Holiday, handwriting…

Today one of my jobs is paying me to do all the company holiday cards.  they are red and green and lovely, but with lots of gold and seasonally Northern Hemisphere holiday animals, think otters, polar bears, orca, swan.  they are really lovely, really. and i’m getting my groove on in penmanship. all i’m doing is addressing and signing, really, and its still so lovely.  my kids haven’t been taught cursive writing in school and its a sadness for me, though they are learning signatures from their dad and I , they’ll never know the great satisfaction of a loop. One of the names I just had to write was Mazzella. Now, thats a name to bring fantastic satisfaction to a hand-writer.  OOh, man, double z’s and double l’s?

i love the back and forth, the curve and return of an ‘c’, the curve and return… ah, metaphors, you never fail me.

sigh.

we have heat today, all the kids are in school, at least, at this moment.  I’m finally able to look at some of the work I should have been doing during plumbing issues and pinkeye. there’s a healthy amount.

and in the background, i am trying to figure out larger meanings… i look chill but the number of health/stress connections is sad… and… the number of large ticket items that i’ve bumped into around my car and the house and such are pretty substantial.  what does it mean? what do I THINK it means? Am I believing I need to sell this house? that THAT is the practical step forward? And then I look around and fall in love again… Am I grounding down to settle in for a winter with a house that is all fixed up and safe for me and my kids?  AM i learning that money is just something I need to stop thinking about, because things are managed somehow?  (i live in a fairly frugal way, most of the time, so thats my baseline) but with family and a single credit card and alimony and child support and a wee bit of job money, i have swung this season of giant expense, and christmas is not even here yet, but i have decided already that whatever i have at this point right now, is what will be.  thats it. no more.

thats cool, thats right. the kids have more than enough. no one will be crying on christmas. and if they do, that is not a problem of mine.

and what about love? Am i finding that I am ready to begin looking for something more than sex? Don’t fucking tell anybody, but its a glimmer right now. just a fleck of light really.

I was just glancingly invited to my kids birthday party last weekend.  i had asked, but gotten no response.  my unbelievably crafty birthday boy begged me by phone to come, in front of his dad.  his dad was essentially forced into a ‘if you love me, mom has to come’ situation.   I was able to swoop into the place, see the set up, get the big hugs and the laughs and swoop out all with my emotions completely intact.

seriously, it was no big thing.

i can’t even believe it was me that typed that.  So much has changed with time. SO much.

swoop. and loop.

arms raised to the magnificence.