Back from vacation!! (time to rest?)

I just returned from a week long vacation my boyfriend and I spent at my parent's winter home in Florida. Great weather, great visit, and I am SO GLAD to be back home.

It certainly isn't that my parents are bad people. They are warm, generous, funny people!! The trouble is that when you visit the people who are most invested in your health and happiness, you feel the lack of health and mobility that much more. I am an adult and have read enough to know that this is all my problem. I know that it is something that I am inventing in my silly little brain. I must be a thought genius!! It seems so real. so crippling, so terrifying.

However, I'm feeling better already. When you turn your vision on an issue and examine it as if it were happening to someone else, you gain a clearer vision of it.  It's like turning a flashlight on to look for monstors under your bed. Poof! They disappear (or at least turn into dust bunnies)! Horrors become nuisances. Nightmares become jokes. My life, that seems tragic, turns into fodder for a vaudeville act!!

Laugh often!

Jodi

Whew!! So glad this day is drawing to a close!!

Ever spent a day busy doing not a blessed thing? That was me today. I was glued to the computer, trying to figure out how to fix my Twitter profile. I got my phone to display the tweets that come to me, but instead of feeling victorious, I just feel like a Twitt!!! Social media is wonderful–don't get me wrong– but it seems when it's not incredible, it feels kinda useless.

The yin and yang of human interaction in the 21st century. I think it's grand! I can talk to my parents face to face even when they're hundreds of miles away. Rather incredible! Still, keeping up with what I should seems like a puzzle to me. Statuses to update, things to tweet, checking in places I go... My God! I am a social butterfly even when I'm alone!!

I'm going to do something rather incredible now. I'm leaving the computer and doing laundry.

Happily a bit of a Luddite,

Jodi

Oh my, it's late!!

Just staying up with my boyfriend listening to music when I thought, "Oh, geez, I haven't blogged yet today!!" I'm not the most habitual woman, but since I acquired the adventure of Multiple Sclerosis, it's doubly hard!! I'm listening to jazz now on Spotify. This "magical portal" to any sort of music is simply fantastic. You can listen to pretty much any album you can think of anytime you wish, for free!! Like magic!! It's wonderful. If I feel like listening to a standard, I can hear versions by Ella Fitzgerald, Lena Horne, Mel Torme, and dozens of others in an instant!

It's cool to live now!! There is a small problem in so much information constantly available, however. If you're looking for, say, the best place to vacation in March you have an immeasurable number of choices available to you. You learn of places you never thought of going before. You also learn of places you've never even heard of before.

This same problem occurs when you are looking for the best actions to take regarding your health. Which diet to follow? What drug to take? How should I exercise? Cardio or strength training? Supplements? Which ones? Low fat or low carb? Animal fats or not? What is the best way to meditate?

Finally, you must ask how much it will cost!!

Sometimes, I think that this is all a great adventure, and sometimes, overwhelming! The greatest adventure is sorting the whole mess out!!

I'll think about that tomorrow!!

Good night!

Jodi

A little sunshine...

I woke up in a rather grumpy mood today. No good reason, but one gets to choose moods for any petty reason, so now I'm choosing to be happy because there is a small collection of sunbeams playing on the rooftops in my neighborhood. It makes me smile. It's like rainbows and puppies!! (OK - I'm even making myself a little nauseous). I'll cut the Pollyanna crap now.

Still , I'm seriously in favor of choosing moods. We can't always choose circumstance, but we can choose our reactions to them. OK, I hope I'm not like a dose of ipecac and all of you lovely people are holding on to your breakfasts. Sorry for the weirdness, but March is in the wind and it has an effect on me.

Back to choosing moods. MS has been a valuable, if punitive, teacher for me. Sometimes I feel sorry for myself when a lost ability is missed, but I HATE feeling like a victim!! I refuse. I often search for laughter, even if all I can muster is a smirk. Sometimes I allow myself to wallow in a big pile of whatever, but only for a spell.

Soon I reach for a slightly better emotion. It's not always pretty. Sometimes you are depressed or despondant, and all you can do is get mad, but it's better than depressed. Steven Wright says it beautifully when he says, "Depression is merely anger without enthusiasm."

Give me enthusiasm.

Seek the sunshine,

Jodi   

                                                         

Ah, Productivity! An illusive state.

My entire history has been spotted with difficulty in being proactive, productive and, well, prudent. My kindergarten grade card warned my parents that, "Jodi must improve in regards to her pokiness." Unfortunately, that never happened. My vocabulary grew, I became more genial, and I learned to sing—still, I have yet to banish my pokiness! For example, when I was compsing this post, I became very distracted by the correct usage and creation of the em dash. I came across these articles, http://slate.me/xFJPlp, and http://bit.ly/zWpdiL.  Interesting, but how did it improve my productivity?

Doing things that seem relatively productive, yet really offer meager measurable results is a great talent of mine. Not really a great talent in the sense of being useful or lucrative, but rather in being grandly unique. I wish I could monetize being odd. This woman has come close.  http://bit.ly/y0TV8n

Well, on to figure out more sensible ways to make money than being odd.

Please show some love and comment here (on Squarespace).

Thanks and Peace out!

Jodi