Thankful For My Struggle

 

I am thankful for my struggle because without it, I wouldn’t have stumbled upon my strength.

Alex Elle

As I have done research for my food blog, sweet treats have consumed my thoughts.  I wrote about it for my home page and it made me realize something positive that came out of feeling negative.

My struggle has been the promise I made to myself to go sugar free after receiving really bad reports on my blood tests.  It really scared me after my follow up meeting with my doctor a few months ago.  One of the things I did immediately was to work on getting rid of my Pepsi addiction.  I accomplished that and have stuck to it a few months or so.  The elimination of sweet treats that I love was part it too.  I have been so proud of myself.

Well, with sweet treats that have consumed my thoughts I broke down and bought donuts yesterday.  Since then I have beat myself up and started getting thoughts of being a failure.

Somewhere between cheating on my quest and now, I have realized that I actually conquered the struggle.  It took me stumbling through the struggle that I have realized my strength.  And I feel like I go back to positive thoughts of progress instead of failure.

And I am grateful for the struggle!

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The Scent of a Memory

This post was originally written in 2008

The sense of smell can be extraordinarily evocative, bringing back pictures as sharp as photographs of scenes that had left the conscious mind. 

 Thalassa Cruso, To Everything There is a Season, 1973 

Many of my fondest memories are wrapped around a scent . . . yours probably do too whether you realize it or not.  JR, my first husband, was a carpenter, primarily a wood worker . . . as unusual as this is going to sound, the smell of wood was his scent. 

For the longest time after he died, I would smell his clothes that still held the lingering scent of freshly cut wood.  As the scent faded away, it sadly reminded me that "my present time" had turned into "my past" and memories that I would cherish forever. 

The scent of baking bread reminds me of my fondest childhood memories spending time with my Nana in the kitchen, wanting her to teach me everything about cooking. Every Thursday and Sunday, the whole family would get together for our traditional meal of spaghetti and meat balls and italian sausage.  She made the most awesome homemade garlic bread and pizza that she called "scachata." 

Although I don't live in a cold climate, JR and I used to love to sit outside and burn a fire in our outdoor fireplace. We loved going camping on our monthly mini-vacations which always included having a fire going as long as we were at the campsite. The scent of burning wood in our outdoor fireplace would take us back . . . I love to burn a fire in my outdoor fireplace.  Even though I'm alone, it is so cool to sit outside in the dark by the fireplace . . . and I also love it when my neighbors light their outdoor fireplaces.  The scent takes me back to so many places and brings back so many different memories. 

Diamond Lil has worn the same perfume for as long as I can remember . . . her house even smelled like it. When she would bring me anything from her house, my house momentarily took on the scent. My van smelled like her for days after we went off for a day of shopping since I usually drive. 

Like mother like daughter . . . I have worn the same perfume for as long as I can remember too.  The perfume scent also brings back all kinds of memories of past years. 

The smell of cotton candy takes me back to my teenage years when I'd take my little brother to the fair.  They are awesome memories of the special relationship we had as kids.  All from the scent of cotton candy.

My sweet furbaby Kiki would get so excited when my ordered fried chicken was delivered.  She knew she would get some.  Her excitement was so cute and touched my heart.  When I now smell fried chicken, the memory of her excitement touches my heart since she has been gone.  I didn't realize at the time how special her excitement was to me.

Memories can manifest themselves in many ways with all of our senses when you think about it . . . a song can take me back to a certain place and time.  I won't get started on that one or I will never stop writing.  I wrote a blog post today that mentioned memories from an old song that reminded me of The Captain.

Then I remembered this old blog post and I had to bring it back.  The scent of a memory is very special when the person is gone, but the scent remains.

 

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The anger of grief is gone

 

May you embrace this day, not just as any old day, but as this day. Your day. Held in trust by you, in a singular place, called now.

Carrie Newcomer

I'm grateful for today.

My day.

A day to be happy I'm alive.

Grateful for the joy.

Yesterday I saw a graphic in my phone that said, "I'm happy that God had blessed us with another Tuesday."  It was the message I sent to my mother to say good morning.

