Listening

You know I get little signs from my HP on a daily basis, today I listened to them. I read about a using dream and the funny thing is I had one last night. Then I read about moving small stones will move a mountain, don't quote me I know I am paraphrasing, but that quote made me get off my butt and go to the gym. I need to remember to go on a regular basis, it helps me to stay healthy. I spent some time today with a freind and we went to lunch together. That was a nice change of pace.
I am wondering if I should call any more of my friends to go to dinner Thursday night. I know I would like people to come I just hoped it would be on their own accord. I suppose though if I don't let people know to come then they won't know I would like to have them there. I am going to go to a meeting afterwords and collect my keytag for "multiples". Then Friday morning my girlfriend is coming over to watch my babies so I can go sit with a friend who is going through a rough time with her son, he is having surgery.
A few months ago there was a terrible accident at the meat factory where her son works. By all means he should be dead, he had a 10 ton piece of equipment drop on him. The machine slammed down on him so hard his eye popped out. When his co- workers got the thing lifted off him they had to let him drop to the floor. He was standing up and then dropped to the floor. His lungs were pulverized. I am sharing this because I am grateful to say that there was a true miracle that day. He had absolutely no brakes on his spine. Every rib was broken front and back in two places and his clavicle was intact. it was like an angel hugged him and saved him from being crushed. There is no other explanation and I am grateful that I know there is an HP today.
Today I listened to the signs of my HP and followed His will. Today was a good day and all that needed to happen for me to have a good day was for me to let go of my self will and turn it over. I am in a great space today and I hope to be able to hold on to this feeling. It will definitely help me get through my birthday jitters. Todays meditation; "The secret of making something work in your lives is, first of all, the deep desire to make it work; then the faith and belief that it can work; then to hold that clear definite vision in your consciousness and see it working out step by step, without one doubt or disbelief." -Eileen Caddy

Service as Usual

Getting back into the swing of things here feels pretty good, also a little overwhelming. I have regional minutes that need to be mailed, I also have about 1000 issues of the newsletter to mail out to 3 different areas. The 26th Annual MARCNA is coming together and I am still doing the artwork and now ordering all the merchandise as well. I have never ordered merchandise from vendors the stuff we order is coffee mugs, t-shirts, hoodies, commuter mugs, pens and this year magnetic phone books for the registration bags. Well it is one thing to order this merchandise and look for deals, we are a non profit organization and all the money used is from donations, but to be in charge of the artwork and getting it on the merchandise is a whole different story. Let me tell you it is so hard when you are dealing with merchants who are unfamiliar with the software you use. And being on a time constraint I didn't know where else to look for a vendor. Luckily the place I found, well actually I was referred by the place where I got the shirt catalog from, they have done our convention before. So the girl that works in the office there is really great. The problem is I am not technically on the committee, I can't make the meetings. Except once every three months when they are at the region because I am always at the regional meetings and I told them this at the beginning of the committee year. I could not promise to be on the committee due to time constraints this year. Anyway, I recently learned how to work in photoshop. I have been blessed with the CS3 Master suite and I have been doing a lot of artwork and one thing you do to put together a portfolio is to volunteer your work for free so that is what I am doing, and I submitted 2 different peices of artwork to the convention committee. The problem is I let my ego get in the way and the committee members started asking if they could see something different, then something else different by the time I was done I have submitted over 30 different peices of artwork and I finally said I am done, I am not compromising my artwork any more. I was so eager to have them want my work that I was willing to bend with the wind. Well because nobody uses photoshop and I don't have corel draw I have ended up at the vendors on New Years Eve working with this girl for 2 hours trying to come up with what the committee wanted. That isn't even the best part, when I went to the vendor I didn't even know what mugs to order because I missed the convention committee meeting and they tried to make a decision without a catalog!!! They had no idea what they were ordering and they had no idea what artwork we ( the vendor and I) were working on in corel draw and they wanted something different!! I love being a part of this committee and I do not regret doing this work I have learned so much, I have made professional contacts in the graphic design industry and I am building my protfolio for free!! I will be signing up for a typing class this semester. I still hen peck!! Never took a class, pretty cool huh. If you are reading this and you are in a fellowship like I am and you think something is missing from your program try some service work. Do you know how much need there is for members to get involved!! What are you waiting for do you think your local meeting schedules are going to print themselves!! Do you think the next dance is going to put itself on!! All the events that happen in our fellowships happen by volunteers who give freely of their time and you know what I have learned so many life skills and relationship skills and I just can't say enough about service. I love it it keeps me out of my own head and focusing on the solution until I decide to actually work on me it is a healthy distraction that keeps me grounded and humble enough to ask for help. If I make a mistake I am forgiven and I learn from it. Now I better do some "steppin" for my daily thought; Never mind if you fall far short of the thing you want to do,—encourage your effort. If no one else will say it to you, say it to yourself. "Not so bad." It will make the next effort easier and better.- Josephine Demott Robinson

The Journey Continues

Wow, what a crazy roller coaster this adventure called life is today.
Tomorrow I get to go meet Wes's mother. We have been together for 3 years now, we have a 2 year old daughter and I finally get to meet the living relatives!!! He has taken me to meet his father, well to see his fathers headstone. We saw his Grandparents headstones, his uncles even his step fathers headstone. We have had Christmas's and Birthdays and life all without his family. Never even a phone call to his mother, 2 brothers and sister. Why you ask have we not met, I don't really know. They just don't seem to be a close family. I am so afraid that I am going to do something wrong that his mother won't like but I know it will be OK. Part of it is that I miss my own mother so much that I am hoping to be able to borrow his. I hope to have a more growing family since this last year mine has shrunk so much. So I am excited too. And I am feeling a little squirrely since my clean date is coming up on Elvis's Birthday. I will have four years on the 8th of this month and wow. Wow is all I can say.
I think also that I am suffering from post Christmas Blues. We had such a great time at Christmas, the excitement and anticipation of Christmas was so magical and everything went so nicely and it could have been bad but I was able to enjoy it so much because of being clean and working a program and now it's over.
I forgot to call my Uncle today, I was told that he has cancer and I have been a little busy but I did manage to get the word out to everyone in the family via email. As you can see I am all over the place and can't seem to quiet my thinking. I went to a meeting tonight and my daughter went with me and I shared. I shared about Captain Stupid and how much pain the letter put me in. I cried and I shared very honestly in front of her and she ran out of the room crying. So I am a little shook up about that but the last time she went to her counselor she was given an assignment to write a letter to her biological father about how she felt about the stupid letter that completely excluded her. Well she had just told me that she had nothing to write to him about, now though, her letter is two pages long. So maybe a little dose of honesty will help. Not that it doesn't hurt mind you but sometimes that is just how things are, life hurts and we hurt and we work through our pains however possible, clean. Then we can move on with our lives.
I did not mean to hurt her with what I had to say but when I share it is very candid and honest. And when you are in a meeting that is how you work through things. And I do feel better and I do feel squirrely and I know I can pray about it and it will be OK. I hate my Stupid Ex Boyfriend and I hate Cancer!!! I hope my sponsor is having a safe trip and I hope tomorrow goes well. I hope my daughter works out her feelings and I hope. I hope today and that is my miracle, because life does not beat me down today. I hope today;"All the darkness in the world can not extinguish the light of a single candle." --Francis of Assisi