I am frustrated. I know that I am depressed. I can feel that I need to have something in my brain "click" and make me feel as if I am in a positive place. If my brain is not busy with some kind of intelligent, logical thought, then it calms down and makes me feel bored--and when I feel bored, I feel like I want to lay down, curl up in a ball and cry. So I try to keep my brain busy. I read. I watch medical or detective shows on tv. I work at my job...and if I get bored there, then I am in trouble because I just want to lay my head down on my desk and cry--so instead I violate the internet policy and surf the net. It's not good. Yet I can't get my butt up off my seat and start exercising.

Once I start exercising, though, I can't stop. I can't seem to stop whatever I'm doing. If I clean, I don't take a break. If I have a sewing project, there's no way I can put it down at bedtime and leave it for another day. I have to keep going until it's done. I know that if I stop, I won't start again. Whatever it is, I need to finish what I start or it will never get done. It's taken me a long time to learn that, but it's true.

And to make it complicated, my thoughts have to be somewhat intelligent. If I write, it can't be ordinary. When I blog, it's one way...but if I am at work, it is an extremely formal style of writing. And it's not a popular way of communicating with my peers, who seem to abbreviate everything. And it's very much at odds with my appearance, which is rather drab and droopy--not to mention that it's at odds with my spoken words. And I think it's all because in the silence of my head, the logic never stops...and if I can silently write it, then I can portray that higher level of thought. But when I talk, I'm very ordinary and can't seem to express the words in any kind of eloquent manner.

It's very frustrating when I go to bed. All I do is keep my brain going...thinking of everything and nothing. My sleep latency period used to be hours and hours, sometimes allowing me only an hour or maybe two hours from the time I go to sleep until my alarm goes off. Now, as I lay down, I have learned to repeat silently to myself, "sleep, sleep, sleep, sleep, sleep...." 7 out of 10 times I can go to sleep within a few minutes. But if my brain is too busy to pay attention to my "sleep" word, then I'm up all night.

And now it's time to go to bed. I'm exhausted, and I need to go to sleep, sleep, sleep.....

I had three Thanksgivings this last week, and none of them seemed real. I didn't want to think about being thankful, and it certainly was not a time for renewing family ties. I did enjoy the holiday dinner with my children and their friends, but the other two were in homes outside my original family, and it made me think of my family--but I didn't want to be with them. And that's what I though about.

I am upset, very upset, with my originaly family. If they were not my siblings and mother, I probably would not care if I ever saw them again..except for one sister. They disappointed me greatly in not following common sense, and they deliberately hurt my one sister, and they honestly believe they were justified. There's a lot more to it, but they do not recognize some basic tenets of life, including that there are two sides to every story. And by listening--and acting upon--to just one side was bad enough, but then to act upon those one-sided conversations was a bit much, particularly when people were truly hurt by their actions. And I just don't want to be associated with the kind of people that my family has come to be.

Of course, they probably think I'm a horrible person, too. My main fault being that I am always needing financial help, or at least, I used to. But this weekend, I realized, that a lot of the reason I was having financial difficulty is because my family relied so much on each other that I never learned to be independent. But I'm learning now. An important lesson to learn.

I read that I need to develop a norm that evolved from the past, but is never going to be like that old norm. That's a tough assignment, to create that new norm, but as I sat at the Thanksgiving dinner table with my children, it made me realize that the dinner there was friendly and warm and lots of smiles. And we all were kind to each other, and we respected each other. And, as are some other situations, we weren't smiling just to be polite--and we weren't digging into our deepest pockets to pull out conversation topics that might get the guests through another minute. We weren't guarding our words so that we didn't worry about offending people by just discussing our everyday activities. We spoke freely and it was good.

We had the basic meal, too, at all the dinners. Turkey, potatoes, dressing and pie were at all the meals. Different vegetatbles and salads at all of them. Still, I liked the food my family taught me, and I think my children liked that food. I am not a good cook, but I can cook Thanksgiving dinner--carbs and all. Maybe not good for my diabetic friend, but good for the family gatherings.

Maybe one day I'll again embrace the idea that family is more important than many other things, but that is not now. For now, I'll just love my children and know that my own small family makes all of us feel valuable and treasured, and that's a very good thing!

I am in pain. Major pain. And I want to cry, but I won't.

I think I need to get some exercises to strengthen my back...and some aerobics to get my heart and lungs strengthened. When a person is as big as I am, there can be no doubt that I need to get physically more fit than now. And for the last week or so, every day I have noticed that my heart races every time I so much as bend over--and my lower back is in agony after just cleaning the refrigerator out. The only person that can help this is me, and I need to start really working this through, and not just make excuses.

But two days before Thanksgiving is probably not the best time to strat restricting the amount of food I eat. So I guess I have to start giving myself firm instructions to drop the fats and sugars and concentrate on loading up on vegetables and fruit. I don't know how that will work, but it has to work somehow. Luckily, my daughter's girlfriend is a vegetarian, and that is starting to force me to work on finding some good vegetable recipes.

And as I do all this, I need to work on my attitude and really work on being a happy person, projecting a positive perspective in life so that the people around me can know how good life can be.

I don'tknow if I'm ready to forgive some horrible acts in my life, but I want to maybe also explore the possibility of promoting a feling of goodwill toward those with whom I really don't see eye to eye. I will try, but somehow my brain is being stubborn right now and not wanting to permit any kind of good feelings.

But this holiday season will need me to look forward to each day and the potential for joy that each new day will bring.

This Thursday will be Thanksgiving, and I'm feeling rather non-thankful. I don't like my life.

I am not a happy person, and I know I have to fix that situation myself. No one else will do it for me. Only I can change my attittude. And I want to make my week good so that when I make my family their Thanksgiving dinner--on Friday, not Thursday--we will all be able to smile and enjoy this life.

One week before Thanksgiving in 1997, my father died of lung cancer. That makes today the anniversary of the day I wrote:

A Prayer for Safekeeping

Take him quietly and gently, O Lord,
Hold him in your arms and safely call his name,
Give to him your grace in full accord,
And bring to him sweet peace and joy in same.

Lord, speak to him of things unknown, unseen,
Give him breath to speak of comfort taken,
Fulfill the faith that brings to each a scene
Of truth believed and life awakened.

Stand by his heart and guard his soul from hurt,
Take his hand: placing your knowing touch inside.
Direct his eyes to see the world apart
From tempered news of eartly loves belied.

Take unto you the damaged breath of time
And heal in him the heart of severed prime.

My father was a good man, and I know now tha his view of the world was not always clear. He tried to accept life as it came, but he dreamed of better things. He took happiness when he could, and he expected those around him to be honest with him--but he didn't always understand that sometimes his truth was not the same as others' truth.

My father did not always know the truth, and the truth he did know was not always real. But he always was as honest with people as he could be. I have a son that reminds me very much of him, and I hope with all my heart that my son takes that expectation of honesty in others and makes the dreams work for him in a way that my father always hoped would work for him.

I think I, personally, have lost my sense of hope--but I want my children to never stop reaching for their stars. I don't want them to be disappointed if they don't reach the sky, but I want them to enjoy the adventure and find that when life is done, they have lived a life that represents a person who respected life and all it offered.