Earth Hour

My family enjoyed participating in Earth Hour tonight. We turned off all the power items except the fridge & freezer, ate by candlelight, and enjoyed telling stories and doing shadow puppets on the wall. The boys sang and danced for us. When we finally blew out the candles, we sat and enjoyed the dark, talking about what things we still could see and how much more acute our other senses were when we were not distracted by looking at everything. It felt good to do our part to make a difference in our carbon footprint. We are going to try to make it a family tradition to turn off everything for at least an hour every week. It won't solve the whole problem, but each step that we take makes a difference. We already replaced all our light bulbs with the compact florescent ones several years ago; we only have a few traditional ones in the house, like in the fridge, the oven and in one lamp that has a dimmer switch, since those can't be used with florescent bulbs. We all need to become more diligent at turning off items when we leave the room, though. It's a journey of a million miles, but we are making our steps in the right direction!

My dad wrote back!

I was pleased to receive a note back from my dad today. I feel so glad that he cared enough to respond. My letter back to him had been very direct and harsh in some ways. Even though I feel that all of it was true, and tried to confine the main content to just writing explanations and asking for clarifications on the topics that he had initiated; I was afraid that I would never hear back from him. I wasn't sure that he would even read it through. But he was apologetic for his first letter and did agree that I hadn't been dishonest in my responses. I have already written him back a warm letter, and hope that the honest discourse will help us to find a true closeness in the years ahead.

I go to sleep tonight with hope again. That feels great.

I'm now 47!

My birthday was on Thursday; I'm 47 years old! I guess that means that I have now transitioned from my "mid-forties" to my "late forties". That seems pretty old - LOL. I wonder how many of my classmates from school are chasing around toddlers? Probably most of those who might be, are chasing their grandchildren, instead of their own children!

There are certainly advantages to waiting later in life to birth children; I had time and money to do things on my own; some travelling, etc. I could buy clothes at Banana Republic, or fancy sunglasses and jewelry. It seems that there isn't usually enough money left for such luxury items now that we are paying for college funds as well as current living expenses. Once you have children, they always need to come first. I wonder if that changes when they grow up and leave the house, or if you just shift that priority to your grandkids? When you have children young, is there ever a time for just you?

There are disadvantages too, though; the most obvious being that children are exhausting and it is often difficult to keep up with them. And the mood swings of pre-menopause don't mix well with the non-stop demands of mothering small children.

Thank goodness I have a wonderful, loving husband who takes me in his arms and assures me that we are going to make it when I feel overwhelmed. He was so sweet on my birthday; made me a great breakfast, scheduled a massage for me and took me to dinner. I am very fortunate to have him in my life; he's by far the most incredible man that I have ever known. I just wish that our kids were more like him, instead of being so much like me.

I was not surprised to have my birthday come and go with no word from my dear old dad. Guess that chapter is closed again for the forseeable future. So be it. I waited several days before mailing my letter of response to him; reading and re-reading it to make sure that I really needed to say everything in it. Some of it was sharp, but no more so than his; mine was certainly more respectful than his. I made sure to be very honest and forthright in all of it. If he can't handle the same standard being applied to him that he is so quick to apply to his 3 children, then he isn't a fair person or a positive force in my life anyway.

I was happy to hear from the wonderful friends that I have been lucky enough to have enter my life over the years. It was a nice birthday overall, and probably about as painless of an entrance into my "late forties" as I could have hoped for.

I hope that all of you had a nice week!