Poem: I Watch

I Watch

I watch as two trains hurl towards each other.

Knowing neither is going to stop,

Knowing what must happen next.

I watch as trains collide and pieces go flying,

As anger rages and tears flow freely,

As bitterness and hurt are exposed.

I watch as two people who love each other – destroy each other.

I watch as accusations fly but also…

As apologies are given in shame,

As two struggle to understand.

I watch myself standing in the middle of the train tracks,

First anticipating the inevitable collision,

Then amidst the flaming aftermath.

I watch as I concentrate on all the separate pieces,

Then slowly try to rescue what I can, 

And restore some sense of cohesion.

I watch, knowing that I cannot do everything,

But knowing that I can help,

And determined to do what I can. 

I watch as pieces slowly come back together,

As compromises are reached,

And progress slowly made.

I watch knowing tonight is just the beginning,

That construction needs to be done,

And train tracks redirected.

I watch until I can let go with a measure of peace.

I watch knowing the trains, my friends, can never be the same,

Grieving for the pain and anger I’ve seen,

But hopeful and praying for the future.

If It's Not One Thing...

...It's another right? At least that's the way my life seems to go! I kinda got knocked off of my normal routine this weekend after receiving one piece of bad news after another. Out of my closest friends... one has a mother in law in the hospital and very sick, and another's parents are getting divorced, and yet another one has learned that she has a brain tumor. I was handling it all fine up until the very last bit. Both of the first pieces of news - while difficult - were not entirely unexpected. The last piece of news through me for a loop though.

I think I'm getting better at handling stress though. I didn't have a super-serious asthma attack, and while I've had some migraines that could be as a result of the stress, they haven't been super severe either. Once I got the last bit of bad news I stopped trying to get anything accomplished and took some time to pamper myself. Took a nice long soaking bath, had some comfort food (but not too much), and spent a long time reading and then crafting. It worked :)

The only problem is, once I started feeling better emotionally? I started feeling sick. I don't know what's wrong, just that I'm really tired and my tummy is upset. *sigh* So I've spent most of the last two days sleeping and not done much more than that.

So here's some good news! Or at least interesting... We bought a scale this weekend because since I've been getting stronger I want to be more active about trying to lose weight. At first I was just going off of my frequent weigh-in's at the doctors office, but since a good amount of time has passed and this "getting stronger" trend has continued, we decided to buy a scale so I could keep track in a less haphazard manner. Buying one was a whole adventure in and of itself because the first one I bought was broken and it tried to say I weighed over 300 lbs. LOL

Once I returned the original scale and got one that worked, I confirmed that I haven't really lost any weight recently, but I have tracked my inches and stuff and I've lost some inches! Well. Kinda. I lost inches on my stomach and abs, and gained it on my hips and thighs. Taking my measurements I was like "yay! Yay! boo...what???" I retook them and my first measurements was right. I've got a theory though. In the last two weeks I've done a lot more walking around (running errands and such) and I've done a lot more trips up and down stairs...so my theory is that I lost some fat in my tummy area and gained some muscle in my hips and legs. I'll take it.