I'M CHANGING MY LIFE!

Uh... TOMORROW! I mean, I'm already on the couch today.

Wait, tomorrow is looking kinda full too - I got some sleeping late and drinking early on the docket. Next week, though, is pretty clear, so...

I'M CHANGING MY LIFE NEXT WEEK!

<shrug>

Maybe.

<sigh>

If I run out of wine.

Great. Now I gotta figure out how to murder.

The people are gone: MotherMinder has started a new adventure with a new granddaughter while The Other Girl is luxuriating in full days of living in her own home in her own town without having to drive two hours to elsewhere each week.

Katie, our hospice bath aide, is gone. Apparently I gotta be dying to warrant the continuation of her tender affections. Jeanette, our easily frightened house cleaner, gone. She will no longer be an every-other-week friend as that was a monthly budget item Mom could afford, not me. (That's a shame 'cause I had conjured up a lot of new ways to startle her whilst she vacuumed - all for naught.)

Last week The Boyfriend in the Basement and I gussied up the joint to welcome family and friends after Mom's placement ceremony. It was a simple and touching affair, both at the cemetery and back home. Those people are gone too.

And that's okay. I'm reveling in the silence of the house; the upstairs we don't use and the downstairs that we do. And... I still don't miss Mom.

I asked TBitB the other night if it was weird that I don't miss her. "Yeah," he replied, "but weird is your normal."

He's got a point there.

So now that my focus has moved from taking care of Mom and the other no-longer-denizens of this household to taking care of myself, what exactly am I doing to create this new life?

Sadly, a lot of what I was doing in the old.

I've forgotten how good I am at avoidance when it comes to resolving my own issues. Everyday I shout to the universe "I'm changing my life!" And in the wee hours of the next morning I find myself stumbling to bed bleary eyed with the realization that this all seems strangely familiar.

So while I'm not missing Mom I'm also not roaring forward eagerly to forge a new future. I suspect I ain't quite as okay as I think.

The drinking is still an issue with some easing up, but not much.

Because of the drinking the weight is ballooning, and while beautiful people inside and out come in all shapes and sizes, I'm literally down to one pair of jeans I can squeeze myself into and not a lot of monetary resources to rectify the situation.

And money. Ugh. I pulled it together enough to sign up for unemployment and now spend part of my days applying for jobs I don't want at places I don't want to be. Not an unusual situation for a portion of the population, but after a dementia caregiving stint even harder to accomplish because we're all f'ing EXHAUSTED from the long strange trip it's been.

But somebody's gotta foot that wine bill.

So, from my couch with a view I reluctantly put one foot forward, follow it up with a begrudging second step toward a modicum of motivation, and continue to a place where the luster is definitely lacking but it's an inch or so closer to changing my life.

'Cause I sure don't wanna have to take up murder.

#march2021