Talk about a Dizzy Duck...

So I have been away for awhile. Not that I went anywhere or did anything. I have just been far, far away in a land in my own head. It has been about 6 months or so since my last blog and life has just been crazy. Some good, some bad, some ups and some downs. Life's just that way, isn't it?

I lost my job in August as I was out on disability and the company could no longer hold my position. Although, I just found out yesterday that the team I supervised was outsourced to India and I probably would have been out of a job anyway. My state disability ran out in mid-October and to date I am still fighting for my SSI. I lost my medical insurance on the first of September and currently have none of my numerous medications or my diabetic testing supplies. Currently I have NO income and am just about as financially stressed out as I can be. It has been a rough 6 months and I see many more coming, but hey, let's focus on the positive.

I do have a new wonderful man in my life and he has been such a blessing. I have the love I have always desired and we are truly happy and comfortable together despite the financial hardships. He is so very supportive and encouraging and loving! There is a down side though...He is a duck hunter!!! How very ironic that Lucy and I begin a blog called Dizzy Ducks and we are both attached to duck hunters. Hmmm... We're keeping things on the down-low until duck season is over. Ha ha ha...

After months of discussion and researching, Lucy and I are going to start our own business. We are going to start a Virtual Assistant Service and are so excited to be on this new adventure. I was telling her today that I had a starting point and a list of things we needed to accomplish in order to get started but I have been doing more and more research every day and am just completely overwhelmed at this point. We have so much information to read and so many things to accomplish that my head is just spinning.

I wake up in the morning thinking about what needs to be done, I spend my entire day researching and then I toss and turn all night thinking about the overwhelming task at hand. I think I'm beginning to get nauseous... so, let's just tackle the simple task of coming up with a name. Yeah right. Not so simple. Then a tag line. Even harder.

My head hurts just thinking about it all. I'm almost frozen with anxiety. Tomorrow is a new day and I will be right back at it though. Success awaits this Dizzy Duck! Fear and anxiety will not stop me!

Afraid? Who me?

Do you ever stop to analyze your fears? Lucy and I have had many conversations over the past couple of weeks about fears...mostly mine. She seems to be afraid of nothing. Well, wait a minute, she has a fear of needles...Big Sissy! Anyway, during these discussions I realized that I use to be, pretty much, afraid of breathing! Every time a subject came up, I would say, "oh, I use to be afraid..." or "I'm afraid of...". Shoot! Was there anything in my life that I was not afraid of??? These conversations sparked not only much hysterical laughter and endless daunting from Lucy, but her family as well, as she couldn't keep her Lucy Duck bill shut! LOL... Just kidding Lucy!

Hope...

I have been reflecting a lot this week on one of my favorite promises from God, Jeremiah 29:11. "For I know the plans I have for you," says the Lord. "They are plans for good and not for disaster, to give you a future and a hope.

A few years ago I was thrown into a period of hopelessness. A place of despair so deep that I could not see any reason to hope for anything. My dreams smashed beyond anything I could have ever imagine. I know that sometimes our dreams and hopes and expectations are broken or changed or even disappointing but mine were obliterated with such a violent force it felt physical in my heart. Does that make sense? It was a time on my knees, pleading with God just to let it all end.

Let's talk dreams...

I had a dream the other morning that I was drinking my favorite Bucky's beverage, a tuxedo mocha, and that I had misplaced it. I purchased another and again, I misplaced it. That sounds pretty much like me in my waking life. In my dream, I ran into an aquaintance from a ministry I use to serve in and offered to buy her a mocha also since I had misplaced mine, yet again. I was walking through the parking lot to the door of Starbucks and a homeless man with a red backpack walked up to me and tried to take my money. I started running and he bagan chasing me while I desperately clutched my $6.00.

So, what does it all mean?

Faith...

It absolutely amazing to watch God work in some one's life but it is even more amazing when you can see him working in your very own. I am smack in the middle of watching God work in my life. He has asked me to trust him and I feel I have taken that leap of "faith" into His arms. As the "Serenity Prayer" says, "Trusting that You will make all things right...".

