Monday, November 16, 2009

pre-Thanksgiving thoughts

The renovation project drags on. It’s stressful. Working on our fourth* month. I’m sure other people have had it worse. Do you ever actually feel better when you hear how much worse other people have it? Better, in a relative way, maybe. It doesn’t make you feel good, right? It just puts your misery into perspective. At least I’m not in prison or wandering homeless in the desert. My hands are cold – but I could be starving!

Really, I don’t get the could-be-worse strategy for bucking oneself up.

Last night in bed I was counting my blessings. Most of them came with a yeah-but (“Praise be for two orange kitties. … Yeah, but it would be better if they didn’t pee in the house, and if that big fluffy one didn’t act like we were just this side of enemies and run away from our affections.”); I tried to quiet the yeah-buts and came up with a pretty good list.

We don’t have concrete plans for Thanksgiving. … uh … Cooking in the new kitchen?

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* actually, we're working on our fifth month!

5 comments:

Wonder Man said...

hopefully things will get better

Glenn Ingersoll said...

that's sweet. thanks.

David Lee Ingersoll said...

I don't know why "it could be worse" works for me. It doesn't seem to work for most of the people I know. (It could be worse? Yeah but it could be better!) And even less people I know find the idea that the idea of a mindbogglingly vast and impersonal universe at all comforting.

Paliki used to be a cat that we only saw when she wanted to eat who only just tolerated our attempts at giving her affection. Now days she's very good at demanding pets from pretty much anyone who is in the house. I never would have expected it.

I hope the house work ends soon. Sure it could be worse but who likes having their house in a constant state of being unfinished?

Glenn Ingersoll said...

The mindbogglingly vast and indifferent/impersonal universe works for me because it makes sense to me. (And it's much grander than a fussy little God.)

Discomfort? Not so much.

Things have improved since I wrote the post - we now have a heating system. Just in time, too. Is cold out! The heating system isn't perfected yet but it's the first real improvement in the house experience since the reno began.

David Lee Ingersoll said...

Congratulations on making sense out of that sentence on the vast, impersonal universe. Ugh. I try to reread for spelling and clarity before I post but ...