Bubble Bath

I was going to write the obligatory post election blog but I don’t have it in me. I don’t think I have anything worth adding. It has been disappointing to see people acting hateful and I pray that God will show us grace, despite the lack of grace that we extend to others.

I have been feeling worse the last few days than I have in my life, which is saying a lot. One of these days it will be better but the meantime has been a rough road... I took a bubble bath worthy of Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman after work today. Sir Barton (The Cat) is fascinated with bubble baths so he keeps me company, perched on the side of the tub. He learned two weeks ago that he cannot walk on the bubbles, so he is content to sit and paw at the bubbles and ponder the meaning of life.

We have an event in Tulsa on Tuesday that I am covering for work, and I’m flying out on Saturday to spend a few extra days. My mom is meeting me out there, so it’s going to be fabulous! I love that woman and haven’t seen her since The Wedding so I’m really looking forward to some QT. It will be my first time away from Kyle since we got married so I wonder how it will go. Neither of us are very clingy and I think it will be fine but I wish he could come with me.

I hit that place in my blog-life where I don’t feel like I have anything post-worthy and it only took two posts! There are mountains of topics filling up my head and I try to sort through them, seeing what might be worth posting. I tend to vacillate between being too flighty and too weighty and have not found a safe middle ground.

A topic that is a continual thread, woven into the fabric of my life, is that of chronic illness. Such funny words, they sound so heavy and foreign. But I have had lived with chronic illness for the past fourteen years and it effects and permeates every area of my life. As I have gone back to proof read this post, I realize that it has been fifteen years, but since that sounds too long, I’ll keep it at fourteen, like the women who turn 39 every birthday.

Through the peaks and valleys, I have learned to live with sickness, but it is not something I have ever gotten used to, like getting used to a new haircut. It is always there, always new, and always different.

The first ten years were tumultuous to say the least. I think it’s mostly because no one can see my sickness like they can see a deformity or see someone suffering from Chicken Pox. And since we live in a world where seeing is believing, it is hard for people to see or believe that I am sick, no matter how much they want to.

The people closest to me (Mom & Kyle) understand me the best, but I know that even they can never know exactly what it’s like, just like I will never know what it’s like to be colorblind. It is a completely different ballgame when you are the one experiencing the situation.

Now, I don’t write this for pity. There are a lot of people out there deserving of pity, and I am not one of them. I am blessed beyond my wildest dreams with a husband who loves me, family around the country who would drop everything to help me if I needed it, food on the table, a job that pays the bills, a fat cat who is nice most of the time, and friends who laugh at my attempts at humor.

I think I write this just to get it out of my head. I keep writing more and deleting it in an effort to prevent this from becoming too wah wah for a Monday morning. Maybe some day I’ll write more about my fears or what it feels like being sick. But not today. The sun is out and it’s warm for a November morning. And I am thankful.