As I stated before, I have been in a state of disconnect in just about every part of my life. I have been off of work for 7 months, out of ministry for 4 months, ended an engagement I realized I was not ready for, and have drawn away from the church for no reason at all. Lots of big nothingness in my life. I kind of feel it has been God's way of forcing me to slow down and really reflect on what is important and teaching me to trust Him in all areas. I feel Him drawing me back into his arms and assuring me that I do not have to be in control of everything. He's got my back.

Life

So how many times have you wanted to know what your purpose is in this life. Is it your career, your family, your church, your service to your community. I know for many years I have pondered this. I don't know anyone who hasn't asked themselves this question. At 20yrs old, your lucky if you have set a goal to try an obtain. Most of us don't plan life we just let each day happen and deal with comes your way that way. As you get older and you begin to look back instead of forward you wonder what happened to that excitement, those dreams. Good friends have come and gone, family members have been lost. We are looking for what must be a very complicated, complex answer. And it's getting harder, the divisions are getting wider. Whether it is money, morals, entitlement we are not the same. Yet we continue to get up and move each day, some miserable, some happy feeling blessed for another day. So the answer...................everyone has their own theory. For me its being the best I can be, serve humanity so we may all have hope of why we are here.

I was sitting struggling to find something to write about when I hear Hanna Montana say, "Selfworth comes from within, not from others". Wow, a relevant and meaningful message from teen pop sensation, Hanna Montana! How funny that I was just thinking about this concept this afternoon when I text a long time friend, that I have not seen in years, that I am not the same person he knew years ago.

I think about how much my life has changed over the years and I think "change" is the wrong word. My life has "evolved" over the years. To evolve is to come forth gradually into being. Yes, I have come forth into being and it was a long, slow process. In years past there was no me. There was only everyone else. I was who and what everyone else wanted me to be. The problem was that I really could never be who and what everyone else wanted. A vicious cycle of failure.

Evolution is a slow, purposeful process and

Customer Service? Are you kidding me?

I consider myself a pretty mild-mannered, easy-going, good natured person, but on occasion something will rub me the wrong way and I just become ridiculously ungracious and ill-tempered. The very sad part is that it doesn't have to be anything serious or big; the smallest infraction of stupidity can sometimes send me over the edge of no return.

Due to the numerous years as a supervisor, handling customer service issues, combined with my codependent, people-pleasing nature, "Customer Service" is very important in my world and can make or break a business and/or a person. I strive to provide "Superior Customer Service" and it is what I expect in return. Unfortunately, the attitude of today's generation is that they are doing us a favor or that we are inconveniencing them when we ask for assistance. There is one young lady though, at a shoe store in Elk Grove, that has the most pleasant of attitudes for someone in customer service but is as dumb as a rock. Seriously, not a winning customer service combination. Yes, yes, I will admit, I am being critical and harsh and it is obviously something I need to work on but COME ON...

CPAP? What the crap?!

I have been recently diagnosed with sleep apnea on top of my numerous other ailments. At 44 I'm beginning to feel like I'm 94. Well that's not even true because if someone lives to be 94, they must be in some semblance of health, which I am most certainly not. Sucks... Anyway, back to the sleep apnea.

In my conversations with some friends, they have all told me, "Oh you'll just have to wear one of those breathing machines when you sleep. So-n-so had one and it's not that big of a deal" or "So-n-so had one and couldn't stand it so they won't wear it". The technicians and other people told me that it would help me to get a better night sleep and I would start to feel better because I was able to get that deep REM sleep without interruption. Riiiight. My wonderful friends and family basically laid it out for me: I would be ok with it or not. No one, not one person, prepared me for the trauma of really wearing one. Now mind you, I did wear one for about 3-4 hours during my sleep study but for some reason, that still did not prepare me for the reality of what they call "continuous positive airflow pressure", CPAP.

Wayward Purpose

My purpose in life seems to escape me these days. For the past three years, I have had and known my purpose. I knew in my heart that I was exactly where I was suppose to be, doing exactly what I was suppose to do. Now, within a matter of a few months, I seem to have lost my purpose.

