[what later became] Work In Progress [d.b.a.]

 

I am doing a new client startup today, while also having “Friday with the Little Girls” which was going to be at the Little Girls’ house, but I woke up to snow, and a pile of stuff to do for my startup, so the Little Girls are coming here, the dogs are running ‘round and about and M is due home this afternoon, wherein we also like to f’ with each other, punch each other in the arm and try to “keep our relationship alive” while planning for the weekend (my new startup involves weekend hours, as many startups do, and as many transcription projects do … there really are no 7 days in the week, it’s more like one day that just runs together.) 

When I reached in a basket this morning in my office/sunroom/sanitarium for a new client folder, I came across this calendar that I’ve saved FOR.YEARS!!!!  It depicts this BRILLIANT ASS IDEA, which I had back in the start of 1998, well into the separation of my second marriage and single-parenthood (again, OMG … yes, I try hard but often fail), and still yet a full year-plus more before papers were finalized.  I was flying by the seat of my pants, and this was still back in the days of dialup and multiple phone lines, and screeching LOUD MODEMS … slow uploads and downloads, and car runs (with Alice in hear car seat and Carol and Beks at school) for CASSETTE TAPES!!!! 

We were still printing and delivering things, in person!!!!!! 

There was the internet, so to speak, but there were also tapes, and paper and cords everywhere!!!!  There was, and always has been a dollhouse and toys in whatever office space I’ve used, and I did more than once (especially during 9-11, which came years later, fell asleep on my office floor—many people did not work their shifts and IC work during that time because they were locked in front of their TV sets).  A very much of my life in those years WAS.A.BLUR, but a fun blur, an amazing TECHNICOLOR DREAM-COATED BLUR!!!!!

 
I had devised this calendar wherein I designated highlighter colors for activities.   On this one, orange was for one of my accounts, yellow was for sleep and pink was for the other account.  While I had some notations in there of events and such with the girls, etc., I also had a separate calendar attached to the back of each monthly form for “extras”, and a wipe-off board, magnets holding shit all over the front of the fridge … and we ALWAYS USED WIPE-OFF MARKERS ON THE BATHROOM MIRROR for stuff we might forget. 

Every Tuesday morning when I got up, or before I went to bed, if I went to bed that wee hour in the morning, I was met with green wipe-off marker and the word TRASH … and/or recycling, depending on what kind of Tuesday it was.

 
I love this calendar for the simplicity of it’s chaotic facts, and I love (to hate) how when it got towards the middle of the month there were no hours for sleep notated in the yellow spaces designated for catty naps.  I’ve always had that “I can catch up on that sleep later, if I can just …” mentality, which has gotten me through a lot of things (and terror and …), and when I take a nap, now years later, and/or stay in bed for eight uninterrupted hours, I just think HOW FANTASTIC IS THIS?!?!?!? 

The calendar and notes attached to this page are AMAZING to look at, and I will never, ever throw this calendar away, or any of my other journals, note scrapes and date books, though I’ve often told myself, a good barn burning of personal books would be a fantastic idea.

 
The jury is still out there on whether or not my stroke, the year after 9-11, and ten years almost 11 now ago, was caused by sleep deprivation and clear chaotic craziness (not possible … lol, how can chaotic craziness be clear?!?!?!) … but I jest … my stroke was more hereditary in nature, and was compounded by the fact that I’d been pounded by lesion-building migraines for years and also had a head injury the year Alice was born. 

 

I don’t blame my game of sleepy cards for my stroke (though I wonder of late with my way-too-many hours of Kindle reading and Spider Solitaire, if I might be irritating my lesion’d skull). 

In addition, when I look back at this crazy paperwork, and forward to yet another new client startup today, which keeps my work interesting, because every project is DIFFERENT AND INTERESTING AND AMAZING AND SOMETIMES ALTOGETHER ANNOYING, BUT I ABSOLUTELY.LOVE.WHAT.I.DO---I feel lucky!!!  Lucky as hell and all get out and shut the front door behind you!!!!!

I’m lucky to live in beautiful surroundings with a man who drives me just as crazy as my schedule and two dogs that are both our “babies” and our freaked out rolling balls of amazement and humor, which a person needs in this life, amazement and humor!!!!!  I was lucky enough to leave home base a year or so ago and take a sabbatical in a “Little Yellow House” by the lakeshore, and though sabbatical was cut short this summer, it netted me reunification with my mother and father … so, really, what goes around and around and around, does come around again.

And I’m lucky beyond lucky, I realize when I’m able to call my daughter and switch the playdate with the girls from her house to my house, and Brad easily can manage same, and Carol will be here after work for their retrieval and to catch up on things with me before the weekend.

All of this rolling around in my brain and off the pages of my calendar today and I remain, IN STOCKING FEET, this beautiful (fresh-fallen new snow day), going TGIF (as if that makes a difference in my work world) and feeling lucky that the career path I chose really did turn out to be something incredible!!!!

I feel all gushy and happy and only slightly stressed … which RHYMES WITH BLESSED!

… she said, realizing, the girls will be here in 1-/12 hours, Mark will be here in 2pm, I must start work on new client stuff at 4pm, Carol arrives at 5pm, wherein there’s already a break in the new spin, and then once everyone is gone and settled into their nights, I get to keep on going like the energized freaked out manic bunny that I am.  Sweet!!!!

 

 

"You can discover the secret of a dew drop while drowing in the sea!"