Blogging Tips

I was reading an article about blogging today, thinking maybe I'd pick up some useful tips. The author was talking about the importance of posting a photo of yourself. She said that people want to see the real you, not a picture of your pet, or something generic like a flower.

Oops.

Well, I'm not putting up a photo of myself. I just can't write about my life without keeping some degree of anonymity. I mean, I can barely tell my therapist this stuff, and I know perfectly well that I'm paying for her confidentiality. I know that it's not rational to pay to see a therapist and then get annoyed when they ask personal questions, but there you are. Anyway, it's the insurance company that's paying.

I actually have a pretty good therapist, even though every week I swear that I'm going to break up with her. Her name is Joan, and she's 107 years old. Well, maybe not really, but she seems like it. I'm usually glad after I see her, but at the same time almost every week she says at least one thing that irritates me. This week she asked me what I'm going to be for Halloween, and when I told her I'm going to be a devil she cocked her head to one side and asked "What kind of devil are you going to be, Violet?" in this meaningful tone. Sometimes a two-dollar pitchfork from the Halloween store is just a two-dollar pitchfork form the Halloween store, Joan.

So here's the deal...no photo. Also no real names. But I do promise to stay with the "emotional truth" as Joan likes to call it. I'll try it for awhile and see how it goes.

The Siren Song of Powdered Sugar

Today was a doughnut day. The vending machine in the break room at my office has those little packages of powdered sugar doughnuts that I'm crazy about. They only show up sporadically, not even every week, but on the days when they're there I find myself thinking about them all day long. Every time I walk by the machine I'm checking out of the corner of my eye to see if they're still there. I end up spending way more of my day then I'm happy to admit mentally weighing the calories versus whatever else I've eaten, thinking about how good they would taste with my coffee and what a pig I look like trying to eat them without getting powdered sugar all over myself. Today I managed to hold off. Life is all about small triumphs, right? It helped that I had some leftover birthday dinner-related guilt. It did take about four cups of coffee to keep me otherwise occupied though, which, it occurs to me now...may have had something to do with why everybody and everything was annoying me so much that I was fantasizing about taking my coat and leaving and never coming back.

This is tricky...the blog thing. I'm already trying to figure out what to tell and what not to. Frustrating as my job can be, I really do want to hang out to it, so I don't think I'll go into details. I work in an office. That tells you just about everything you need to know, doesn't it? Computer programs that fail at the worst possible time, nosy office mates who want to tell you how to do your own job all the time, stupid power-struggles and 15 minutes for lunch. Sometimes I like it a lot. Even when I don't, I try to remember that I'm lucky to have a job at all when so many people don't.

Anyway, I ended up the afternoon on a positive note. When I'm working, I get so in my own head that sometimes I feel like I don't really return to earth until I'm walking to my car. Today there were a lot of crisp red and orange leaves under my feet as I went, and I was able to enjoy the fact that I didn't give in to the doughnuts.

Hello

I am writing this in the calm before. Before what exactly, I can't be certain, but there are a few things I know are about to happen, and a few things I think are likely to be about to happen. First of all, and most certain, I am about to turn 30. I never imagined I'd be particularly hung up on this birthday. In fact, I always thought it was pretty stupid to get upset about things like that. It's just a number, age is irrelevant, it happens to everybody so why worry about it, beats the alternative, etc. Now I wonder why I thought I had any clue what I was talking about.

It's like when I was younger and had perfect skin and flawless digestion and never even thought twice about my reproductive system (except to make sure it never actually reproduced anything) and I thought that when people complained about aging they were just whining. I knew I'd never be that way myself. I would age gracefully and embrace every stage of life as it came. What the hell did I know about it?

To my surprise, not only am I not aging that gracefully, but I've gotten pretty fat. This isn't exactly news, I've always been on the heavier side, but here I am suddenly on the wrong side of 200 pounds, and I seem to be the last person to have noticed.

Those are the things I know for sure: I'm turning 30 and, like so many Americans, I really need to lose weight. If you're thinking that this is a total cliche, I assure you that nobody is more annoyed about that than I am.

Less certain, I may be about to lose my job. It's not a job I especially love, but even so I'm attached to it, and with the economic climate the way it is I'm not likely to find another one easily. I know I'm lucky in that my husband and I can get by on his salary alone, but even so the prospect of unemployment sends shivers down my spine. What the hell am I going to do with myself?

Another uncertainty: I may be about to lose my husband, too.

So basically, it's hard not to feel as if my life is falling down around my ears these days. I'm not sure where I went wrong. I've spent most of my life so far coasting along fairly comfortably. How did this happen? What can I do about it? I've always felt like my year begins on my birthday rather than January first, and so this is when I make my resolutions. Tomorrow I will turn 30. By the time I turn 31, I want to have a much better handle on all of this.