Once again, I find myself in a season of loss and change. I have not worked in 7 months due to several medical issues that cause me constant pain. The ministry group that I was so devoted to, has disbanded. I have tried other groups in the ministry but I am just not able to walk in and serve. The church I attended has gone through a season of change as well and most people I was close with have left. I find myself not attending church often anywhere as I just dread starting over. I backed out of an engagement that I wasn't ready for. No church, no ministry, no work, no fiance. Just a bunch of pain that limits everything I do.

Do I have a wayward purpose? One that has turned away from what is right or proper and is disobedient? Maybe I have a prodigal purpose. A purpose that has been spent fully and lavishly on the ministry that I was so in love with and now is gone. My hope is that it return to me and once again I embrace it fully and celebrate with the fattened calf.

So I wait for the unknown purpose to be revealed to me. I wait prayerfully and in anxious anticipation for that purpose. I know from experience that His purpose for me is greater than any direction I could go on my own.

Dizzy begets…

It all began Friday afternoon when Lucy and I picked up my new “sexy-librarian” glasses. Of course I thought I was kinda “HOT” for a brief moment in time and sang all the way home, “I’m too sexy…”. The reality is that they’re progressive bifocals (my first), I’m in the poorest of health and so overweight that “Hot” kinda cooled off many, many moons ago. I’m a little on the tepid side now but hey, I had new “sexy-librarian” glasses. It’s all in the perspective, right?

So Lucy, her husband and I go to dinner at Red Robin and there is where the dizziness of my undoing begins. Under Lucy’s insistence, because I have new “sexy-librarian” glasses, we each drink, not one but two, Nuclear Ice Teas (Long Island Ice Tea on steroids I suppose). I’m just excited because I can read the menu without having to take my glasses off. I am told that progressive bifocals are a little difficult to get use to but I seemed to have no problem Friday night. Imagine that, new progressive bifocals and mind numbing alcoholic drinks and I think I’m fine.

Dizziness begins deep within. In the state of stupidity topped with a heaping of vanity.

A beautiful adventure...

I have spent the last two days recuperating from a day trip to the Napa Valley with Lucy. My body hurts so bad I can't think straight. Heck, you would think that I ran a marathon the way my body feels but all I did was drive! Ok, there was a short hike up a hill at the castle but, DANG it was only a very small hill! On the way down the hill, we even got a "thumbs-up" from someone driving by in his car. We must have been a sight. This is a picture from the top of the hill.

Tired Duck

For all of us, who have drained themselves physically, emotionally, or have been overwhelmed this is for you. As you can see by my pic I am a tired duck. Went to Napa with Lucy, ooopppsss I am Lucy I meant Ethel on Friday and had a blast. Our last stop of the day was to go see this beautiful castle where every young girl or old duck would love to be married in. Hopefully Ethel will post some pics, put she was pretty busy trying to make sure I stayed upright not alcohol, just M.S. and taking pictures of flowers that was absolutely driving me crazy. Why?! There is no bathroom at this castle, well they may have had some but the castle was closed and we needed to fine a bathroom quickly. We had some interesting conversations, like coming up with alias names from the freeway signs. Don't know when we will use that, but I stored mine in my phone because I knew if I didn't I would not remember. Then we tried saying our names with Don Diego as our last name. That was pretty funny you should try it you don't drag it out like ddddddddddoooooooooooooonnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn ddddddddddiiiiiiiiiiieeeeeeeeeeeeegggggggggggoooooooooooooooo. It has to be said quickly and with confidence. I bet you are doing it right now. Oh and as we are leaving for Napa and Ethel is driving I am the co-pilot. lol Right I can't find my way out of a paper bag. We stopped at the information center in Napa to get maps which we really didn't need because all the wineries were just off the highway. Now I have no sense of direction, I can't see, blind as a bat, with no glasses, and the dots that you follow on the map are not accurate, yep not at all. On more than one occasion I had to yell at Ethel that oooppps we just passed it. Well she was not happy and having to get back across the highway was enough to wish you had written your last will and testament. I'm yelling no cars on the right no cars on the right, well anytime you say something to Ethel a song starts to play in her head. Pants on the floor, pants on the floor seriously! We eventually made it across the highway without a scratch, truly amazing! Well Ethel has more medical conditions than anyone I know. She seems to add one each day like you would find a penny on the ground, seriously. She is the most perky, happy person I know The total opposite of Lucy
who rarely sees her, glass 1/2 full. Heck she has to use plastic glasses now because she keeps dropping the glass ones. Whose laughs because she cracks herself up more than anybody else.
So if your tired, rest. if you are in pain take your pain medication with a glass of wine, if you are overwhelmed stop listening to or reading news because they only tell us things are going to get worse. So consider yourself pretty lucky right now, I do, because Ethel has faced it all and still is, and she is still so darn perky and happy and won't let you feel any other way. But I am still going to buy the button we found that said die perky one die. jk

