One of those days

I’m having one of those days.  One of those days where work and life kicks your ass and you sit back and ask yourself “what am I doing?”  One of those days where if you could actually come up with an answer to that question, no one around will be able to relate anyway.

Just. Blah.

When I think back to my childhood (shudder), I feel like I probably had some sort of fairytale life laid out in my mind.  This ain’t it.

Well, not completely anyway.

I probably had some sort of timeline that went something like this . . .

Graduate high school – Find great boyfriend – Graduate art school – Find great art job – Get married – Have 2 kids (or 2 point whatever the amount of kids the norm is now, lol) – Have a great job that I successfully balance with being a mom – Maybe even do some art on the side or get more involved in the community.

All before the age of 30.

**Did you hear that sound of the record scratching?**

Here’s how it really went.

Hated every stinking minute of high school – Boyfriend?  What boyfriend? – Almost didn’t graduate – Went on to a junior college to see if I liked it – Still no boyfriends – Find out I am riddled with endometriosis which could lead to infertility, but that’s ok (see “no boyfriends” above) – Never went to art school, studied art, but just at a regular college - Boyfriends yet?  Yes!  All creeps. – Get an ok job – Get another ok job that turns sour – Get another ok job, none of these pay the bills really – Racked up lots of bills – Keep getting jobs that I’m soon realizing are not a good fit for me.  – Mediocrity at its best with men and jobs.

And then I hit the big 3-0.  Yep, life over.  No shot in hell for that fairytale that I drummed up in my head. 

It’s hard to find others who understand this destructive path I was on, unless they were on a similar path. Haven’t come across too many.  I suppose some paths are much worse than mine though so I should find myself lucky.

And as luck would have it, just before my 31st birthday, I met the man who would later become my husband. 

Wow.  31 years.  That’s a lot of boring chapters in my life’s book before getting to the good parts, LOL!  I do realize that life is getting better, and it’s what you make of it.  I’m just not patient enough.  And I still have some of those other issues to resolve and slowly I’m tackling what I can, but it’s just one of those days.  Man, I hate limbo.

Here’s to looking forward to blowing the dust off this book of life and writing some new chapters . . .

Just get pregnant

Sometimes I wonder if getting pregnant would just make things easier. This probably sounds idiotic, but seriously . . .

It would put an end to the what-ifs.  I keep going back and forth in my mind about finish school first or baby first?  Find a way to make this job better, or keep pushing for my future endeavors?

Back and forth.  Back and forth.

[insert screech] 

Baby would make everything come to a complete halt, wouldn’t it? 

I mean once a baby enters the picture.  Everything changes.  Everything becomes secondary and not as important.  The small stuff you sweat every day, forget it.  And even some of the bigger stuff, doesn’t seem so big anymore.

At least that’s what people tell me.  And I’ve been on this planet long enough and witnessed enough births to those around me to believe them. 

Even some of the silly stuff.  We just don’t fit in.  On Halloween my husband and I sat freezing at the end of our driveway waiting to pass out candy.   It was then that I realized since we don’t have kids and mingle much with the neighbors who have kids, we were getting overlooked.   I watched all the neighbors with their kids stop by the homes that had kids so they could say hello or whatnot.  And, I understand when the kids are young you’re just not going to hit every house.  Who do you shave off the list?  The kidless homes.  It seems silly, but I definitely witnessed this.  And I love Halloween as much as the next person. 

In just day to day life, it seems everywhere I turn there’s a conversation going on about someone’s kids.  I have no input.  Nothing to share.  No funny stories.  Unless I steal funny stories about my niece and nephew or dig deep in the archives from when my brother was a baby.  (We’re ten years apart in age).

But those aren’t my stories or input.  Those are someone else’s stories that I’m simply relaying and not nearly as well as the beaming parents would be able to relay, I might add.  

So then I feel stupid. 

This stupid feeling is usually followed by the “one day it will be your turn” remarks.  I’ve been hearing that my entire life.  First with getting married, since it took me so darn long.  And now, with the kid thing since that’s usually the next plan of attack.

Don’t get me wrong.  I am certainly not for having a baby to make life better.  Too many people go down that road for the wrong reasons and it is NOT the solution.  It’s selfish.

But then again, sometimes I feel like I am being selfish right now about life.  But in a different way.  I’m so torn with what I want to accomplish in life and feel like it has to happen before baby or it just won’t happen.  What I’m really starting to think about now and wonder is, will baby just not happen?  If I keep doing what I’m doing for me, will I miss my window?  An opportunity for a baby to be brought into a loving home with an amazing extended family just waiting with open arms would be missed. 

