In my dreams...

I remember when I was a child. I used to watch The Waltons on Thursday nights and Little House on Monday nights...and on Saturdays it was Hee Haw and Fantasy Island.

Yeah, I did my share of fantasizing.

But, for as long as I can remember, (along with dreaming of being the first woman president and a country music singer...) I wanted to be a writer.

That's probably the one dream that stuck.

The fact that I never made any money off it don't matter, because all artists starve...right? Doesn't mean I don't have the talent or the potential...Just means the bird forgot how to fly.

Anyway, as I am sitting here watching old episodes of The Waltons and Little House, I realize that these two television series taught me so much growing up.

I wanted a family like theirs. Both of them. One that was supportive and encouraging. A family that believed in me as much as I believed in it. One I knew that no matter how far I wandered, I could always come home.

I guess that is why I loved my grandma and granddaddy Freeman's place so much. It's a place we all gravitated to. The land, the house my granddaddy built with his own two hands...it was as much family as they were. I mourn them as I think how they are all gone, in spite of my every attempt to not let it go.

I wanted to be a writer, though, because I realized at a young age, watching the stories that Laura Ingalls Wilder told and listening to the tales that John Boy wrote about, that writing was just an honest way of recording lives, whether they were real, lived, or just dreamed up. I could be anything I chose to be as long as I could write it down.

Maybe this is why these two television series' dug such a deep impression in my life.

Tonight, I watched Mary Ellen wish upon stars that she knew was long burned out, longing to chase dreams and have adventures, not realizing that everything she wanted was right there, where she could have it all. John Boy, I think, had already figured that out. And, once she stopped struggling, fate found her an opportunity to go get a taste of what she wanted.

My life is like that even now. Like John Boy, however, I am content to do what I can do in the now, where I am. I know that if the Good Lord wills it, one day, I'll go where He needs me to be. In the meantime, I am there.

Communication with the younger generation...

I was watching an episode of Little House on the Prairie last night. In it, the old widow was about to have her 80th birthday party, but she hadn't seen her children for nany many years and they are always either too busy or don't respond at all. So she faked her death to get them to come to her funeral so she could see them.

As I see posts about young people who don't respond to the older generation in this technological age (when you KNOW they are getting your messages and voice mails) I wonder if this isn't a trick I will one day have to try in order to see my own children.

I wonder if they'd even come then.

Has having parents really become so unimportant to the younger generation? Or, is it just the mindset that they are (as the widow said) perceived by them to be a permanent fixture in life.

My youngest son once jokingly said to me, "Nothing is going to happen to you because you are immortal."

I now wonder if he really believes that.

Not Perfect

I saw a post on Facebook from a FaceBook friend that I just had to borrow:

"I have heard it said...if you find a perfect church don't join it...it will no longer be perfect. Likewise if you are perfect you should probably unfriendly me...I will never live up to your expectations!"

I do not want perfect friends among men. There is only one who is perfect who deserves my friendship, and He was the only perfect friend who was willing to be imperfect in the eyes of another so I could appear perfect in the eyes of God.

It is HE that I beg not to "unfriend" me. And He has already answered my request...

Hebrews 13:5
“Let your conversation be without covetousness; and be content with such things as ye have: for he hath said, I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee.”

Closer to Jesus than ever before...

Last night I dreamed of someone who has been dead for a long long time. I dreamed that I still loved him and I had the opportunity to befriend him and invite him to my church, and that leading him to Jesus was more important than finally becoming his friend.

It was a strange dream that I found myself wanting to go back to sleep to keep dreaming because it didn't end right....I hate waking up in the middle of a dream...

I wonder if, when we finally die and go be with the Lord, we look back on this life and wish we hadn't died yet...as if it were in the middle of a dream...

What do you say at the end of your life, or when you realize that you are older than you are young and that glorious day when you go to meet your maker is only a wink away....

What do you say?
"If only I had more time..."
"Did I do all I should've?"

"If only I had taken the chance when I could..."

I look in the mirror and see that I am now a ripe 48 years old. Then, I get tears when I realize that my granny was only 14 years older than I am now when she passed on. I don't mind telling you that at 48, 14 years doesn't seem long at all.

Lord, help me use what time I have left to bring YOU glory!

Closing a door behind me to find another one to open.

I just quit my job as Wadley Hospital's EVS Supervisor.

