New Year’s Resolution No. 2568490320- Learn to be more proactive; instead of reactive.

During lunch…

Matthew: You and I are reactive people. Not proactive people.

Me: Why do you say that?

Matthew: We don’t work out to stay in shape. We work out because we got fat.

The events of yesterday evening were the kind that make people question what they are doing with their lives.  They make people ask themselves, why did I marry this person.  They make people weak, angry and defensive and blamers. Yes, blamers.

As we pulled into the drive way, we notice the lights were all off in the house. I confirmed with Matthew that we did indeed leave them on this morning.  Then we walked inside.  I flipped a light switch. Nothing.   I turned to Matthew, “They turned the lights off.”

I quickly searched the cabinets  for candles because if you know me, I am terrified of the dark.  Seriously. I will hall ass down the hallway to the nearest light switch if I wake up in the middle of the night.

Matthew called the energy company. We had not received a bill in a over a month or a disconnection notice. WTF?!?! How could they just do that?

Billing was closed. And nothing could be done till the morning. We light candles eat dinner and I hear Matthew upset. I kept telling him everything would be fine. What’s a few hours without electricity?  I was not trying to comfort him, I was really okay with it.

This made me think about my previous marriage.  If this incident had occurred back then, all hell would have broken loose. I would have blamed my ex-husband, screamed that I wanted a divorce for the 100th time that week.  And I would have packed my bags and stayed with my parents.

Not this time. The truth is we slacked off. We have not made time to look at bills the last month.  We have both been so busy with other things that we did not make this a priority. Forward to today at noon when we had the conversation at the beginning of this blog. We agreed, we make too much money for this to happen. And we need to be proactive about bills and not assume that the other person took care of it. Sometimes, I think we are too busy being in love that we forget to be responsible grown-ups.

As a side note- earlier yesterday I had been super grumpy and moody.  I was crying at lunch about not knowing what to do with my life. Matthew was sure it was his fault I was unhappy. Ugh so much drama! By 9:00 pm, I had perspective.  Silly woman, you married your bff. Calm down.

All wonderful, relationship growth aside- it was interesting living in third world conditions for ten hours.  Things got real, real fast. First of all, I had no idea we owned that many candles. Second of all, i spent most of the evening terrified we were going to burn the house down. I stayed awake as long as I could just so that I would not forget to turn off the lights. I can not explain how terrifying it was to have to use the bathroom in the middle of the night without lights.  I wore my big girl panties well, walked quickly through the hallway, walked quickly into the bathroom making sure not to look at the mirror at all while washing my hands.  At one point one the cats scared me. I could have sworn she was a giant rat. God, I hope it wasn’t a rat.

As I write this, Matthew plays Halo 4.

So in an attempt to turn things around, we decided to go to the gym early this morning.  Seeing as I would not be able to blow dry my hair at home, we decided to shower and change at the gym.  In an effort to lose all this happily in love marriage weight, I started this 12 week fitness challenge from The Sweaty Betties http://thesweatybetties.com/
. I am on week 1 Day #2 and I love it.  It is definitely a great workout.  Fifteen minutes later, I was drenched in sweat. Matthew decided to try it out. He did well, except for his criticism of my squats.

This week has been intense. I would like to think that I have grown as a person and as spouse.  This weekend will be filled with board games and budgeting.

Friday, I welcome with you open arms.  For real, hold me closer tiny dance.

 

 

Lunes, lunes, lunes maloso

Today was both amazing and difficult.

I slept maybe three hours last night.  My mind was filled with a gazillion different thoughts and a desire to write chapters upon chapters of To-Do-Lists.  However, my exhaustion and a bought of lazyitosis kept me from getting out of bed, walking to the living room and retrieving paper and a writing utensil.  So instead, I stayed in bed and simply kept thinking.

Lack of sleep and I do not go very well together.  Needless to say, this morning required some extra special crack.  I pull into the Starbucks and inquire about the bold of the day.  All I kept thinking was “please don’t say Christmas blend. God in heaven please don’t let it be.”  Over the intercom I hear, “Komodo Dragon.”  Holy Mother of Abraham Lincoln!!!  After two months of having to hear “Thanksgiving/Christmas blend” the Gods looked down on me and said, “Here my child drink of this, your second favorite coffee ever (Casi Cielo is my absolute favorite. That is the sweet nectar of the Gods.  It’s been rumored that they use actual Cherub tears in the blend).

I’m on my way to work, singing along to my “Songs for melancholic chaotic week” mix Cd (lots of Mumford & Sons, one Lumineers song and The Pretenders).  And it hits me- I’m on complete and total autopilot.  It’s as if I had never been on vacation. I am completely going through the mentions with my work life.  There was no excitement to be back and see all the different students or co-workers.

During lunch, Matthew and I met up. We eat lunch together almost every day, unless one of us has a working lunch meeting that we can not get out of no matter what.  We work about 15 minutes away from each other, so most day’s we have maybe 20 minutes to eat and then we are on our way.  It has become this obsession that we have lunch together.  I think it might have something to do with the fact that we were not the greatest of spouses in our previous marriages so now we try extra hard to make time for each other.  At first, I thought the driving back and forth might be too much but honestly, now my day is incomplete with out our lunch time.  It’s a great way to re-energize and focus for the rest of the day.

Matthew was so excited about his Monday. He was going on and on about the great meeting he had and all the positive progress he made in just a few short hours.  As he was speaking, I found myself feeling completely jealous and angry.  He is happy in his job.  And I am not. And the worst part is that I just started this job four months ago.  It isn’t a horrible place.  I work for an amazing district.  Everyone around me is super nice and supportive and kind.  And I do not dislike what I do but I am not happy- not Matthew happy about it.

In Matthew’s voice, I could hear so much passion and an excitement to get back to work- an excitement that I have not felt in years at a place of employment.  Later in the afternoon, we were texting back and forth and Matthew asked me what we are going to do about finding something that I love to do.  I have thought about this all afternoon and I think I am going to challenge myself.

From now, or maybe from tomorrow morning till the end of February, I will:

• Give myself kudos- identify five of my best talents/skills (Being a Master of Bad ass-ery, you would think, I’d have everything figured out).
• Research different careers based on those skills. Narrow down the list to two.
• Create Steps 1-3 for moving me in that direction.

Now I’m giving myself a month and half.  I get way to distracted to give myself a deadline of January 31st.

Did I just give myself homework? Wish me luck.

Tuesday- You better be nice because Monday kicked my ass.

Monday’s aftermath.