Out with the old...in with the new...

Here’s an understatement: This was a tough year.

I spent December 31, 2008, in my bed, sick with the flu and bronchitis. It was a sign of things to come. As the months progressed, being sick in bed, hacking up a lung seemed more fun than dealing with a lot of the crap that came my way.

Like most people, I struggled with my job. I went from being notified that I would be laid off, to told that if I took a pay cut and accept some other changes I’d have a job, to wishing that I had been laid off.

It wasn’t a big shock—I knew my small company was struggling—but it affected me more profoundly than I ever expected.

I turned 40 in 2009, which wasn’t so much traumatic as it was a wake-up call. I had more than a few What Have I Done With My Life? moments. I second-guessed my decision to switch careers two years ago, and I was terrified that I’d have to do it again. I don’t have kids (ultimately my choice) so I think I tend to give my career way more importance to my self-worth and expect more fulfillment from it than I should. So when I examined my life up close, I got scared, unhappy and angry.

I was slapped in the face with the realization that I lost any sense of balance in my life and allowed my job to permeate every molecule of my being. I stopped doing anything other than complaining and crying. I didn’t go out of my way to make plans with my husband or my friends—things that would have pulled me out of my self-absorption and given me a reality check. Instead, I hunkered down at home like soldier in a foxhole, feeling trapped and attacked. Even blogging, which used to be my creative outlet, became a chore and my posts got increasingly negative.

I was miserable. And worse? I wanted everyone to know just how miserable I was. I knew I crossed the line when co-workers started asking me what was going on and if I was okay. Scowling around the office wasn’t going to solve my problems. Neither was taking it out on my husband—the same man who told me—repeatedly—that if I was that unhappy I could quit and we’d be fine.

Here’s the thing: In the scheme of things, my life isn’t all that bad. I’m healthy, my husband is healthy, and so are my parents (pretty amazing considering my dad is 81 and my mom is 76). I’m not hungry or homeless and I’m not unemployed (in spite of my wish to be quit or be fired). I am surrounded by good friends who put up with me in spite of myself. Most of the things that sucked about this year are all things that I have the ability to fix—maybe not easily and definitely not overnight, but I have more control over my destiny than I allowed myself to have.

I don’t normally make New Year’s resolutions. Sure, I can always lose a few pounds, be smarter with money, and stop saying “fuck” so much, but I feel like starting my year off with unrealistic expectations just sets me up for failure.

But for 2010 I will make one resolution: I resolve to stop being so negative, to quit bitching about things (well, maybe not totally quit) and get off my ass to solve the problems I encounter.

I don’t know—this may be harder than eliminating “fuck” from my vocabulary.

This is my first entry for {W}rite of Passage, a weekly challenge to just write. This week’s assignment is to write about New Year’s Resolutions.

I love shoes. Flat shoes, high-heeled shoes, boots, slippers, flip-flops. I like them shiny (I adore my silver ballet slippers) and I like them funky. So needless to say, I have a lot of shoes. A. Lot. I have so many that they’re taking over.

Bill and I share a not-so-big closet so there isn’t a ton of space anyway, but no matter how much I try to keep it organized I can’t find anything. I’ve held onto a lot of them because I suspect some of them will come back into style one of these days, but that assumes that they were ever in style to begin with. So today I decided to clean out a few pairs that I’ve had a hard time parting with. Here’s most of what I decided to donate to Goodwill.

Nordstrom’s Blass Plum department used to carry The. Best. Boots. Every summer when they have their Twice Yearly Sale I’d stock up on a couple of pairs for the fall. I wear a size 5, which isn’t easy to come by so more often than not, if I found a pair I liked, I buy them in multiple colors. That explains the first two pairs.

About 8 or 9 years ago I bought these boots in black and found them so comfortable that I went back to buy them in another color. Unfortunately, the putrid Pepto-Bismol pink was the only color they still had. I should have saved the $80. I think I wore them about 5 times—and that’s about 5 more times than maybe I should have worn them.

Pink boots from Nordstrom's Brass Plum department

Same with these blue boots. I bought these in black and tan, and for some reason I felt I couldn’t live without them in blue. I think I wore them twice—the second time was to a costume party.

These denim blue boots were also from Nordstrom's Brass Plum department

These green shoes would fit into The Real Housewives of Orange County Shoe Collection. I went through a phase about 6 years ago where everything I bought was bejeweled or had to be blinged out. The gold butterflies on the front are gaudy enough (channeling Maria Carey perhaps?), but the green color? I never did find anything to match them. Yet, you can see, I did wear them. Oddly, I think I wore them with jeans.

Green heels with golden butterflies

These black satin Nine West shoes are actually kind of cute, but when I walk, the rhinestone flower cuts into the top of my foot. Plus, I feel like I’m channeling Blanche Devereaux when I clack around in my slip-ons.