So I can be a designer?  Hmm.  

I still want this dream, I really do.  But I think I need to let whatever is going to be in the cards for us happen as well.  I don’t want any regrets of any kind.

After having a great review here at work on Friday I realized something.  I may not be happy with what I’m doing all the time, but I have to make the best of it because my schooling is going to take a lot longer than I first anticipated.  And the benefits and maternity leave here are pretty darn good.  In the grand scheme of things, it’s starting to look like baby comes first. 

Just as they are designed to do.

Letters and numbers

School and work.

Seems I’m doing well on both fronts.  I know that I got an A in my one class and now I’m focusing on the tougher of the two, AutoCAD.  I never thought I’d say this, but I’m starting to dig this class.  It’s still confusing as hell and I spend half the class scratching my head sometimes, but it’s getting better.  And so are my grades.   I was hanging on to a low-to-mid B in there and I think I can safely say I’m in mid-to-high B range now.  I just may be able to squeak out an A, but we’ll see.  That would be great though since this class really intimidated me when I signed up for it.  And I signed up for it early to use as sort of a gauge that I would base my decision of a career change on.  It’s an important program to learn in terms of design and I figured if I can’t do it, might as well find out sooner rather than later.

Then there’s the other side of the coin.  Work.  I finally had my review on Friday after we had to bump it from Wednesday.  I was totally ok with this, by the way.  We use a rating system with numbers.  I fill out the rating forms with all the things I do at work and I have to rate myself on a 1-to-5 scale.  I turn it in and my boss does the same.  She then emails it back and we talk about it at the review.  I gave it to her Wednesday during the day and I just happened to check my email at home Wednesday evening, and there it was.  The email with the attachment that I just didn’t want to open. 

And I didn’t.  I just didn’t want to ruin a night’s sleep with what I’d discover by clicking that file.

Then I had to deal with the consequences of delaying the inevitable.  I had horrible IBS the next morning.  Why do I do this to myself?

I opened the file at work and read it. 

Wow.

We were pretty much par with one another on the numbers.  In fact, in a couple cases my boss went up a number. 

Once again, it was a fine review.  Why do I get so worked up?  I think I do well at my job, but what I worry about is if anyone notices how I really feel some days.  And if that will come up in my review.  It didn’t.  Well, I suppose it could have when she asked if I like my job and what she can do for me.  I can never seem to really nail that one when it comes up. I’m too afraid to be a squeaky wheel and come across as ungrateful.  Because the more I think about it, I have to make this work for the time being.  I am blessed to have a job right now and I sure need this job. 

We did touch on some of the stuff that really gets under my skin and ways we can alleviate that.  We both have some ideas to explore.  So maybe things will get better for next year?  And then for once, maybe I won’t be so sick and nervous about my review? 

I decided not to bring up school just yet.  It’s still too soon.  I’m barely thru the first semester and having signed up for my next semester without disruption to my work schedule, I decided it can remain “mum’s the word”. 

It’s kind of nice that I may have options down the road.  If school continues to go well and if work gets better in the future, this could get interesting.

Vacation pt. 4

The second half of Sunday was a little on the solemn side.  We knew the Flight 93 Memorial was in the vicinity of where we were staying and had considered going to it.  While at the winery talking with the locals about places to visit they  informed us just how close we were to the site.  About 30 minutes. 

We had to go. 

After plugging in the coordinates into the GPS we were off.  Honestly, I was a little anxious.  I wasn’t sure how I’d feel once we got there.  What to expect. 

The roads in PA are definitely not like Ohio.  Some twists and turns, but even moreso the ups and downs.   You’ll be driving down a road, only to start up a hill and not really see where the road continues for a brief moment.  This is exactly how it was down some of the lonliest stretches of roads we took to get there.  Roads in what seemed like the middle of nowhere. 

At times it was breathtaking and at other times tense.  At one of those moments where we were reaching the top of an incline, we got over the top of the hill and the land just opened up.  The horizon as far as you can see.  This was it.  The place that went down in history on 9/11. 

Eerie.

Solemn.

Peaceful.

 

 

 

 

 

 

In this next picture if you look really closely, there is an American flag on a fence.  This is approximately the area of the field where Flight 93 went down.

 

There was a lecture going on when we got there and we learned that a true memorial is in the works, to be done in phases, leading up to the ten year anniversary of 9/11.  Hard to believe it has been that long.  The plans sound really amazing and I’d be interested in seeing the final design.

