When I was obese, I would hear women with a couple of pounds to lose complain about their weight. My typical response was, “Bless your heart,” which is, of course, Southern for “Seriously? You’re 14 ounces overweight, try being 100 pounds over. Ima need for you to shut the hell up.”

As you know very well, these past months have been a tremendous struggle for me – physically, mentally, emotionally, financially. With the help of friends and better living through chemistry, I’m beginning to get a more realistic perspective on things.

This weekend, I sat in the home I own on a peaceful street, surrounded by my pets (luxuries if ever there were ones). warm in front of my fireplace, enjoying a cup of French vanilla coffee, listening to Renee Fleming. There is plenty of food in my kitchen. I have gasoline in my car, a job that almost lets me make ends meet, a healthy son starting his own life, a new gentleman friend who values my company and whose company I also enjoy. I have plentiful food, warm shelter and clothing, affection and general good health.

In spite of my struggles, there are a great many who could and would very quickly say, “Seriously? Ima need for you to shut the hell up.”

I joined a group on Facebook called Three Weeks of Thankfulness. In spite of the validity of the concept, it’s gotten a little cliche to express gratitude for something every day of November. Everyone seems to do it; so, of course, I don’t. I’m perverse like that. This is different, though – starting the year off with a grateful heart. That sounds like a good way to start this year’s journey to me.

According to group founder Darin Hollingsworth, the protocol is simple:

“There is only one pretty child in the world, and every mother has it.” – Chinese proverb

I used that truth on my son’s high school graduation invitations in 2012. I believed in its veracity then and I believe in it now, particularly when my child recently returned from college for Christmas.

I had not seen him since he walked through security at the Nashville airport on 26 August. When he arrived home for Christmas, I was immediately struck with the physical changes in him.  He just looks so grown! His face has lost the last vestiges of boyishness. At 6’2″, he’s a long way from that 20 inch bundle I first held. In Tacoma, he is going to school, working and has taken up bouldering. In listening to him talk about his friends, his roommates, and their activities, I was reminded of when he was little.

I grew up in a small town where my mother was a teacher and Girl Scout leader. My father was a forester, a deacon in our church, a member of the Civil Defense and helped out with the Boy Scouts from time to time. They knew all of my friends, my potential friends, and (often) the parents of all of these kids. If I talked about a kid at school, my parents probably knew more about the kid than I did. It was different for my son. I remember him talking about kids in his pre-K class and being surprised that I didn’t know them. I didn’t know them and I probably never would.  It was a strange concept to me. The extension of that idea was that my child, who had depended on me for everything, was beginning to develop a life independent from mine. This human being who had literally shared my body and my blood was establishing himself as a truly autonomous being. It blew my mind.

This trip, he arrived at around 11:20 PM. We talked almost non-stop until 3:30. He shared some of his daily activities, but mostly, he shared his thoughts about society, sexism, politics, history and gender issues. He learns new facts in his classes, but, with his friends, he learns, expands, develops and shares concepts. In sharing those with me, he challenges my own notions. Whether or not he changes my mind, the discourse is engaging and energizing. When he was little, I loved rediscovering my world through his eyes. These days, I find myself rediscovering and/or changing my opinions and beliefs when I see them from his point of view.

Listening to how he is maturing makes my heart swell for I am so proud of the man he is choosing to become. Make no mistake, he’s not perfect – and, thank goodness! Who would want that!? But, he is choosing to be socially, environmentally and fiscally aware and responsible. What a thrill to watch his development!

The morning after his arrival, I woke to find him piled up in his bed with the two dogs who seemed to rejoice that their boy was back. Don’t tell the pups, but he’s my boy. Man that he is, he’s my boy, my child, the only pretty one in the world and I have him.

Last year, I threw darts on a team for a few weeks.  I threw them badly, mind you, but I threw them nevertheless. Still, I enjoyed learning the new games and I enjoyed the camaraderie that whole subculture offered to me. I got better as time went on until, at last, other players no longer wore kevlar or feared for their safety. The dart boards were clearly marked and the rules of the games meticulously defined. There was no question what my goals were as a player. The only question was if I had the skill to hit the targeted sections I needed.

As we enter this new year, the same question holds true throughout my life: do I have the skill to hit the targets?

Well, yeah. I just have to define what those targets are and I mean really define them. It’s not enough to say that I want to lose some weight, get healthier, or be more organized. I have to be specific – as specific as hitting a double six with my last dart to close out a game of 501. So, I will share with you the resolutions I am making to myself, the goals I am setting for myself:

• Reduce my size so that I can wear my size six clothes again. (That will actually be the natural result of keeping the following resolutions related to increasing my level of health.)
• Go to the gym at least four days a week.  (I stand or walk a minimum of nine hours each night at work; however, I’m still not getting the aerobic or strength training I need, in spite of what I tell myself.)
• Reduce my diet soda intake to no more than 12 ounces a day.
• Increase my water intake to at least 72 ounces a day.
• Reintroduce an animal protein-free day into my diet each week.
• Reintroduce a fish day into my diet each week.
• Reduce my wheat intake to two servings a week.
• Resume careful portion control and food intake documentation.
• Establish and maintain house, car and dog cleaning schedule.
• Remove useless and/or meaningless objects from my house. (In other words, I’ve got all kinds of crap in my living space and in my attic that does nothing but take up space and give all the dust bunnies a place to hide. That crap’s gotta go. I’m thinking eBay. Thoughts, anyone?)

That’s enough to get me going, don’t you think? I’ve already started on a few of them and am excited to at least have some feeling of order and control in my life again. I’ve got my darts in my hands and am aiming for that triple 20 to make this year a better scoring one that last year.