Nine West Slides with rhinestones

These are Guess flip-flops. They have the same kind of jeweled design thing going on and I have the same problem with them cutting into my foot when I walk. And they’re heavy.

Guess flip-flops

Also from The Real Housewives Collection, these Nine West shoes never quite fit right. My feet slip too far forward and my toes hang over when I walk. There’s not a lot of support and my feet also shift sideways—not a good trait in a high heel. I think I bought them because—Look! Shiny Things!

Nine West slides with pewter squares

I have no idea why I bought these. These are too disco for daytime even for me. Plus, they hurt my feet.

Rhinestone Flip-flops

I love DSW Shoe Stores. If you aren’t familiar, it’s sort of like Costco for name-brand shoes. They carry a lot of high-end shoes at pretty discounted prices. Unfortunately, that leads to a lot of bad decisions on my part. I was lured into these Michael Kors off-white patent leather with blue stripe disasters because, well, they were Michael Kors. But they’re kind of fugly, and they make my feet sweat.

Michael Kors patent leather shoes

These Guess cork-heeled wedges are cute, and I wanted them so much that I bought them a half size too big. Of course, they rub my feet raw and give me blisters.

Guess cork wedges

I bought these Nine West slip-ons a few years ago and only wore them a couple of times. When I bought them I didn’t consider that I couldn’t really wear them with socks and I’m totally not a wearing tennis shoes with bare feet girl. Plus, wearing them without socks totally screws up my pedicure.

Nine West Slip-On tennis shoes

I found these Stuart Weitzman driving moccasins at DSW too. I loved the IDEA of them, but they aren’t really me. I’m not the preppy chick with the Izod shirts, madras shorts and driving shoes. They’re pretty comfortable and, well, they’re gold, but I don’t feel like me when I wear them.

gold driving moccasins

I bought these at Victoria’s Secret, and they looked adorable in the catalog, but they are the most uncomfortable pair of tennis shoes I’ve ever owned.

silver slip-on shoes

Some time in the next month I’m going to tackle the rest of the closets in the house. We can barely close our coat closet by the front door…

I wish I had the time to send out holiday cards. Instead, every November, I buy a fresh box or two absolutely intending to send holiday wishes, but instead, the box sits unopened, mocking me.

So considering I haven’t sent out Christmas cards in years, I realize it’s kind of obnoxious of me to complain about some of the ones I’ve received this year, but honestly? Some of them just blow me away. And not in a good way.

I love getting Christmas cards. I really do. I like knowing that someone is thinking of me—and has much better time-management skills than I do. I love getting updates on people’s lives, learning how their year was, even seeing pictures of their family. I don’t even mind the holiday newsletter—as long as it’s not one of those “Our lives are so perfect so we’re going to rub it in” letters.

But then there are the ones that seem…well, less than sincere? Maybe lazy? There are a couple that arrive every year that come across like we ended up their mailing list, and as long as we’re not dead, they haven’t removed us. They’re a little assembly-line-ish.

Look, I know that if you’re sending out more than a dozen cards you’re going to look for shortcuts like printing address labels to the sender. I get that—I don’t expect the senders to suffer from hand cramps addressing and writing out cards. However—and this is a biggie—please, for the love of all things Christmas, DO NOT slap a sticker inside with your names in place of a real signature. “Love, Husband, Wife, and Kids” loses the essence of a heart-felt holiday message when it’s typed on a sticker. Just scrawl something along the lines of “Happy Holidays” and sign it. I’d just as soon you save your stamp.

But maybe that’s just me.

Have I turned into a big Grinch?

bah humbug

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Back to our regularly scheduled randomness (which is an oxymoron, or maybe I’m the moron). You decide after reading this post.

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I love “the Situation.” Okay, not really, but I hate to admit that I’ve sunk to a new TV low (clearly I don’t really hate to admit it or I wouldn’t). “Jersey Shore” is an MTV reality show about a bunch of North Jersey guidos (and guidettes)—their words not mine—who get a summer share at the Shore for the summer. These kids try to keep it klassy at clubs named Headliners and Karma (you KNOW those places reek of Polo and Obsession for Men with a touch of tanning oil thrown in for good measure), but end up getting drunk, making out with each other or random people on the dance floor and going home to chill in the hot tub. It’s trashy and craptacular in the best way possible with people nicknamed “the Situation” (as in what do you think of “The Situation”? while pointing to his abs), Snookie and Jenni “JWOWW,” who say things like “I feel like this is beneath me. I’m a bartender. I do great things.”

Sorry, Bill, I’m setting the DVR.