 

 

But in the meantime, there’s this.  And, if you ask me, just as impressive because it’s real people leaving real momentos behind. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Even kids leaving beloved toys and trinkets to show their respect.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here’s a couple more pictures of the temporary memorial.

The benches in this picture have the names of the passengers on them. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

One of the nicest things of this visit was seeing people continually showing up.  Cars pulling in and out.  People are not forgetting.

We will never forget.

Vacation pt. 3

I’m back with my latest installment of photos and stories . . .

Here’s what our vacation was supposed to look like!  LOL!

Look at those leaves!   Look at that blue sky!! 

This was Sunday, the nicest day of the lot, and unfortunately our last day that we’d be spending in the area, so we had to make the most of it. 

 

 

 

Here’s the view from our condo of the lodge.

What a difference a day makes? Oh well, we still had fun, rain or shine.  Of course shine was our preference!

 

 

 

 

This is the pathway leading up to this quaint little restaurant that was originally the house of the founders of the resort.  We ended up not dining there, it’s pretty pricey.  But then again, so was the seafood buffet that was a bust. 

Ahh, hindsight.

Love all the mums.  They were everywhere.

 

 

 

 

Here’s a shot of the restaurant I was explaining.

 Isn’t it cute?

Next time.

 

 

 

 

After breakfast, we roamed around some more since it was so beautiful.  Here’s a few more shots before we took a break from the lodge to make some stops of our own.

“E.T. phone home!”  LOL!  I just thought this was funny so I took a picture of it.  There are bike paths and a lot of crazy bike dudes out there, riding down the slopes, apparently.  They take the ski lift to the top and, if it were me, their life in their own hands to the bottom!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

After we had a chance to walk off breakfast, we headed out to a nearby winery.  Ahh, wine!   This was my husband’s discovery when he researched the area and he found out this particular winery was having an open house.  We weren’t exactly sure all that would entail.  We thought maybe a tour of the facility and deals on wine.

This was taken on the grounds of the winery.  Very scenic place.  The pics that follow show the surprise that the open house provided us.  Free of charge they provided this amazing spread. 

 

 

 

 

Amazing!  I told my husband he really found something great for us to do and he said he had no idea it would be like this.  All sorts of great finger foods, cheeses, of course!  The best food ever to accompany wine!  They also had little pastries, which was more up my husband’s alley.  Haha!

They also had entertainment and tables set up for people to enjoy wine samples or even to crack open one of the bottles people purchased.  We did both of course.  Had samples and cracked open one of our bottles.  Hey!  It’s our vacation!  haha.

One of our six bottles, I might add.  Ok, it’s not what you think!  We only drank part of ONE bottle.  The rest are for later or gifts for family. 

Really.  I’m serious! 

 

Ok, on that note, I’m seriously heading to bed. 

More tomorrow!

Variety of feelings – vacation pt. 2

Today is my wedding anniversary.  2 years.  So many years behind most everyone else I know, but it finally happened to me when I lost all hope that it never would. 

We didn’t do anything too terribly special to celebrate.  It’s a freakin’ Tuesday!  Haha!  Plus we spent so much time and energy into our trip that we ran out of steam.  We spent the majority of our day putting together a shelving system that we purchased from IKEA on our trip.  Wait til you see how well this worked out!

I’ve said many times before that this is my absolute favorite time of year so it was no wonder we chose it for our wedding, but unfortunately it’s the same time as my performance review at work.  My review happens to be tomorrow.  So here I am on my anniversary feeling slightly down because I keep thinking about my review and what I should or shouldn’t say and what my boss may or may not say.  Every review I’ve had has been just fine and nothing to worry about, but I don’t know how much longer I can keep up the charade before I spill how I really feel. 

Well tomorrow will be here soon enough and for now I’ll stick with what is more comfortable to talk about, day 2 of our vacation!

Day two it rained some more.  Ugh!  So frustrating. 

This is a glimpse of the toboggan slides that we never had a chance to try.  I’ve been on them years ago but too much rain on Saturday and then on Sunday they tried to open it but we had other plans that day so we didn’t wait around.  You take the ski lift up to the top of the slope and ride down on this toboggan type sled that you can control yourself.  Some sort of wheel/brake system that I can’t really explain, but it’s fun. 

Here are some more shots around the resort:

Wish it wasn’t so rainy because I think the colors of the trees would have been much more vibrant, but we got what we could. 

