Making plans sometimes helps

"You make your life look easy, and it's not." -Stacey Lyzanga

There's some background information that you need to know about me. Kalamazoo, Michigan will always be home to me now. Why? It was the first place I really enjoyed living. It's where I met my friends, where I learned to love myself before trying to love someone else and it's where I finally started to take a stand for thing I believed in. When I was there, it wasn't home; home was where my grandparents lived, Richwood, New Jersey.

I fell in love with someone that I shouldn't have when I lived there. He broke my heart. Broke probably isn't the right word. He shattered it, smashed it into pieces, and ground it the unfinished floorboards in the entryway of my cute little apartment. Don't worry, he knows he did it, it's been an ongoing conversation for a few years now. This is the kind of thing we talk about on the way too and from events that include our friends. They are the friends who refuse to accept his girlfriend into our circle. It took awhile, but he's still my best friend.

Let's start at the beginning, which was probably the worst year of my life so far. When that man I fell in love with needed my help most, I was finishing a trip back to NJ. That was the trip where I was informed I needed to give up my life and move back east. That was the trip where, given time, my whole life would change. That was three years ago yesterday. Tried to keep the moving thing to myself, but it was hard. I tried to give myself reasons I couldn't move, a new job, a kitten, a new lease, a friend who needed help....another new job. Eventually it all came crumbling down at the joint combination of my broken heart, a lot of gin, everyone's wedding plans and my conscious. Even though it doesn't always look that way, given my shady past, I usually do the right thing.

I held off for a year and a half, and then finally broke down and moved. Instead of community gardens, coffee shops, riding bicycles, playing guitars, knitting at parties and public school democracies; my life became blood sugar levels, Delaware River Port Authority tolls, corn fields, apple orchards, peach trees, the History Channel and Bonanza and trying to keep my grandfather from getting lost. I took a full time job at Target, a company I've worked for on and off for a long time, but I still wanted to keep my life mine, so I joined a gym.

A combination of sobriety and an 'all or nothing attitude' has helped my lose a lot of weight. 119 pounds, to date, to be exact. Keep in mind, that much weight does not vanish overnight. Losing that much weight does not make you skinny. (I will NEVER be skinny, nor do I want to be.) And only a very small amount of this was done with the intention of being skinny. Along the weight loss journey there were some wonderful people that have popped up along the way. CK and Tone at Retro Fitness were a huge help. I'm pretty sure that CK didn't think he'd see me at the gym almost everyday when I joined. When he left, Tracey joined their team and she was also a delight to see everyday. It really does help when the person at the gym is excited to see you, it makes you WANT to go. Caroline, Ashlie, Lexi, Emily (and her boyfriend Mike who I see more then her sometimes) were also a huge part of things. If you have someone to talk to at the gym, it makes you want to go a little bit more. Joining a gym wasn't enough, I joined Weight Watchers, too.

Weight Watchers helped me realize I want to be a Dietitian or Nutritionist. Why? I love eating, and if you've known me for more then 3 years, you know that. Weight Watchers helped me figure out how to make my food a little more healthy, but still enjoyable. Combine that with my Martha-Stewart-like domestic skills. (I would have been an awesome 1950's housewife.) I started experimenting with baking and cooking.

With those little things going on, there are much more creative events that have happened too. I took a part time teaching position at Rowan University, which actually uses my college degree. With the advice of a man I knew from my party days in Kalamazoo, I applied for some grants to aid the city of Philadelphia in involving the public school kids into art programs. (The arts are the first programs cut out of most inner-city schools when a budget crisis occurs.) At the time he played for the Philadelphia Eagles, and has since been traded to Detroit. Thanks to his commitment to Play 60 and his teammates curiosity of "the random white girl who's drawing on the walls where we're building a playground that you keep talking too" (yes, that was a quote from the highest paid Quarterback in the NFL) I got help on the murals. The project went from 7 schools to 17. And it went from some kids and myself painting to pretty much every sports figure in Philly, along with some people from my past just randomly showing up. It also allowed me to get to know the mayor. Mayor Michael Nutter is a magnificent person. He makes politics in a city look easy, and it's not.

That was the fun stuff, now comes the hard stuff. My grandparents are old, almost antiques. My grandma is doing fantastic, for being her age. She still paints china, does her crossword puzzles without cheating too much, can recite versus of the bible from memory, usually know what the date is, always knows the day of the week, (I don't usually know the date, so that's pretty impressive), remembers the baseball schedule and stats (John Mayberry Jr and Jimmy Rollins are her favorite players....and Ryan Howard who's out this season.) She CAN cook, if I'm not there to do it, she CAN drive but doesn't like too, and she CAN do dishes, but that's my job. She has friends who are still alive and like to shop, so she (window) shops. (She says she doesn't "need" anything, and when she does need something, we go get it right then and there.)

My grandpa, on the other hand is not doing so well. He is a diabetic with a sweet tooth and has cancer but due to his age can not have anymore treatments. Most of the time he thinks I'm my mother, forgets that we have two cats, does not know their names. He does not want to take his medicine, sleeps all day when possible, and should NOT drive. My life really revolves around taking care of them.

All of those things bring me to Friday night, and a mental breakdown at work.  I made it through, trying so hard not to let it show how absolutely horrible my evening was going, but it was not working.  Most of my coworkers do not know that I'm sick.  There are very few of them who need to know the details. Usually when things get sticky, I can sleep it off, but when I work up Saturday morning things were still a disaster in my head.  There are a few ways to for work through a breakdown, one is talking it out, that isn't really an option anymore.  Another is sleeping it off, which didn't work.  Lastly there's re-directing my focus, and that was going to have to be it. 

The hardest part of living here as opposed to Michigan is not having friends like I used to.  Yes, I'm still friends with those people, most of them at least, but at 11:45 on a Friday night I can't call them.  I pulled out the button maker, I reworked some sewing patterns, did my organic chemistry homework and re-wrote my syllabus for next semester.  I re-directed my life into a schedule that I'm going to try to keep.  Cross your fingers, because things can't get too much harder.

In just over two weeks I'll be in Michigan at Stacey's wedding, in the city I love with the friends I adore.