dreaded good bye.
I say dreaded because it involves a handshake or a hug or that weird awkward crap you say when it's time to leave and nobody wants to be the first out the door for fear of being the couple that broke up the party.
Then it's walking past the other couples that are donning their coats to head towards the host of the party and his wife.
They are friendly, lovely, wonderful people. True pillars of the community.
We say our thanks to them for a lovely meal and then it's time for that awkward hand shake or hug thingy. You know what I'm talking about, right?
They extend their hand but you've already moved forward for a hug and so what happens is that his hand grabs your hand but your forward momentum sandwiches both of your hands (yours and his) which are gripped in a handshake right smack into the middle of your bosom.
Every. Single. Time. Girls.  Every time.
I am not only awkward at small talk but awkward when there isn't any talking at all.
That's right...I'm an awkward hugger too.
I could have sworn that his boss was going in for a hug. Not a creepy one but a genuine hug.
So on the way home I tell my husband how I hate feeling so awkward during the good-bye part of these evenings.
He asks me why.  I tell him that I am embarrassed about moving in for a hug when his boss was going for a handshake. That I feel dumb and remorseful. And can't stop feeling stupid about it.
He nonchalantly tells me that everybody was being hugged and to not worry about it.
I asked him "Don't you worry about these things? Don't things like that bother you?"
He rocked my world by answering No. No?!?
No. Simple as that.
I busted out laughing at myself because I really do take myself too seriously and then girls...I let it go.
And haven't worried about it or thought about it since (with the exception of this telling).

So, today at the market, I ran in to an old high school friend.
Queue up the awkward small talk.
Son of a.......Why am I so F@#&ing bad at this???
She asks if my husband and I are still together, and how many years have we been married.
"Uh..33 or 34" I tell her. She says they are still together after 35 years.
She wants to know our secret to staying together. I tell her this-
"The way I figure it, if we had gotten divorced the next person I married would have his own version of faults and things that would aggravate me so I might as well stay with the man I'm with."
Plus I tell her that I still think my husband is cute and that I think he smells wonderful.
Blink......blank stare......Uh.....crickets chirping..........gulp......hot flash..........shit.
I got that exact same feeling in my gut as the handshake/hug thing with my husbands boss.
Why am I so awkward??
More to the point, why do things like this bother me so much?
Why do I feel like I need to find a way to call her and try to fix it?
Uh..I didn't mean to say that he smelled good..uh....What I meant to say was...uh..
For heaven's sake that would just make it so much worse!! And I know it.
I'm trying to find the humor in this but really all I feel is that weird humiliating shame thing that happens to me when I open my mouth and try to engage in small talk.
I always say too much. It's as if I have no filters.
I leave the market feeling stupid, again, and remind myself to keep my mouth shut in the future.

An hour later I found this on my Instagram feed.



Wowsa. That feels a lot better than telling myself that I'm awkward and foolish.

Next time I see this friend I will tell her Only my surface is disturbed. 
Uh......er...maybe not.
Maybe I should just stop trying so hard.

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When I first saw Annette I hugged her and felt awkward and stupid afterwards for being so forward, like maybe I should have just waited for her to make a move to hug me, but no...I dove right at her in my haste to meet her and say Hi!
Again, maybe I should just stop trying so hard.

To me it feels awkward to be still and silent and awkward to be open and up front. It feels awkward to be truthful and it feels awkward to lie.
It feels awkward to be honest with you guys and hope that y'all don't think I've lost my mind.
Geez...Get a grip Lolly.

Truthfully this awkwardness only happens with people on the periphery of my life. It's with people that I don't see very often or people that are merely acquaintances.

When I settle down and think about it I'm not really that awkward.
I have a spouse and sisters and a best friend and kids and grandkids and extended family that I am NOT awkward with.
I can hug them and talk with them and laugh with them and not feel weird or foolish.

Maybe it's just as simple as this - I need to stop hugging strangers that I sort of know.
I need to stop saying that I am foolish or weird or awkward because I stink at small talk.
I need to learn to laugh at myself and not take the world or myself so seriously.
I need to remind myself that Only my surface is disturbed.
The rest of this beautiful hot mess that is me, in my core, is NOT disturbed.
I love myself, I am happy, I am at peace, I can be still.
Only my surface is disturbed.

More faith in action

I accidentally deleted a blog post and have no idea how to get it back.
Don't even know if it's possible to find it or if I can retrieve it.
It was titled Faith in Action and was about my lack of faith when it came to trusting God
with the health and safety of my grown son.
Basically my son stayed out with friends for two days and never called or texted that he was ok,
so naturally I assumed he was dead in a ditch somewhere.
I talked about being frantic and crying and worried beyond belief.
I talked about finding perfect Bible passages to help my unbelief.
And I talked about my walk with God and how if I'm talking the talk
Then I need to walk the walk or something along those lines.

Honestly I'm more frustrated than sad about losing the blog post.
I don't even know how I did it! One minute it was there, the next minute...gone.

******************************************************************************

So I've been praying for those 12  Marines who are missing off the coast of Hawaii.

I'm a follower of Christie Purifoy, a writer and Blogger.
Her brother-in-law is among the missing. He is married and the father of four young children.
From what the news tells us 12 Marines are missing after their helicopters crashed during night maneuvers 6 or 7 days ago off the coast of Oahu.
One empty life raft was found. The news says there should be two life rafts.
So there is hope. Slim but still there is hope.