We rode the chairlift up to the top of the slopes where there is this beautiful lake.  Again, cold and rainy, so not much to see, but it’s nice in the summer and I guess during the winter there is a restaurant/pit stop nearby when people take a break from skiing to hang out. 

Here’s another shot of some more condos up at the top of the slopes. Sorry so foggy again.  I wish it was a better day on Saturday since that was the day we planned to do most of our hiking around.  We were assigned Saturday as our Bavarian buffet day so it made the most sense to do our roaming around the lodge and slopes that same day.  Cold and rainy, but still nice.

These next shots are pretty cool.  My husband snapped them during our descent from the lifts to the lodge. 

Yikes! I’m glad he was the one taking them.  I was afraid I’d drop our camera!  Not to mention, get raindrops on the lens.

This is a nice shot of the main lodge area taken from the ski lift. Again, courtesy of my husband!

After we got our feet back on the ground, we went to the Bavarian buffet.  It was much, much better than our dinner the night before.  Especially if you like potatoes in just about any form imaginable and salty, German style meats! 

Yummy!  And unfortunately we were stuffed sick, pretty much most of the weekend. But hey, it’s vacation, right?!

Then there’s this . . .

What more can I say about this one?  Desserts galore.  It seems like we did a lot of eating, but there really were other things for us to do.  We spent a lot of time checking out all the crafters and vendors at the craft sale.  I picked up some cute jewelry and some early Christmas gift items for family.  So many things to buy, it was dangerous!

Well, sorry for the abrupt ending again, but I’m still beat.  More tomorrow!!

Home sweet home – vacation pt. 1

Well, our vacation has come and gone.  My husband and I got home earlier this evening and we are glad to be back.  As much as we needed to get away, you always get to that point when you can’t wait to get home.  As promised, I took a lot of photos and I’m thinking I’ll probably split up our trip over more than one post. 

Guess I’ll start with showing a lovely example of the weather we left behind on Friday morning.

Yep, that would be our windshield wiper, wiping rain off our windshield.  We had the wipers going the ENTIRE time.  It rained the entire commute from Ohio to PA.  Not that big of a deal since we were only driving at this point, but it did make the drive a little slower. 

 

 

Since check-in at the resort we were staying wasn’t until 5pm, we decided to stop in Pittsburgh for lunch.  My husband was given a recommendation from a coworker for a place to grab lunch.

Communion wafers and wine? No, no.  This church had been converted into a brew house.   I guess that sounds somewhat sacrilegious in a way, but if the alternative was to tear it down, I think they chose to do a neat thing with reusing the building.  It’s over a 100 years old and you walk right up the steps as if you were attending Sunday mass.  Once inside, it seems like a church, with all the pews and church seats being reused as restaurant seating, but nope, not church.  I don’t usually order up a beer in the church I go to!   I wish I was able to get better shots, but of course it was still raining and I had to take this from inside our car.  Totally couldn’t get the steeple into the shot, but you get the idea. 

One thing I will interject with, my husband borrowed a GPS thingy from a coworker.  If you don’t have one of these, GET ONE!  Amazing little gadget.  We laughed and asked ourselves how did we ever get anywhere without it?  Um, paper maps and gas station attendants once we got lost.   LOL!

Anyway, the GPS usually gives the shortest distance for your destination.  We put our trust in it to get us out of the city.  Instead of taking the highway, it took us down side streets.  I suppose this could have been scary, but we’ve seen worse in Cleveland, honestly.  Sad, but true.  A few of the streets were run down, but a majority of the streets we ended up taking were so scenic and lovely.  We were able to see some beautiful historic buildings and homes along the way. 

Once we got to our resort, it sort of looked like this.

Yep, still raining.  Which is kind of annoying when you are driving down winding, hilly roads.  But we made it in one piece. 

We had rented a one bedroom condo and you can’t tell from the picture but the driveway to head up that way was on the left side before the resort entryway.  It was nice to be in more of a private area, yet still close to the action of the resort when we needed to get there for activities. 

 

Here’s some pics of our condo:

Ok, so this isn’t exactly the outside of our particular condo.  For some reason, I don’t think we snapped any.  Guess we were too excited when we got there.  This condo is across the drive from ours.  It’s a little nicer and much larger than the one we rented, but it gives you an idea of the rustic condo community up in the mountain slope area of the resort.  It’s a ski resort, btw, in case you haven’t figured it out yet.  We don’t really ski much but we went for Autumnfest. 

