April 06, 2009

Discordant

Lent is coming to an end, but winter won't release her grasp from Chicago. The wind is still howling and the snow is still falling around here. Surely, that has something to do with my rotten mood today. That and the fact that I've been suffering from vertigo for two weeks now. This weekend, I suffered from the worst migraine I've had in about a decade. The pain still lingers and combined with lack of sleep and vertigo -- I'm a mess this Monday morning.

Spring promised to renew us, but she hasn't arrived just yet, so I'm desperately trying to make it through this latest round of choking winter and illness. Today feels a little hopeless, but that could just be the pain talking.

This Lent, I did manage to accomplish some things on a personal and spiritual level: I quit smoking. There has been a small amount of backsliding, but overall, I feel that I can confidently say that I have QUIT. Smoking ties in with a lot of old relationship baggage for me, so I'm happy to take a first step in putting those things to rest. Of course now I'm left looking for another coping mechanism and I really haven't found it yet, though chocolate has been the tempting choice. Why can't it be exercise?

Today is the anniversary of my first date with The Nurse. We had a lovely little date last night, thanks to a friend who surprised us with last minute tickets to The Goodman to see Magnolia. Very nice. The kids are still driving us both crazy, our schedules are still overwhelming and we still haven't figured out exactly how to keep the fires burning, but we're trying. Sometimes that's easy and sometimes that's hard. I guess that's just life.