the shed list

this morning i wrote a list titled "things that are weighing me down: this week's shed list". it was ambitious with unfulfilled tasks having gathered mass for the past year or two. i encouraged myself that in seven days i might feel oh so much lighter.

lighter despite the pan majority of m&m peanut butter chip oatmeal bars i've eaten in the past four days.

i have perfected the ability to put off and ignore anything that puts a knot in my stomach by focusing all my attentions on tasks like making packer scrapbook paper for the photo book i meant to have done in time for Christmas and won't because photoshop and i are not done tweaking OR arranging Christmas decor and then moving things back around before moving them once again and then throwing my hands up and complaining that i'd like to just throw everything back to the basement unsure that anything works anywhere.

or eating m&m peanut butter chip oatmeal bars.

writing out the list helped me breathe more fully. i would get this. saturday and i'd feel a marked difference in myself.

and then i realized it was already thursday.

the snow made its first fall of the season.

caleb and i spent the quiet afternoon opening my lionel train ornaments, or as he so carefully pronounces "ore-ma-nn-ents". reading the boxes. talking about the massive o-gauge track my grandfather set up every season.

and then someone delivered flowers. a stunning square vase with red roses, pine and holly. three little red glossy balls. a touch of snowflake.

my initial thought escaped my mouth and i told caleb i couldn't figure out what the heck - i haven't been that nice a person these days. who the wha?

the card led with a joke and ended with an old friend's initials. in the card she said she had considered baking me a pick-me-up, but decided flowers were better for the waistline.

the big hefty i'd been ignoring since thanksgiving escaped as a jumbo mylar balloon from under me. of which no one in my house has made mention. that didn't make my week's shed list because i simply can't.

dad died today.

it was remembered. and i didn't make any more bars.

i did have a coke.