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I’m sick. Not in the way the above item would have you think, but in the sniffling, sneezing, wanna curl up into a ball and die kind of way. It started on Friday and hit me full force on Saturday. I spend most of Sunday moving my achy bones from the bed to the couch and back.

This happens every Christmas—in fact, I think it started in college. I never know when exactly it’s going to hit me but I can guarantee it will. I haven’t Christmas shopped with an un-congested head in years. It makes what’s already difficult a Herculean effort. Needless to say, I’m way behind on my buying, wrapping, shipping and if you were expecting me to mail out holiday cards? Forget it. (I know—I suck.)

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I realize I lose a lot of credibility with the second paragraph of this post, but you have to go see Up In The Air if for no other reason than George Clooney is in it. It’s funny, it’s sharp, well written, and yes, George Clooney is in it. (Did I mention that already? Oh well, it bears repeating.) The fantastic Jason Bateman co-stars along with Vera Farmiga (remember her from The Departed?).

I don’t talk in specifics about my job but I work for a boutique ad agency that does marketing for motion pictures. Up In The Air is one of the movies we’re promoting this year, and it’s so awesome that it got six Golden Globe Nomination this morning! At 5:30 this morning. Which is why I came in at 6:00. So please, don’t let my early morning be for naught. Go see it. I promise, you’ll totally love it.

PS: If you’ve seen it, tell me what you thought.

For more randomness, check out The Un Mom.

I usually do this on Tuesday, but I’m a little behind this week.

Ah, glorious Thursday. One day away from Friday, which puts me thismuchcloser to the weekend.

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I am so behind on my Christmas shopping this year. I’ve tried to do a lot of it online, but the bigger issue is that I’m stumped for ideas. My mom, for instance, is THE hardest person in the world to shop for. Yes, it’s really that difficult. It’s hard to shop for someone in her late ’70s who pretty much has whatever she wants. And the fact that her birthday is next week doesn’t make it any easier. She is the 9th out of 10 kids, so she had a childhood full of combined gifts, so really, I need to come up with two ideas.

My brother asked her straight out what she wants—no sense being subtle with her—and she told him she wanted a Roomba. You know those robot vacuums that you turn loose on your floor? I guess Target had a Buy One Get One deal and she wanted both—one for one end of the house and one for the other. He called her back and told her he found them, thought they were cool and decided to give the second one to his mother-in-law. Needless to say my mom was sort of annoyed at that one.

Roomba by iRobot

So now the question is, should I go out and get a second one for her? Oy. I hate this time of the year.

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I finally got my tree out of storage this weekend and put it up. At 7:00 p.m. Sunday night I got an energy boost and decided to tackle it then. Big mistake. By the time I got the tree set up and all the ornaments unwrapped and ready to put up, I was done. I’ve been decorating here and there during the week, and last night I decided I was done—until I looked at the tree and realized there weren’t any ornaments on the top half. I thought about leaving it that way—after all, I’m only 4’11” and the tree is 7′ tall, but I knew Bill would notice, so I added some more and called it a night.

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It’s no secret around here that I bought a purebred dog. I struggle with that sometimes because I totally believe in rescuing animals from shelters. Gracie’s predecessor was a shelter dog, and she was the most awesome dog ever. The irony of that is, of course, that finding a Samoyed in a shelter was not going to happen again and I wanted another. In purchasing Gracie I got sucked into the world of dog shows, and I pretty much embraced that (it’s an odd world, but that’s part of the fun).

But there’s a big downside—getting an AKC registered dog from a breeder ties you to people you might not normally associate with otherwise. It’s like having in-laws: you have to tolerate them because they’re family, but you don’t necessarily like them (Sue, if you’re reading this, I don’t mean you!).

Today I got a panicked phone call from Gracie’s breeder. She’s breeding Gracie’s mother again to a different father (hussy!) and she needs to show proof that the puppies from Gracie’s litter are healthy. And by healthy, they mean certified to not have hip or eye problems, not just regular health issues. This requires X-Rays and a few other tests. Personally, I think Gracie needs glasses the way she walks into walls and doors, but I think they’re more concerned with bone density and hip dysplasia.

Gracie's stamp of approval

She was panicking because she never told me she needed this done in a certain time frame. It was always, “If you decide to breed her, you need to do this first.” And frankly, I haven’t decided yet.

And because I can’t just drop everything and run our during the day to do this, and because, let’s face it, this isn’t really MY problem, she’s going to pick Gracie up at my office and take her to a vet to get all of this done.

Bill doesn’t trust that she’ll bring Gracie back to me. I don’t think she’s that devious or shady, but Internet, you are my witness. Gracie will be picked up at 9:45 a.m. tomorrow and if she isn’t returned to me by noon, I’m going to hunt her down. Who’s coming with me?!