I keep thinking about writing but not sure what I have to write about. I look back at the past 2 weeks and wonder what I have been doing. I did manage to catch a pretty good cold last week, so I had to cancel going to my SWEA group of Swedish ladies and a birthday party. It was a bummer to have to miss hiking with my friend Deanna as well, but all in the name of recovering for the trip to see the kids.

I did drive LYFT for the first time before I got sick. I drove about 3 hours. It was very interesting. I picked up 5 people from 5 different walks of life. I drove from one side of the valley to the other, and then my phone was dying, so I had to stop. Then I got to sit in traffic for an hour to get home. A few days later, I got sick so I haven’t been out since.

Right after Lyft driving and getting sick, I had a couple of difficult down days. The 30th of January would have been my 26th wedding anniversary. I am not pining for that any longer, but what hit me was I am not where I hoped I would be. The man I wrote about last time disappeared, and I was devastated.  I had no idea what happened. I immediately went down a rabbit hole. I am also still me and catastrophize things directly. All the bad scenarios I played into. Sure, I have changed some, grown but ultimately where ever I go there I am. Then I realized, thru the work I have been doing, I get to choose how I respond. I get to choose to accept things as they are or not, and when I don’t, I feel dark and burdened. When I choose to accept, surprisingly, things open up, and new things appear.

I think I got sick because I allowed myself to get stuck in that dark place for a little too long. I did not live in the better version of my life, and by the time I figured it out, I was really sick, so I just accepted it and allowed myself to feel it all and grieve. I was content to be at home and relax while I was sick. I let responsibilities go, and not getting others sick was also a choice I made. I could have gone to the party and pretended I was fine and spread the cold or enjoy my own company. So I did the latter.

Now, as I write, I am on a plane. Unfortunately,  my cold, while largely over,  has left me with a cough which starts spontaneously and always when around people. So, while I cough up a storm, I feel embarrassed and hear what everyone must be thinking. “If I get sick, I will be so mad.” Sorry people, I hope it isn’t that way. I will never know, but I hate this stage of the cold. I have eaten almost a large bag of cough drops to try to keep the coughing at a minimum, but still, it sneaks in there.

My dream man popped back in again a few days ago. They had power outages, and it took some time to restore. Could be true if he is where he says. While communication is spotty, I have been optimistic. I don’t know if he is real, if he is trying to scam me, but I know I like how I feel when we talk. I am keeping my eyes and ears open and keeping myself in check.