What are your plans for the new year?

I’m one of those people who wants to know the How and Why of things.  So, finding myself in my current state, I’ve pondered a great deal over the How and Why of it. I have worried my memories to find where I went off the rails. Where did I start making the decisions that have led me to this point in my life – starting over (yet again).

I have a few ideas about it.

When I went to college, I wanted to be a neurosurgeon. (I know, right? I’m a very long way from that.) But, I ran into the roadblock of chemistry.  Let me let you in on a little secret in case you don’t already know: chemistry isn’t science.  It’s math masquerading as science. I am, let’s say, math deficient; so, the dream I’d held since junior high school went down in flames.  I was not strong enough to find a way around the roadblock and I began to drift.

I drifted into a general liberal arts degree.  Now, let me interrupt myself for a minute and talk to any college students who may be reading: Make sure your advisor knows who you are and gives a damn about your future. My advisor did neither and told me – a clueless student – that a general liberal arts degree was marketable.  He said that as long as you have a degree, employers don’t really care what it’s in. They just want to see that you are trainable and that you stuck out the college career to the end.

That advice could have fertilized a sizeable garden.

If your advisor unloads that crap on you, change advisors, then take a look at the want ads. Look for what employers are advertising for. Right now, they’re looking for accountants, human resource people, and computer programmers, among others. Find something that appeals to you and get a degree in an actual discipline. My degree with its emphases in history, English and philosophy make me an absolute terror in a trivia game; but, that’s about it. A business degree would have been much more useful. Even an English degree would have been better, at least I could have taught with that. Meanwhile, I’m your broke, Who Wants to Be a Millionaire Phone-A-Friend….

…your broke, Who Wants to Be a Millionaire Phone-A-Friend who is trying to reinvent herself yet again.

When my son was growing up, he would often talk with me about situations requiring difficult decisions. Rather than give him an answer, I usually asked him to decide who he wanted to be. If there were two ways to deal with a situation, then he should examine each way and look at the kind of person would take each action. Then he should decide which of those people he wanted to be. The question was always less about what to he should do and more about who he wanted to be. Did he want to take the action that a kind person would take or did he want to take that action that a complete tool would take? Not that every situation can be broken down that easily, but you get what I’m saying.

Last week, I got a call from an old friend I haven’t heard from in two years or so. I was really thrilled to hear from him since it was a day when I was feeling particularly low emotionally – like I have been frequently here lately. After the first few sentences, I realized that he hadn’t called because he wanted to talk with me; he called because he wanted something from me. What a let-down. As you can imagine, that didn’t do my mood any good. At that moment, to me he was That Guy.

But, here are some things I have to remember:

1. Neither he nor anyone else is responsible for my mood, either maintaining or elevating it.
2. Friendships change – they ebb and flow; however, their current state has no bearing on their previous state (what I mean, but am not saying very well, is that just because this man and I are no longer close friends doesn’t mean that we never were.)
3. I must guard and work on relationships that are important to me to avoid being That Guy.
4. I have been That Guy.
5. I will likely be That Guy again.

I have to make certain that I am not that person who only talks to people when I want something. I have to stay engaged with those who are important to me regardless of my situation. I may be enjoying the breeze on the parapet while they are in the stuffy air of the dungeon just as easily as they may be on the parapet while I’m all stretched out on the rack. For all I know, we may both have views of the Iron Maiden!

I guess my point is that I must consciously work on relationships that are important to me. I don’t know what friends or strangers are going through or not going through. While I may be reluctant to ask for their help, they may be just as reluctant to ask for mine. However, if I call for no reason, ask them for coffee or whatever, that may be just the encouragement they need.

I know that it makes a world of difference for me.

Since I realized that my commission-only job was not working out, I took a seasonal job to keep Wells Fargo happy and to keep me and the zoo living in conditions we are accustomed to – you know, like inside and stuff. The job had me packing boxes at a local facility.  It’s not the most mentally challenging job I’ve ever held; however, it pays the mortgage and has introduced to me people and experiences that are outside of anything I’ve experienced before.  When discussing the job with my sister, she posited that it could be research. She didn’t know for what, but she was just sure that I was gathering chapters for my life experience library that would come in handy later.

She was right.

Since starting the job five weeks ago, I’ve been promoted to a quasi-trainer position (I caught on quickly). I’ve met some great people and some really interesting ones – including the woman I worked with last night. She was having some difficulty getting in the groove. Her frustrated trainer came to me asking that I work with her since she was still making mistakes that she shouldn’t be at this point.  After a few minutes, I found that I was working with a glacier.

Remember when I dropped my son off at the airport and talked about my glacier calving? Working with this woman reminded me that everyone has a story and that there is often more to any situation than meets the eye.

While the trainer thought this woman was being deliberately uncoachable, the truth was that she had never worked with computers or in a quantity rated situation before. The woman is a welder who has had some really tough life experiences in the last decade. As a result, her personality is something less than warm and fuzzy. She’s highly suspicious of others and comes across as being, well, a little crusty. Welding isn’t packing boxes or working with computers; so, she’s a fish out of water the one in that quote:

“Everybody is a genius. But if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid.” (Einstein is usually credited with this one; however, there’s no pro0f that he actually said it. The sentiment is valid, regardless of the source.)

After just 20 minutes of personal instruction, the woman’s productivity rate increased by 30%. I don’t know if she’ll make the rate they are asking for; but, I know that she is motivated and open to learning. She wants to do the job and is willing to listen to instruction. Although our life experiences are day and night, I like her and will do everything I can to help her.

After all, she has already helped me, reminding me that there are glaciers all around me – people with stories and experiences that demand patience, respect and understanding rather than impatience and judgement.