Life is a series of learning experiences – but what have I really learned?

2017.08.06_Sunday

Well first of all I have learned that time flies whether you are having fun or not! I can’t believe that I have not posted a blog for just over two years, since my Father passed away and I experienced that God awful trip to Germany for his funeral.

“For there is nothing hidden that will not be revealed, and nothing concealed that will not be known and illuminated” Luke 8:17

That really kind of summed up that little field trip, except that the only thing that was revealed was that people that I love and thought I knew are not speaking to me, but nobody actually had the cajones to tell me why.

I have learned that you can love your family, but that doesn’t mean that you have to like them, and they don’t have to like you. And what is the true definition of “family” anyway? What’s that old saying, you can choose your friends but you can’t choose your family? Something like that – truth is we CAN choose our family. Family is NOT defined by blood, those people are just relatives, and honestly, I have a closer connection to my cousins than I have ever had with the siblings that I grew up with. To say that we had a dysfunctional family would be an understatement. We were never close, moving to Europe fractured the family unit beyond repair. There was constant bickering and resentment, Mom divorced Dad, Dad remarried, started a new family and I ended up with two new siblings that, despite the fact that we are not related by blood, I feel I have a closer connection to – or at least they seem to want to spend time with me and get to know me. Who knows, I could be fooling myself and they are only being polite because their mother raised them to have good manners.

I have learned that life is short. And speaking for myself personally, I feel that every day I wake up is another day closer to death – “Another day older and deeper in debt….” (Merle Travis) That song originally came out in 1955, I was eight years old and it’s the only music I ever remember being played in our house. My Dad played it over, and over, and over. At times in my life it was like an anthem, I have lived pay check to pay check for as long as I can remember. I have always said that my greatest fear is outliving my money, when, in reality, that happened the day I started having to fend for myself. I wasn’t raised to take care of myself – I wasn’t given the training to take care of myself! It was assumed that I was just going to “get married and have kids”. When I asked for an allowance as a teenager I was told “what do you want an allowance for? Everything you want I buy for you”. Believe me I milked that cow for all it was worth – but, the end result was that I had no clue what to do with money other than spend it. I once spent $10,000 in one day – granted I was told by my attorney to get rid of it because I would have to split it with my future second ex-husband when we got divorced, but the sad fact is – I knew exactly how to do it and have basically nothing to show for it. I suppose the state of Illinois might have enforced it, but he knew that if he wanted to get rid of me ‘peacefully’ he would have to give me everything – the house, the car and alimony, which he agreed to eagerly since he had a 9-month-old son with some other woman who was pressuring him into the proverbial shotgun wedding. God forbid the kid would grow up being a bastard like his father. But I digress – I firmly believe that the best thing either one of my ex-husbands ever did for me was to divorce me. I can’t commit to anything and I’m quite content to be on my own; there’s no reason why they can’t go on to lead happy and successful lives. Maybe I will eventually learn to forgive and forget, but I highly doubt it.

I have learned to think twice about what you post on FB:

The

My God, my mind is really blitzing out – I am definitely not firing on all my sparkplugs – I lose my train of thought right in the middle of a sentence – or after one word – look at that hot mess up there ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ I literally can not remember the post that caused the uproar – oh, yeah – the medical thing. The only reason I posted that was because I looked in the mirror and I literally saw my mother when she was on prednezone (here’s where typing on the phone is better than typing on a laptop because all I would have had to do is type in p r e d and the word prednisone would have popped up and I could have saved soooo much time and a virtual rant about how right now, Microsoft office is telling me that I have spelled prednezone wrong and I have to do a spell check) it’s spelled p r e d n i s o n e, and this is why I never finish a blog…..

One glass of wine later that night...

So where was I? Oh, right… I need to think twice about what I post on Facebook. Yes, I looked in the mirror and saw Mom, only she looked older. That’s why I posted it, I found it amusing. I really was not saying it to get attention.... (mind goes blank)

• Ø  Don’t drink wine around a desk lamp without putting a lid on it (the wine) – unless you are looking for a little extra protein in your diet - ewwww

Or get sympathy. I had mixed feelings about the reactions; I loved that everyone was so concerned – but at the same time, I was upset that I had caused the concern.

• Ø  Wanders off to play Township…
• Ø  Nope – just had another thought – did I mention that the $2.97 Chardonnay from Walmart was a huge hit?

To be continued…

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