First off, let's all take a moment of silence this morning to commemorate ANZAC Day. On the 25th of April, Australians and New Zealanders remember their fallen at Gallipoli and in subsequent wars. After seeing the graves at Gallipoli with a group of New Zealanders, I know this is their Memorial Day, and they hold it more reverent than most Americans hold their own.
"They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old;
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anzac_day#Turkey
Being a now experienced deployment wife (though not to Jere, so I'm guessing I'll get at least a little more correspondence this time around), I know what I need to do to maintain my sanity when he leaves. I remember what a sad, pathetic mess I was when Josh was gone, and I'm determined to fare much better this time around. Having no job and no local friends doesn't make that easy (Sara, you were my Godsend when Josh was gone, even though I did learn to lock the bathroom door). So a routine is the key! Ok, so it has nothing to do with deployment. I need a routine to make sure I get out of bed in the morning even if Jere's here.
Mornings are tough for me, mostly because with this quarter-life crisis thing, I'm convinced nothing in my day is important enough to get up for. Moving has made that easier, because if I don't do something about the cluttered mess, I have to live with it. But now that things are slowing down and I have some room to walk, I'm finding myself getting lazy again. I've only been out of jammies long enough to either change into clean ones or slip on my jeans to take out some trash. I resolved a couple of days ago not to do that anymore because it turns out the UPS guy here is gorgeous, and I showed up to my door in reindeer jammie pants. No, I'm not trying to pick up UPS man, but still, how embarassing! Plus we get tons of deliveries, and if he always sees me in jammies word will get around that I'm strange.
So here is my morning routine so far. It started out as just remembering to eat breakfast and feed the cat (because I tend to forget both, and that pisses Ginger off). Over the past week, it's developed into something pretty solid.
1. Wake up at random time because the clock in my room is wind up and stops ticking everytime I set the alarm. Walk straight to the computer all the way across the apartment.
2. Check email. Curse because there's nothing but junk. Check status of all deliveries to see if UPS man is coming. If so, throw on jeans and a t-shirt just in case and pull back messy hair. I'm married, so it's good enough.
3. Walk to kitchen and feed cat, because she will have obviously clawed my leg by now waiting for me to get done at the computer.
4. Turn on coffee.
5. Take some kind of berries out of the fridge and wash them. Set on paper towel to dry.
6. Make bed while waiting for coffee, because once the bed is made, I won't crawl back into it after breakfast. Plus it makes a future step easier to accomplish.
7. Coffee is still brewing, so put away clean dishes if I ran the dishwasher the night before.
8. Get out bowl, mug, glass, spoon, milk, water, and super healthy cereal. Pour coffee, pour water, pour cereal, pour milk, top with berries, and drag all off to the computer. Most likely still in jammies. Tear pages off of desk calendars.
9. Reply to a few non-junk emails. Double check Amazon to see if they lied about incoming packages. Play on myspace and facebook until breakfast is gone and maybe a little after.
10. Go pee, because somewhere in my morning routine I forgot to do it, and am now dancing around in my chair.
11. Refill coffee. I didn't drink it all, but it's cold now.
12. Sit at the computer a little more, probably blogging if I have something to talk about. Drink coffee and water. Possible second refill of coffee.
13. Open the blinds and watch the wasps, cursing because I can't go outside. Even though I wouldn't go outside anyway.
14. Finally get off my ass and shower. But on the way to the shower, realize I have tricked myself the night before by washing either my favorite towel or favorite jeans or favorite bra or favorite bathrobe. And to get to whatever the missing item is, I have to go get the laundry out of the dryer.
15. While in laundry room, switch laundry out of washer if needed.
16. Take laundry to bedroom, and fold it on the neatly made bed (see, bedmaking benefit #2!). Put away laundry.
17. Shower. Brush teeth. Brush hair. Get dressed. In no particular order. Just as long as it all gets done.
18. Go back to computer with the last bit of coffee. By now, am so caffeinated I'm shaking and couldn't be lazy if I wanted to.
Unfortunately, this entire routine only takes about two hours. If that. And it in no way guarantees I'll get anything important done the rest of the day. But at least I'm out of bed at this point, usually dreading the fact that I'm almost out of berries and need to go to the store. Or grumping because I really need to do some writing, and just don't have the motivation or inspiration to take it on at this point. My life seems to run out of meaning before noon. Hopefully I'll be able to adapt the rhythm of my morning routine to the rest of my day, but it won't happen until after Jere's gone and I come back from my trip to Michigan. No point in getting started when I don't have the time to follow through.
Speaking of writing, I think I want to go somewhere in July. I almost don't care where at this point, just as long as it's someplace new. I wrote a ton while I was on vacation with Karalyn, despite how busy we kept ourselves. And even though I'm going to Michigan and seeing my friends in a month, I know by July I'll be itching to get on the road again. Plus I'll be turning 25, and I am already sure I don't want to be here for that one. I'm just not sure where I want to go next! I'm already going to Eastern Europe in December, and I'm thinking of adding either Berlin or Vienna to that. I'm starting to think visiting some of my friends in Oz might be in order.
Well, I'm stuck somewhere in the middle of step 17 (meaning I'm in the bathrobe all clean, but my hair isn't brushed), so I should probably get my ass in gear. Unfortunately, the hot shower made me drowsy and I so badly want to go back to bed. But I have to battle the wasps today or tomorrow to get to the grocery store and pick up more berries for my cereal, and some bread. And empty the coolers for the big final move down here next week. Hooray!
Today's lesson: What can brown do for you? Well, it can panic my ass out of bed in the morning...
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