**Depressing blog warning** {note to parents - contains gratuitous strong language, angst and disgust at life in general)
Ho hum. Time for one of those soul-searching, OMG-am-I-doing-the-right-thing, where-am-I-going, what-am-I-doing, life-sucks kind of rambling posts. You can been warned. If you want, you can skip reading this and go read Jax's Making it up blog for some more interesting home ed type stuff (that's me sat in the middle of the photo under 'Look what we did!').
So where was I? Oh yeah - what am I doing? Stupid thing is, we've had a really good day today. The girls have done some hama beading, watched a bit of tv, we've read a couple of chapters of the Wizard of Oz (D just loves that book!) and now, after lunch, I put the two smaller ones to bed and D and I had some quality time making muffins. And rather nice gloopy, squidgy, choclatey-chip muffins they are too, (she says, brushing crumbs from the keyboard).
Whilst I was tidying up, after sending D upstairs for a little nap, I started thinking that I should really be addressing the pressing issue of the blasted LEA. I wish the whole fucking lot of them would go jump in the Don. I have a set of minutes, from a meeting we had with them a few weeks ago, that I really must get inthe post to various folks around the county. Thing is, they require a covering letter and it's that letter I'm stuck on. I really, really need to get my ass in gear and write the bloody thing, asap, but I just can't. My brain won't work properly and every time I look at something that has the letters L E A in it, I start to lose the will to live.
Thing is, I seem to have volunteered myself as secretary and scribe for the local area. And whilst normally, I could do this kind of thing standing on my head, circumstances of late have somewhat robbed me of my mental faculties. The letter is just beyond my grasp at the moment - I sit in front of the computer screen and my mind goes blank. So I sign into MSN and that's the night lost - talking about the letter instead of writing the fucking thing.
We have a meeting tomorow of local home edders, so I should really have a draft to wave at people. I've had some truly fabulous feedback from folks on a couple of the home ed Yahoo lists, so I have no excuse.
Except for the rest of the chaos in my life at present. My to-do list reads as follows:
And just when you think you've enough on your plate, along comes the grand finale. On xmas eve, my step-father was diagnosed with bowel cancer. They operated successfully on him and removed it, but he'd left it a bit late and it's spread to his liver and lymph. He's on chemo, but is his normal cheerful self. It was shocking enough, but Mom and Terry live in Birmingham, so whilst I'd move heaven and earth if they needed a hand, I'm not under a great deal of stress from that direction.
However, last week we were told that James' mum has pancreatic cancer, with shadows in her lungs and other surrounding areas. This is an entirely different kettle of fish. Liver cancer isn't painful, so Terry just gets on with things, albeit slightly slower than normal as he feels tired from the chemo. Pancreatic cancer is probably the most painful kind of cancer there is you can have, and James' mum is on two kinds of morphine, isn't eating and can't do anything as it's so debilitating. She had her first lot of chemo yesterday. She lives between here and where James works in town, so he's calling in to see her most night, and comes home looking drawn and tired from keeping up a cheerful front for her.
Guess that's it really. Just wanted to spit it all out. I can't believe that my kids might be losing not one, but two grandparents at some point in the very near future. I've been doing some research (damn the fucking internet sometimes) and if they have just one of them here next Yule they'll be very lucky. And I just want to jump up and down and rant and rave and yell 'it's not bloody fair! It's not, it's not, it's not!'
Because it isn't. Mom and Terry have had their differences over the years (which couple haven't?), but they've just moved house, things have settled into a good routine, finances are straightening out and things were beginning to look up for them. James' mum is the nicest one of his whole family. And the ultimate, most bitter-sweet irony of it all, is that his mum lost her father to cancer when she was 11 years old. So for the past 50 years, her mum, who we all call Grandma Z, has spent every spare minute of her time working to raise money for Yorkshire Cancer Research. This incredible woman, who was 90 a year or two ago, has raised hundreds of thousands of pounds, all because of losing her husband. And now, she's suddenly faced with the prospect of losing her daughter to the same fucking illness that took Grandpa Z when he was barely 40.
Ok, feel better now. Fetched tissues, wiped tears, blew nose, stole another muffin. :) Sorry for dumping all this on you, but as I said in my 'Interview me' blogging has a cathartic effect sometimes. You don't really know who's going to read it. But if you can cheer someone up by showing them that their life maybe isn't as bad as they thought, then maybe this might have done some good. And that sentence probably made no grammatical sense at all, but hey, I don't care. I'm off to have my hair cut now - first time in a couple of years. I loathe hair dressers. :
Edited to remove a few bits, change a few bits and generally tone things down. Apologies to anyone I offended. :\
So where was I? Oh yeah - what am I doing? Stupid thing is, we've had a really good day today. The girls have done some hama beading, watched a bit of tv, we've read a couple of chapters of the Wizard of Oz (D just loves that book!) and now, after lunch, I put the two smaller ones to bed and D and I had some quality time making muffins. And rather nice gloopy, squidgy, choclatey-chip muffins they are too, (she says, brushing crumbs from the keyboard).
Whilst I was tidying up, after sending D upstairs for a little nap, I started thinking that I should really be addressing the pressing issue of the blasted LEA. I wish the whole fucking lot of them would go jump in the Don. I have a set of minutes, from a meeting we had with them a few weeks ago, that I really must get inthe post to various folks around the county. Thing is, they require a covering letter and it's that letter I'm stuck on. I really, really need to get my ass in gear and write the bloody thing, asap, but I just can't. My brain won't work properly and every time I look at something that has the letters L E A in it, I start to lose the will to live.
