Making progress. Or not.

Back about a month ago, I made the following goals for myself to celebrate the New Year and whatnot. I thought I would do a little check in to see how I'm doing today.

1) I want to be a better wife.
Okay, I'm not really sure how I'm doing on this one. Because, on one hand, I try really hard to be a good wife and friend and all that crap, but also? I'm still just kind of wildly inappropriate all the time. Like last night, we were going to go to this Japanese restaurant? And we get there and there's a forty-five minute wait and we didn't make reservations. Okay, honestly? With two eight year kids around? How many times do we go places that require reservations? If you said almost never then you are the winner. You don't get a prize though, sorry. I'm a low-budget blog.

Okay, so anyway, we go to this other restaurant that's kind of quiet and out of the way, but it's still a big chain restaurant. It was really high class too, the guy at the table across from us burped really loud when he was done with his dinner. But anyway, our waitress was a really, really sweet girl.

On the way home I said:
"Our waitress, she was really nice. I think she's probably about my age. She probably married her boyfriend immediately out of high school, he does some kind of manual labor, and they have two or three kids. She's never lived anywhere but here and she never will because her entire family is here and she can't imagine living away from them. She doesn't have any education beyond high school, not that there is anything wrong with that, but her parents never encouraged her before so that is how she ended up being a waitress instead of her dream of becoming an x-ray technician."

Jason looked at me, befuddled and said, "You got all that from the two times she refilled your Diet Coke?"

Eh. I l just like to give everyone a back-story.

So, yeah. I probably need more work on being less annoying.

2) I want to work on my forgiveness skills.
I'd like to say that I'm doing better at this, but actually, I'm not. Not really. I'm still really angry about a lot of things that I have no control over. Which is not smart and really isn't helpful either.

So I need more work. Also, therapy.

3) Finish my novel
This one is the one I thought would be the easiest. I thought, stupidly, "I have this story in my head. I just have to put it on paper." Alas. Not so easy. It's still in my head but putting it on paper in such a way that would actually interest anyone and not make them, you know, fall asleep in their cornflakes, is actually much more difficult than I anticipated.

Also, I didn't realize the emotional impact it would have on me to relive a lot of what happened. I thought I was over it by now. I thought I had moved on. I have, in most ways. But sometimes, I write down something like, "My son, my little son, he wasn't moving. He wasn't breathing. I expected a rush of screaming, of tears, of...something. There was nothing. He was silent." And it all rushes back to me again and I have to stop and catch my breath.

So it's hard. I'm still dedicated, but it's hard.

4) Stop working so many jobs
I'm actually doing better at this. Last week I worked for only one company. I mean, I'm still doing two different jobs, but technically, I'm working ½ capacity at each, so it all balances out. I think this one is actually going to work out and I'm going to (eventually) feel more balanced.

5) Walk five hundred miles
I'm kind of embarrassed by this one. I'm still working at it, and trying my best. Unfortunately for most of January I had my girlie issues going on. I won't rehash that in great detail. Needless to say, I became quite anemic and am still feeling overly tired and weepy about the whole deal. But I'm still plugging away. I haven't quit. I won't quit. I'll get there. It might take me the entire year, but I'll get there.

Here is another one. I told you all I'd have more, right?

6) Start recognizing my own self-worth
This one has been, by far, the most difficult. I've always thought I was slightly less than nothing and I surrounded myself, for a long time, with people who were very happy to confirm that notion.

Now, I have a loving husband and two children who think I'm the shiznit. Also, I just got my degree and I have a great job. My weight isn't what I want it to be, but I'm working hard on that too.

I asked for a raise last week. I asked for a huge raise last week. It was the hardest thing I've ever had to do, to speak to my boss and say, "I think I deserve $10,000 more a year."

Much to my surprise, he was okay with that and told me he would be happy to pay it to me, as long as the client agrees to my new, higher bill rate. I'm still waiting to find out, but I am SO proud of myself for saying, "This is what I need. Please give it to me."

You've got to start somewhere, right?