Pillow Thinking

Don't you miss the days when you could simply turn off the light, flip over onto your side, and be asleep in five minutes? I do. I do a LOT! Everyone knows the feeling; your mind starts racing...what do I have to do tomorrow? Who do I have to call? I really should have registered the car today so I have it by the end of the month. Why did I have to yell at the kids like that? Why did the kids make me yell at them like that? (see how I turned that around right there?)

Even when I am DOG tired, as soon as my head hits the pillow....BAM! Wide awake while my husband and dog snore away incessently...that's the salt in the wound right there! I tell myself I should get up and write or at the very least, make a couple of notes on the pad I keep on my bedside table, as I think my best ideas come at either bedtime or at 2:30a.m. when I wake up in a panic about...see above! But I don't. Instead I beat myself up and fight with myself to STOP THINKING. We all do that. I'm sure there are heads nodding emphatically reading this and thinking, "I know exactly how she feels!"

So how do I fix this? Hmmm.....make a list today to answer the question of what I have to do tomorrow and who I have to call? Register the car sooner than two weeks before it expires? Stop yelling at the kids? (yeah, right) It's doable, I know it is, just like reaching over and grabbing my notepad in the middle of the night. Ahem.

I love reading articles about how incredibly easy it is to organize your life, your house, your family...it's as easy as 1,2, 3! "Come on, now, no more excuses! Just follow these 25 easy steps and within only a few short weeks you'll be able to lay your head down at night and sleep peacefully." In a perfect world there are 25 easy steps...well, in a perfect world I guess I wouldn't need the steps in the first place because I'd be organized and happy and channeling Donna Reed. In my world, though, I get to step 4 and I start to wane. By step 9 I'm starting to line up my excuses and by step 14 I've added that article's magazine to my recycling pile never to lay eyes on again. "Easy steps"....riiiight!

So here it is...I'm not going to beat myself up. Well, I'm going to try not to anyway. I'll renew my website favorites to include Flylady.net and pick and choose what I'll do and listen to, but perhaps not always take, advice on how to get it done. I'll tell myself, and try to believe, that tomorrow is another day. I'll register the car, I'll call so-and-so, and I won't yell at the kids. I'll try not to yell at the kids. I'll try not to yell at the kids too much.

I'll give myself a clean slate every morning and try to give myself a break. It's the best I can offer myself.

~Eileen Cassidy Bishop

I Want to be a Rock Star When I Grow Up!

Since joining Facebook and finding long-lost friends, I've realized how many of my old friends actually pursued and are still pursuing their dreams of rock and roll stardom...and doing a great job and having a blast doing it! People who I thought were in a band because it was the cool thing to do or the best way to get laid were, unbeknownst to me, doing it truly because they loved it!!

I loved singing when I was in high school and after but I succumbed to the practicality of life and instead of picking up and scouring the Village Voice for bands in need of a lead singer, I picked up the Star Ledger and scoured the classified ads for companies in need of a sales rep with expertise in staffing. Whoa! Now that's exciting, huh? But as a 21 year old living on my own and in dire need of making the rent, it was as exciting as I could get.

Now, years later, the thought of singing in front of a crowd sends me running for the Zanex! I had to read a scripture passage for my brother's wedding recently and thought for sure I would throw up as I walked to the alter! How impressed was I that I not only DIDN'T throw up, I didn't trip, lose my place, or stutter once! Of course, I think I was in a bit of a fugue state so my memories might be a bit vague.

Sometimes I try singing a bit louder than usual in church and in my imagination people are awed at my suppressed talent.

So here's to my wonderful old friends who didn't give up and didn't suppress one damn thing and to show for it have, if NOTHING else, a fantastic scrapbook of old memories and new memories waiting to be made. So here's to you, Melanie, Vinnie, Mike, Steve, and others. Please keep it going so I can continue to live out my personal dreams of stardom vicariously through you all!

~Eileen Cassidy Bishop

New Kitchen, New Lease on ....Cleanliness?

Around April or March of this year I turned to Gene and said, “I hate this kitchen. I think if I had a new kitchen, I’d keep it cleaner.” Clearly desperate for a cleaner kitchen, he readily agreed with my hypothesis. I walked into Northeastern Kitchen and Bath’s showroom, stated I hated my kitchen, and I haven’t looked back since!!

We’re now in the throes of construction. Ron, my contractor, is steady and deliberate breaking only to eat lunch (I supply some stale bread and room temperature water in a three ounce Dixie Cup) and to take the occasional call from another client (the nerve!) or his wife (good thing!) He and his helper work while Sesame Street or Scooby Doo is blaring from the family room TV, or Cathy is asking them to please stop using the nail gun because she can’t hear said TV, or Xena is laying in the worst conceivable spot and they have to get her to move; sometimes having to enlist my help 'cause when Chickie don’t wanna move, Chickie AIN’T movin’! But I just give her the stink eye and the gravelly-voiced “let’s go, Xena” and voila! Clear path…for at least the next couple of minutes anyway.

Then we have Mike at Northeastern who is quick to praise my good taste or shoot down a bad suggestion. I’ve called him from Home Depot’s lighting department, I’ve called him while pouring over sink catalogs, I’ve called him whining about the price of granite. He takes my call every time. My husband doesn’t even do that! Maybe if I pay him….?

At any rate, at the end of six days in, I have seen the last of the vinyl-covered cabinets, the blue formica countertops (yes, that’s right, I said BLUE FORMICA COUNTERTOPS), the dishwasher that lost a piece of rack at every wash, and the crusty range with the burners that had three settings: high, higher, and holy crap get the fire extinguisher! I’ve lived through the panic of having to find additional floor tile for a floor put in almost three years ago (thank you Avalon Carpet!) I watched my half-empty garage fill up to the rafters with boxes and boxes of cabinetry until it resembles the closing scene in Raiders of the Lost Ark then watched my once 80’s-style, completely empty kitchen fill up with absolutely beautiful cherry cabinets. Sweet.

I do miss my kitchen sink though. I miss microwaving in the kitchen as opposed to the dining room. I miss my countertop…well, I should say I miss a place to put stuff down ‘cause Lord knows it’s not the blue I long for! I miss, most of all, my dishwasher. Even though I know it’s only for a short time, cleaning dinner dishes in the laundry room slop sink and setting them out to dry on the top of the dryer is a drag.

Yes, I’m complaining about being inconvenienced while my dream kitchen is installed. I know, I know, what nerve! What can I say? I’m human and slightly anal but honest. I’ll keep my impatient foot tapping and laundry room whining to a minimum but I can’t guarantee a full cease fire!

-Eileen Cassidy Bishop