The jokes about why did I want to grow up have more to them than I'd like to admit. Having someone pay for everything, do everything of significance for you and not having to make the tough decisions is quite the easy life. Why did I want to leave that behind? Oh yeah because I wanted to buy what I wanted, do things for myself and not have my decisions made for me when I thought I new best. In the long run I think it's best that we grow up, I don't think I'd really enjoy being my 7 year-old self forever. This would be doubly true if I had to go back to knowing only what I knew at 7, because I wouldn't be able to appreciate the simplicity of my life.
In a way I think that's one of life's greatest rewards, learning when to appreciate simplicity and when to appreciate the complex nature of what you have to face. It is one of the harder concepts I find to grasp right now. Some how over the years I've let the complex be too complex, I let it all over whelm me so it seems as if life is giving me too much all at once; the simple becomes all I search out. The simple all the time bores me. I used to enjoy a good challenge, I used to crave solving the puzzle and making everything work.
I miss that.
I'm still coming to terms with why I let that part of myself go. I ask myself is it gone forever? Will I ever enjoy a challenge again? Or have I doomed myself to a life where I get bored with the simple I place in front of myself. I'm not looking to actively seek out something completely ridiculously difficult just because it is complex and difficult. I also firmly believe that I'm still looking for my place, my niche. I have lost some of my self identity or at the very least have convinced myself I have. I let some things get to me and continue to get to me from my past. And it's not that I haven't come to grips with those events, but just that I'm not sure how to let them shape me.
So I'm resisting letting my past influence my life. The only problem with that is I don't think it works. These things happened, I lived through them. Sometimes I lived through them with grace, other times I lived through them like a 2 year-old child fighting and screaming before nap time. So at last I'm willing to face the reality that they will shape my life, they will change me. I need to decide how they will do so. I need to take control of my emotions, feelings, and reactions to dictate who they make me. Only when I really accept what happened do I think I can be ready to face a challenge. Then I will be able to accept life as it comes to me instead of searching for the easy way out.
Enough philosophizing for now, how about a funny Nigel anecdote. Today the Husband gave Nigel a bath. It's chilly here in Korea, and well Nigel seems to be a wimp about the cold. In order to keep our heating bill relatively sane we keep the heating set at 20 degrees Celsius. I don't know what that is in Fahrenheit and honestly I don't want to. With as drafty and poorly insulated as our place is I know that the actual temperature in the house is not 20.
Nigel's bath was about 5pm, the sun was going down and we knew it'd be a little cold outside. So we had Nigel go outside and do his business before his bath. Seth bathed him and brought him out after towel drying him. (Note: Nigel is scared of the hair dryer so we can not blow dry him without him freaking out.) Nigel does his wet dog routine, running around rubbing on stuff to dry himself and shaking trying to rid his fur of water. Then he settles down and starts shivering.
As mentioned above, Nigel is a wimp about the cold. His coat is fairly fine and doesn't seem to hold his body heat well. He was laying between Seth and I on the couch just shaking. We put a blanket over him and that still didn't warm him up enough. He ended up cuddling on Seth's lap, with a blanket over him. Then two blankets. The dog was still freezing. Now at this point we figured he HAD to be faking. So I reaching under all the blankets to feel his fur and see how warm he felt. He didn't, he felt room temperature.
We had been making fun of him for being a wimp and he was really cold. His little doggie teeth were even chattering. I felt horrible. So to warm up my dog, who has fur on every inch of his body, I broke put the heating pad. I turned it on high, place in under the blankets and let it work it's magic to warm Nigel up. The funny part is, that we used a heating pad on our dog. Not funny ha ha, but funny in an ironic sort of way. The furry, fluffy dog had to be warmed by a pile of blankets and a heating pad. Now you know not to believe him when he tries to act all tough. Nigel's krytonite is cold.
No comments:
Post a Comment