Selfish Woman

I grew up afraid of being alone. I believed in the "Boogy Man" and I believed he lived under my bed. I was one of those children who turned off the lights and took a flying leap onto the bed and under the covers. I considered myself lucky if my bed was close enough to the light switch that I could get onto the bed and turn off the lights once I had both my feet off the floor. I was afraid of the dark and afraid of everything that went bump in the night.

When I was 5 and we lived in Germany, I remember my parents having a mattress under their bed so that when the Boogy Man chased me out of my room, I could sleep on the mattress on their floor. I also remember being about 15 and home alone, on a stormy night, in a 2-story house. Noises echo when you're alone. It doesn't help when the dog keeps looking up the stairs and freaking me out. I turned the TV up and went and got a carving knife from the kitchen to keep me company until my parents returned.

Farming

So I have spent my entire evening playing the new game that is all the rage... FarmVille. Well, that is really not the only thing I did; I was able to multi-task and drink Bailey's Irish Cream, watch Law and Order, American Idol, and King of Queens, AND text my step-mother and my friend. A night well spent though not completely over because I have to harvest my crops in about another hour.

I am very excited in playing this game as I now have a pond on my farm and TWO ducks. They are getting busy, as we speak, behind the chicken coop and I should have duckling waddling about very soon.

Closing

Tonight is a solemn night. The closing of a very significant chapter in my life. It was a very short but defining chapter. There have been many "ah ha" moments in my life and this is to be marked as one.

I have come to the realization that I may never marry again and I may be okay with that. The thought of never being married again does not scare me like it use to. I suppose after "walking through the valley" in my last marriage and the things I have learned about myself since, being single really no longer scares or saddens me.

I pray that my heart has not just become hardened and that some day, I will be ready and God will be in the center of it.

What to write, what to write...

I am soooo uninspired to write tonight. I actually want to write but nothing is just jumping up in my mind and shouting, "Pick me! Pick me!". Unlike Lucy, I do not have any funny poop stories. I do however have a "duck tale". Ha, ha, ha...

I started this blog at the encouragement of Lucy and the "duck" theme, as I stated in my profile, was born out of an insult from my boss. Lucy and I have had many conversations and great laughs over the title and chapter of my "duck" book (which we continually joke about me writing) and ducks have become my inspiration these days. It's almost like being pregnant... I see them EVERYWHERE!

Well today I had a mother duck and 9 ducklings in my very own backyard! Now how's that for a sign? As far as I know, they are still back there in the weeds somewhere. For those of you wondering, "Dang, you can't tell if you have ducks in your weeds?" No I really can't. Ha, ha, ha... I have a third of an acre of unlandscaped yard and one third of that has not been mowed down yet. Great hiding place for a ducky family!