Thing is, I seem to have volunteered myself as secretary and scribe for the local area. And whilst normally, I could do this kind of thing standing on my head, circumstances of late have somewhat robbed me of my mental faculties. The letter is just beyond my grasp at the moment - I sit in front of the computer screen and my mind goes blank. So I sign into MSN and that's the night lost - talking about the letter instead of writing the fucking thing.
We have a meeting tomorow of local home edders, so I should really have a draft to wave at people. I've had some truly fabulous feedback from folks on a couple of the home ed Yahoo lists, so I have no excuse.
Except for the rest of the chaos in my life at present. My to-do list reads as follows:
- file the 3 massive piles of paper on top of desk/filing cabinet/buffet unit
- update (and balance) house accounts, ie figure out how much money we don't have to live on
- post the last 4 remaining seeds packages that are lurking on my desk, looking accusingly at me
- correlate LEA and HE legal nonsense
- finish the covering letter to go with minutes of LEA meeting
- write my ed phil and post to LEA with an extract from our HE diary
- write HE diary
- make inroads into a website I'm supposed to be designing for a friend
- update (when I've decided what to do with) my own pathetic website that I flung myself enthusiastically into in Feb and haven't looked at since
- finish making curtains for the landing
- finish the fleece throw for the living room
- dig over, tidy up and plant my garden
- dig over, tidy up and plant my two allotment plots
- go to the tip (several times)
- update blog (can tick this one off at least!)
And just when you think you've enough on your plate, along comes the grand finale. On xmas eve, my step-father was diagnosed with bowel cancer. They operated successfully on him and removed it, but he'd left it a bit late and it's spread to his liver and lymph. He's on chemo, but is his normal cheerful self. It was shocking enough, but Mom and Terry live in Birmingham, so whilst I'd move heaven and earth if they needed a hand, I'm not under a great deal of stress from that direction.
However, last week we were told that James' mum has pancreatic cancer, with shadows in her lungs and other surrounding areas. This is an entirely different kettle of fish. Liver cancer isn't painful, so Terry just gets on with things, albeit slightly slower than normal as he feels tired from the chemo. Pancreatic cancer is probably the most painful kind of cancer there is you can have, and James' mum is on two kinds of morphine, isn't eating and can't do anything as it's so debilitating. She had her first lot of chemo yesterday. She lives between here and where James works in town, so he's calling in to see her most night, and comes home looking drawn and tired from keeping up a cheerful front for her.
Guess that's it really. Just wanted to spit it all out. I can't believe that my kids might be losing not one, but two grandparents at some point in the very near future. I've been doing some research (damn the fucking internet sometimes) and if they have just one of them here next Yule they'll be very lucky. And I just want to jump up and down and rant and rave and yell 'it's not bloody fair! It's not, it's not, it's not!'
Because it isn't. Mom and Terry have had their differences over the years (which couple haven't?), but they've just moved house, things have settled into a good routine, finances are straightening out and things were beginning to look up for them. James' mum is the nicest one of his whole family. And the ultimate, most bitter-sweet irony of it all, is that his mum lost her father to cancer when she was 11 years old. So for the past 50 years, her mum, who we all call Grandma Z, has spent every spare minute of her time working to raise money for Yorkshire Cancer Research. This incredible woman, who was 90 a year or two ago, has raised hundreds of thousands of pounds, all because of losing her husband. And now, she's suddenly faced with the prospect of losing her daughter to the same fucking illness that took Grandpa Z when he was barely 40.
Ok, feel better now. Fetched tissues, wiped tears, blew nose, stole another muffin. :) Sorry for dumping all this on you, but as I said in my 'Interview me' blogging has a cathartic effect sometimes. You don't really know who's going to read it. But if you can cheer someone up by showing them that their life maybe isn't as bad as they thought, then maybe this might have done some good. And that sentence probably made no grammatical sense at all, but hey, I don't care. I'm off to have my hair cut now - first time in a couple of years. I loathe hair dressers. :
Edited to remove a few bits, change a few bits and generally tone things down. Apologies to anyone I offended. :\
posted by Kris | 3:10 pm
4 Comments:
(((Kris)))
gather you aren't hama-ing with us in Chesterfield tomorrow.
Love, if you want to come over and unload in person, feel free - you know where we are. No fronts necessary here - don't have the energy for them myself.
Can I help with the letter? I'm not attached to your LEA - are the minutes in any kind of form that you can post them over and I'll write your draft letter for you? Can't think of anything else specific that I can do to help, and I find usually that doing something specific when someone is drowning under a list is the most helpful thing.
I'd offer to help dig your garden, but I haven't even started my own properly - or maybe I could come over with my tools, help you and then you could return the favour.
Or I can give you lots more links to sites where you can buy plots of land for self-building and we can daydream about communes with dome houses...
have another hug for the bad stuff that I can't help with, parentally speaking. (((Kris)))
Oh Hunny! ((hug)) and check your inbox!
((((Kris))))
Hope you got to Leeds & back safely.
If you need any help with the letter, just let me know - I'm sure hubby can drop me off one day and I'll bring my big folders with me.
Now, now, now... next time take a nice long hot bubble bath. :)
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