 

Here’s some pics of the inside of our cozy, one-bedroom condo:

Cute, huh? 

 

 

 

 

 

This is another shot taken of the kitchen area. 

 

 

 

 

 

After we settled in and looked around we decided to head to the lodge to check things out.  We had planned to have dinner there as there was a seafood buffet.  My husband is not a big seafood person, but they billed this as a “surf and turf” type of deal so it seemed there were enough other things that he’d like.  As the hostess showed us to our table, we both thought maybe the other had something to do with the table location.  (Our anniversary was coming up.)  Turns out it was just a happy coincidence that we got the coziest, cornermost table in the joint.  It couldn’t have been more private and more perfect. 

The food, however, was not so perfect.  I have been to this resort before with family many times and this buffet was always to die for.  Not so much this time.  And I felt bad that the “turf” part wasn’t so great for hubby, either.  But we made the most of it and enjoyed a bottle of wine and laughed and looked forward to the rest of our trip. 

After dinner we looked around at some of the ammenities and decided to go bowling.  The resort had 6 lanes of bowling for its guests.  My husband never lets me win!  But I came pretty close the first game.  Haha! 

Well, I think that’s enough for one night.  I’m beat.  More pics and stories over the next several days.  Stay tuned!

Automania!

It’s mania alright. 

Why do cars decide to let you know how old they are at the most inopportune moments?  Like, I don’t know, when you are saving up to buy a house?  (We had a major engine repair for $2300 right before our down payment was due!)  Or when you have extra expenses like two mortgages or other big expenses?  (We then had an issue with the shocks on our car, during our stint with two mortgages, and during the holidays!)

Or how about when you are about to go on vacation?!

The countdown to the little trip my husband and I have planned a long time ago is on.  And our car knows it.  We planned to leave tomorrow morning and the car is not cooperating.  Well, it is but not 100%.  It started having some issues during startup, and only the first startup of the day, and only now that it’s cold.  My husband told me about it yesterday and this morning I got to hear it for myself.  Not terrible, but enough to make you reconsider driving it out of state. 

The main reason we are taking my husband’s car is simply more space.  More room for our luggage and for us to be able to haul home some of the furniture we’ve bookmarked at IKEA for what feels like the better part of a year.  We’ve been waiting for this vacation ever since we moved into our house, but with two mortgages, we just couldn’t swing it last year. 

So less than 24 hours to go we have to decide what to do.  We do have a roadside assistance program that we can always resort to, should the worst happen.  My husband is confident we’ll be ok, but you never know.  The car drives fine otherwise.  We could get a rental last minute, but the prices aren’t exactly great.  We could take my car which is small and then have to make arrangements for IKEA to ship our furniture at a later date.  What fun is that?  And again, another expense, plus a potential day off from work to sit and wait for it to be delivered.  No thanks. 

Why does this crap happen to us?  My husband and I never really traveled together before we got married and basically our honeymoon is the only trip we’ve taken together and that was almost two years ago.  We are were really excited about this trip.  I’m hoping some of the excitement will return when I’m packing tonight and my husband tells me he was able to remedy the situation.  He’s been bending ears all day getting advice from every person imaginable.  It sounds like he’s got a simple solution to try on the car that will help.  But, we really won’t know until tomorrow when we start up the “cold” car to head out. 

Here’s hoping we get on the road tomorrow.  This trip serves so many purposes for us.  First and foremost, it’s a precursor to our anniversary which is 10/27.  We’ll actually be back home on our actual anniversary, but that’s ok.  It’s also serving as a much needed getaway from the world, especially work.  We’ve both been pretty bogged down lately and we really need this.  October is our favorite month of the year and we want to get outdoors and enjoy it before it’s gone.  This trip is to a ski resort in PA and they have an Autumnfest weekend thing going on.  Wine, arts and crafts, german beers, bavarian buffet, more wine, a condo on the mountainside overlooking the fall foliage.  What could be better? 

A car that starts. 

Keep your fingers crossed!!  More from our trip to come, including lots of pictures!!

Holding down the fort

It’s what I do at work.  A lot.  In fact, I don’t know how to really break the mold on this one.  Until today, temporarily anyway.  I stepped away from the phone, the desk, the computer and went to a work-related event.  It was pretty amazing and it reinforces that I work for a really fantastic organization.