A poopy day lol

Well first when was the last time you saw a poopy duck, never ? Well today Lucy duck had her share of poop. I won't share all the gruesome details but Ethel understands. Thats her in the picture. You know the little yellow duck trying to figure how to blend in with the other ducklings.
Okay well maybe not to blend but to get up on the wall, because well no reason at all, thats the kind of random thoughts she has. For Lucy, her cat was pooping as she was trying to run down the hallway holding the cat as she is releasing herself all the way. So picked up the poop, yuck! Had to change the bed another story of poop but I will leave that story for another time. You know the older you get the more random ideas pop into your mind. Ideas that hold no meaning, other than to bring you a chuckle. Like my random thought of a story a co-worker shared one time at break that he husband like to s---- her with a br---. Haven't seen her, can't remember her name, just what she said popped into my mind. lol just strange thoughts like that. Do you have those same kind of random thoughts, if so we would love to hear them.

Just another day

... in the life of a duck. Nothing special happening today. Had coffee with Lucy but it was quick. Too quick and very disappointing. Kind of like... well, I won't go there. I will try to keep it clean.

I'm sitting here while my boyfriend mows the lawn, trying to decide what I should be doing. Plenty to do but nothing is really saying to me, "You really need to get this done." so, I do nothing.

Ok, I really am doing something. I am playing with this blog and trying to figure out how to get the profile pictures to show up on the front blog page. This is my first time blogging and I am very computer illiterate. Who's idea was this anyway? Oh yeah, it was Lucy's. She has such brilliant ideas sometimes; though please don't ask her about today's grand idea... you don't want to know. Hugh Heffner doesn't want to know!

Ok, a little about Lucy and I. We have been friends for many years and yes, we are quite the team. We are the spitting image of Lucy and Ethel in the "I love Lucy" show with the exception that I am a brunette. Lucy is forever causing hysterical moments in my life and the lives of her family and friends. No one is safe from her antics or witty tongue. And please, please, please never offer her a dare. She is a "dare addict" and is in recovery for it as we speak. I, on the other hand, am quite, demure, sweet, and oh yes, very, very humble. Ha, ha, ha... Ok, really, I am more on the quiet side (at least more so than Lucy) and I try desperately not to draw attention to myself, though when I am with Lucy, we are always the object of attention.

Let me just give you a taste of our ordinary adventures... hmmmm...where to start? How about the day we went to Costco? Before I begin, I must preface the story with the facts that Lucy has Multiple Sclerosis and I have Rheumatoid Arthritis, Peripheral Neuropathy, Diabetes and a few other conditions. I state this so you can better appreciate the humorous antics we share (and possibly Lucy's posts about "voiding" HAHAHA).

Now on to Costco... We decided to walk around Costco one day during the holiday season. It was crowded but not overly so we pushed on to enjoy our "windowless" shopping. We came upon some of those fuzzy tan boots that everyone calls "Ugs" and Lucy wanted to try some on. Not a big deal right? Well, once she got them on, she could not get them off. So Picture this... woman with MS (loses her balance with the breeze) is trying to pull these boots off her feet while standing. Not happening. I try to help pull them off but Lucy can't stand while I am pulling on her leg. She sits on the floor and I, with my weak, arthritic hands, try to pull the boot off her foot only to slide her butt across the smooth concrete floor! Ok, now everyone is looking and we are laughing so hard we are crying. That happens a lot! Great times, great times.

We will have many more such silly antics for you very, very soon. Working on this blog I'm sure will be one of them.

ever notice

If you say oh wait it sounds like 08. Just came to my mind this morning. Amazing what your mind can do. lol

Tip for the day

When you have a battery operated tooth brush it works more effectively when you actually turn it on.

2:35 pm

2:35pm just voided, ahead of the game it's going to be a good day. lol

Thursday

Hi my friends, aka Ethel. Well this morning started out great with you bringing me that donut, still trying to void every 3 hours as the doctor ordered. It's coming up on 3pm so I have one hour left. lol Its pretty funny when the only thing you have planned for a day is to see how many times you bladder will release it self. So why the ducks and not the eagles? Everyone aspires to be an eagle but we spend most of their lives swimming with the other ducks. They are the indivduals who can find a ray of light in the hardest of situations especially rain storms. They are the ones that hold you up when you feel like your going under. They have a have great sense of humor and the love to laugh. They are the ones that won't migrate, they stay right in the water with you. Well that is what I would like to think, but the truth is they probably have just forgotten how to fly.