In a meeting today, the manager over me says, "While we are here, Shonda, I noticed you have a hole in your shoe. That is unacceptable." My director says, "Yes, that is unacceptable and you will not show up to work with a hole in your shoe tomorrow." I said, I just havent had time to go get new shoes and I just recently noticed I need to. She said she didn't believe me and that it doesn't look good for a supervisor to be walking around with a hole in her shoe (the picture is on a previous post, it's hardly noticeable, it was just the manager picking) and that next time I have a hole in my shoe there would be corrective action.

So, I went off about having to stock every cart in the house every night after everyone leaves because I don't have time to do it before the end of the shift, which was why I was there til nearly 3 this morning. I inquired as to why I wasn't getting support in that area.

She said that since I didn't want the overtime, from now on I am to come in late like everyone else does if I work late. I told her that I had no problem with the overtime, I had a problem with doing work by myself that I shouldn't have to do by myself. She let her decision stand.

Then, after the meeting, I was to check a few rooms, then I had to do a round in an area that has to be done three times a day. As I prepared my cart to go to work, my manager said, "hurry up and come back and get started on these carts." I wanted to say, "You've gotta be kidding?" instead I said, "Okay, if I have time."

Sure enough, as I am checking rooms, I get a call for pillows. I have to take linen to another department, and I get a call to check more rooms.

I come down, grab a work log, tell him I have to take pillows to Day surgery, I need to check this and that. He says, "don't take pillows from the closet without checking upstairs for extra pillows in other closets." So, I said, "Well, I might as well go ahead and do this linen round as I check those closets," and I grabbed the linen cart. He said, "See, that is your problem, you are trying to find excuses not to do the carts." I said, "No, I am trying to not waste time making two trips when I could just make one. If I am going to the linen closet I might as well stock it while I am at it to save time." He wouldn't let me finish so I yanked off my badge and put it down and said, "Here is my badge and my paperwork and I am done. Bye."

I had enough.

Psycho is what they are...always pitting you against everyone else by saying, "so and so has said this about you" when it was a lie, and the most famous one lately was "Your team members say you don't support them" when I have done nothing BUT support them by stripping their rooms for them when I have time so they can clean them faster, making sure they have help in their areas when they get behind so they can get off on time, use extra time to train them in new areas so they can become more valuable team members (and take some of the load off me) and a host of other things. Nothing I did was good enough for the director so she had to find stuff to point out how I wasn't being supportive.

When my dad had a heart attack and I found out Sunday, she had come in to take care of some issues and I tried to tell her in case I had to leave in an emergency (like, if dad didn't make it through the operation) "My dad had a heart attack" and she slammed the door in my face saying, "I don't mean to be insensitive right now, but I'm dealing with more important issues." Excuse me? More important? If my dad dies I'm out of here...lol...this was a daily basis of how I was treated there.

My manager said that I should stop stripping rooms and start cleaning them that my coworkers would respect me better if I work beside them. Kind of hard to clean a room when people are calling for linen, room mop ups, overflowing bathrooms, pillows, batteries, etc...so no. I ignored that. Besides, I'm not doing their job FOR them.

I am now officially looking for a job again. as I said when I was walking out the door God will always take care of me but I do not have to sit here and take abuse and that is exactly what this was.

I am glad that I was wise enough to make sure that I could live on minimum wage if I need to. The only thing I regret about quitting is insurance. But it's not worth what I had to deal with. I stuck with it a whole lot longer than most and probably left for the same reason.

However I know my worth. And I know that I will be ok. I always am.

I think the first thing I am going to do is rest. I have needed a good rest for awhile. I need my body to heal from the daily aches and pains I've endured, the cramping of my feet at night, the constant headache from character attacks from coworkers who don't want to work. The overall lack of sleep.

I'm gonna work on my prayer life. Not that I haven't prayed a lot, I just haven't prayed as right as I should I don't think. Pastor Rick Warren says that "Prayerlessness is practical atheism". Made sense to me. Another thing he said was that "If God doesn't give you what you ask for, He will ALWAYS give you something better. Remaining in Christ produces answered prayers. And Answered prayers bring glory to God, so why wouldn't He answer your prayers? You cannot fall when you are on your knees."

I am going to also work on getting my sleep hours right again. No more day sleeping.

Then I'll think more clearly to put my best foot forward.