So why can’t I get happy more often?  I think part of it is because I constantly feel stuck.  I can’t get my head above water enough to try doing much else.  I’m buried most of the time and tomorrow I get to write it all down in preparation for my performance review next week.  I hate this time of year when I have to think about my accomplishments.  I feel like I do the same thing day in and day out, over and over.   What have I accomplished?  Not really sure. 

When exciting things happen in my department, I stay back to hold down the fort.  It’s not just this job, but every job I’ve ever had.  For a while there I thought I just got used to it, but now. . . now it just annoys me.  I don’t see how I can change this unless there were more hours in a day or more days in a week. And who wants that?  Not me.   When I think about doing something else with my life, the risk of leaving a great organization worries me.  Leave something good for something unknown? 

There’s still time.   Time to figure things out.  I’ve only just signed up for my second semester of interior design classes and have barely finished this semester.  I’m by no means a designer yet so I have to keep holding down the fort.  It’s safe.  It’s today.  It’s the now that I need to make the best of.  We’ll see if it can be better or if I can miraculously find a way to make it better.  I’m just not at my full potential yet and maybe I won’t be until I’m doing something different.  

But until then, I’m holding down the fort until I find out where I fit.

Serious pain in the ass?

Am I being a serious pain in the ass?  Or just plain serious about my schooling?

I’ve never been this serious about school before, so this is a new side of me that has emerged.  Today, I believe, was the first day to register for spring semester.  I thought for some reason it was this past Saturday, but when I tried to online it didn’t work.  But, it was also the launch of the school’s new website so I chalked it up to bugs and glitches.  No worries.  Since I had to request permission to be allowed into one of my classes, I’d wait until today to officially register.

I went online and signed up for the two classes.  Of course it took the one, but not the other class.  The one I needed departmental approval for.  This happened to me last semester as well and since it went so smoothly, I assumed it would be that way again. 

Wrong. 

I called the person I was supposed to, just like last time and said I was given permission to be enrolled in this class by the department head.  This woman went into slightly snippy mode right out the gate.  At least it seemed that way to me.  Explaining “how it works, just so I know” kinda deal.  Umm, ok, we had this same discussion last semester and there wasn’t an issue.  So, whatever.  I told her I’ll call the department head again to remind her to let this office/person know to let me in. 

The department head called me back and things should be ok.  But, I couldn’t help but feel stupid when she asked me if today was the first day to register.  I felt like she must think I’m neurotic.  I must get into my classes TODAY!  Right NOW!  Ugh.  It’s mainly because I’m just anxious and serious about my studies.  I’m limited to what I can take, and when I can take them.  If I miss out on a class, it will really set me back.  I did tell her that I am actually going out of town at the end of the week and was anxious to make sure I didn’t get closed out of anything.  Hopefully that tamed some of the neurosis I was exhibiting.

Pain in the ass again?  I don’t know.  I don’t want to be like those kind of people.  You know the ones.  Back in the day, they’d be like the most studious students.  The ones that would remind the teacher about the quiz we were supposed to take, or an assignment that was supposed to be due but the teacher almost forgot to ask us for.  Yeah, those students.  The ones that would make the rest of the class moan and groan.  Not only for their uncanny ability to keep us all on track, but their athletic ability to raise their hand for every stinkin’ question without breaking a sweat!

I don’t necessarily want to be that kind of student, but am I?  When I look back over the past semester and the time leading up to it, I took several measures to make sure I was doing the right thing.  Not in a kiss-up way, but more like a covering-my-ass sorta way.  I made a couple appointments with counselors, and also the department head.  I emailed my one instructor before the class even started when I found out I’d have a conflict and have to miss one class.  I was so worried about attendance being a factor, especially since this particular class only met 8 times.

Well, we all know how that turned out.  I aced the class, with extra points to spare.  Yeah, I’m now feeling like one of those students . . .

In my other class, I’m clinging to a ‘B’ and will be missing class this week for a much needed getaway for me and my husband.  Again, I’m all concerned about missing a class and this is only one class out of 16 classes!  What is my problem?  Am I being one of those annoying students?  Or am I just being serious? 

As I think about it some more, most of the successful people I’ve known in life, HAD to be this way to get where they are today.  You can’t just sit back, you need to be proactive.  I think the very reason I’ve never really excelled in my career, or much else, is because I’ve always sort of sat back and waited for things to happen.  It just d0esn’t work that way.   It’s only taken me 35 years to figure it out! 

So whether I’m viewed as one of those students, or even a serious pain in the ass, I don’t care.  I’m doing this for me, and so far it’s proven to be the KICK in the ass I’ve needed all my life.