So when I reread that very first paragraph and changed the subject matter from my wayward son
to those missing Marines, it sort of gave me a jolt. Not sort of. It did give me a jolt. A big one.
Because as I sit here lamenting the loss of a blog post these 12 families are praying like crazy through all kinds of misery and fear and doubt about their missing husbands and sons and brothers and fathers. These men are really and truly missing. And the window of rescue is starting to slowly close.

Won't you please join me and countless others as we all continue to pray for these men
and their families...that their prayers would be answered, that God in all his glory would hear these prayers and answer them with the rescue and return of these 12 men.

Thanks, Love Lolly

I'm hungry

It's Monday January 11th and if feels like -18 degrees outside.
The granddaughter is napping, the grandson is at school, the husband is at work.
Dishes are done, laundry is washing, and I'm watching Everyday Italian on TV.
I wish Giada DeLaurentis would eat a fucking sandwich!
You ever notice that?? She doesn't eat what she makes!
She only ever takes a little mouthful or a little teeny, tiny taste.
Man! She must have some willpower...I'd be cramming that Lasagna in my mouth.
Right now she is rolling out her own fresh pasta...for shitssake!
Also, what's with her love for goat cheese? Have you ever had goat cheese?
Good lord but it tasted like a barnyard to me. It tasted like a goat would smell. Ugh!
She gave herself a slice of pizza smaller than my cellphone and my stomach just rumbled.
Have you ever seen a chef in real life? Most of them are a little overweight or rather a lot overweight.
That's because they EAT what they cook. Giada isn't eating the stuff she is producing on TV.

So we decided we are going to try clean eating in this house.
Clean eating is pretty much eating nothing that is processed.
I figure if I cannot pronounce it, then we cannot eat it.
But! I can pronounce Pizza and Lasagna and Meat Loaf and Chicken and Pork Chops and Potatoes and gravy, and...and... crap.
Portion control is the real enemy in this house.
It's hard to change eating habits. Really hard. But our joints hurt, he is a terribly non compliant diabetic with a high craving for carbs and also has high blood pressure.
And our 27 year old son was just diagnosed with high blood pressure too.
I'm 53. I don't have BP issues but my metabolism packed its bags and left about 4 years ago.
We all need a little help with our eating habits.
Wish me luck...this isn't going to be pretty.
First order of business is to stop watching Giada's show!! It's making me hungry.
Who am I kidding? I was hungry when I turned on the TV. I was hungry as I sat down to type this.

Ok, I'm done with this boring post. Thanks for reading! I'll keep you posted on the clean eating.
Lolly

Starting off the New Year

Happy New Year Readers!

It's been a while since I posted. Sorry about that. Time always flies by in my world.
My granddaughter is not yet 3 and still requires a nap most afternoons and my grandson has started all day kindergarten this past Monday so my schedule is all of a sudden a bit lighter.
Today I find myself with a bit of time on my hands and what better way to use that time than to reconnect with you guys.

Here's what's been happening-
On his first day of All Day Kindergarten my grandson had his brownie stolen out of his lunch box by the classroom bully. Great. Wonderful. Perfect.
The thing is, when he came out after school that first full day, I asked him "How was your day?" and he answered me with "Great! I loved recess the best."
When I asked him what he loved besides recess he told me "Lunch!"
And he never said a thing about that brownie being taken from him.
This makes me want to cry for him but also I was so proud that he didn't complain about it or make it the focus of his first full day at school.

My son's cat has decided that our bathroom is his favorite place in the whole wide world.
Every single day we find him curled up behind the toilet fast asleep.
He still seems kinda skittish so we are leaving him be for now. He'll get used to us eventually.
I love having a cat back in the house. He's soft and silky and he purrs so loud!!

Our assistant church Pastor left our congregation in August.  I've never been the same since.
Gosh he could deliver a sensational sermon. He's the only preacher that has ever made me cry right there in the middle of the service. Our regular pastor is a nice, and I mean a really nice guy, but he is more of a...hmmm...how to describe him....Farmers Preacher...does that make sense?
He grew up on a farm in Missouri, his dad was a pastor, so was his grandpa, and even his great grandfather. He tells a lot of farm jokes and a lot of what I like to call yuk yuk jokes. The kind of stupid, corny, slight insult to his wife and kids type of jokes that the elder population of our church seem to eat right up. I find myself trying to not roll my eyes at the guffaws I hear from the other congregants.
Anyway, imagine my surprise when Sunday December 27 rolled around and who should be the preacher for the day but our sorely missed assistant pastor.
And guess who cried at church services that day?
Geezaloo...I'm gonna have to get over his leaving, but he was so damn good at making a body understand where to find the true light of God and what to do while you are waiting and watching for that light. That man himself is a true light, an honest to goodness apostle, a real Jesus follower.

I find Jesus most days in the sunrises that I've been seeing in my neighborhood. So many beautiful colors...stunning in their intensity. I swear that they are His gift to me.

This is a short and a long post at the same time. It's more than I've posted in a while.
But alas my granddaughter is awake and needs some lunch so I must finish this up.

Hope you are all doing well so far in this new year.
Thanks for stopping by,
Lolly