Later when we spoke, we both complained about our aches and pains, the arthritis, the pain that afflicts us both.  As I was winding down, I repeated the good morning message.  Even though I have this pain, I'm happy that God has blessed us with another Tuesday.  And we laughed and discussed how lucky we are to still be able to use our legs and walk . . . even with the pain. 

The anger of grief is gone and I can feel joy again.

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The bridge that carried me over

"Praise the bridge that carried you over."

George Colman the Younger
English dramatist

Every day is getting better for me emotionally.

It is a natural progression.

And for that I am grateful.

I am finally at peace and feel free

and praising the bridge that carried me over.

The graphic and the quote is how I am feeling today.  Since the stroke of midnight on New Years Eve, it feels like I have crossed that bridge in the quote.

It is a mindset of a new beginning.

Perhaps enough time has passed and my grief stage has remained in that new phase I have discussed.  It is about time!

From prior experience, I know I will still have my sad moments when that wave I talk about hits me, but soon I am back to normal.  

Grief never goes away, but neither does the love we experienced.

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Just Another Chapter

 

Every exit is an entry somewhere else.

Tom Stoppard

We exited 2025 and entered 2026.

Just another chapter in life as we move through the chapters, some good, some bad, some happy, some sad.

As a society, most of us eat black eyed peas or grapes or a number of what I call superstitions that are just that.

Every year I faithfully ate my grapes and black eyed peas, hoping that the year would be better than the last. One year was worse than the other whether I ate the grapes or not.  With the decade or so that I have had, this year I decided to forget the grapes and black eyed peas.

It is just another chapter in my life.  All I can do is pray for a better year and have faith that it will be.  

I'll have faith in God instead of grapes or black eyed peas.

Happy New Year!

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One day at a time

 

“The best thing about the future

is that it comes one day at a time.”

ABRAHAM LINCOLN

16th U.S. President

I've learned the concept of one moment at a time and sometimes it is one second at a time.

Life has a way of testing us by throwing unexpected situations at us, often leaving us broken and lost.

My choice was to have faith that God would see me through it and guide me as I worked through it all.  I was led to take life one day at a time.  When I had scary moments of feeling lost, I would take one moment or seconds at a time.

Now that I have gone through the grief phases and have reached one that allows me to have peace and joy again.  There are times when I think I am back in the beginning phases, but I can quickly get through it.

I'm so grateful I took the one day at a time approach.  When I would think beyond the day, that is when overwhelm and feelings of doom set in.

With God by my side, I can say "this too shall pass" and it always does.

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Coming out of a fog

 

It’s not life’s job to make me happy. It’s my job to find the joy in life by observing and appreciating the small wonders and everyday miracles that are all around me, everywhere, every minute of my life.

Paul Cotter

Beautiful words to live by.

The thought that it is my job to find joy in life was not realized until I started living the Simple Abundant life.  That book opened a whole new world for me.  I've written about it many times.

After The Captain and Kiki passed away, it is as if the world around me didn't exist anymore.  Although I still lived my life with gratitude, it did not bring me joy.

The new grief phase made me realize that it was the world that I knew and lived everyday was gone and I knew I would have to create a new life for myself.

Joy would mean something different.  Everything in my life is somewhat different, but I have finally realized this is my new normal and new joys in life would be experienced if only I would open my eyes to see them.

Now I appreciate the little things again like hearing the neighborhood roosters crow or hearing the sweet voices of the cardinals wondering if God brings them to me to experience joy again in my life.  They have been here all this time.

Today was a sad day for some reason . . . they just hit me like a ton of bricks.  It could be the holidays happening without them.  Of course that is going to make me sad because I miss them terribly.  But having gone through another day that slaps me in the face, I realize the miracle of having found joy again in little things in life that happen every day.  And that brought me joy to know I have entered the grief phase of acceptance even though the sadness remains.  Awesome memories keep them alive.

I have survived the awful grief phases . . . and that has become my everyday miracle.

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