More and more, and less and less...

[Zues126]

Hi Sunny. Thanks for checking in! And ginger, thank you for the words and for riding it out with me.

This weekend was good. Wasn't all easy, wasn't all magical, but good. Hmm, what can I say about it?

Well, my kids were a bit lazy. We live in MN and it gets cold and we get cooped up. If I'm not careful they'll watch TV and play video games all day. So I grabbed them and took them for a walk around the lake. It wasn't warm, but for being MN in January it was pretty nice, so we bundled up and hiked around a lake. It was very nice. Then when we got home I busted out a boardgame that was a little advanced, it actually says "14 and up" but that's silly, my kids played it and we had a good time. I read a couple more chapters of Lord of the Rings over the weekend, we actually covered the stay at the Prancing Pony in Bree and read through where Frodo gets stabbed at Weathertop. I'm actually surprised we covered that much, but we had fun. Then we just hung out a little.

Today I was more of a parent. We went on another walk...but I had good talks with S11 and D8. S11 isn't being very accountable about doing his homework. It's like he waits for me to tell him to do it. So I had a very casual conversation and talked a little about expectations, and how I understood it wasn't fair to criticize him for not doing something I haven't asked. I told him I'd like him to own his homework going forward, to plan time to do it over the weekend and take care of it without being asked, and to let me know if he needed help with the assignments in time to help him. This was on the tail end of him getting a bad grade on his report card because he didn't know how to get an important assignment done. Instead of telling him what he should've done, I asked him if he would've done anything differently. He said yes, he would've asked me for help. He hugged me a bit and I told him that he did a good job figuring it out, that I know he is trying his best and that's what school is all about, not just learning what they teach but learning how to deal with these things that come up. And that he was learning those lessons just fine and doing well.

We walked around another lake today, it was just too nice and I wanted to enjoy it while we could. Then we played a little pool in the rec room. It's strange, I'm past letting them play by throwing the balls with their hands, but it's still a challenge when they try to use a cue. They'll do ok for a few shots, then they'll miscue, then get frustrated, then they'll go in this cycle of getting angrier, doing a worse job, getting angrier, doing worse, etc. Finally they'll relax and just go back to hitting the balls the way they know how, make a few shots, and have some fun. It's not easy, and a few tears were shed. D8 talked to me about how she feels when she isn't doing well, and when she feels sad. It led to a nice talk tonight, I got to learn more about who she is, how she's doing. It's pretty tripped out to be talking to such a special person about life.

I guess I forgot to mention talk of OM. What should I call OM if it gets more official? D8 talks about him a bit. Funny, when I pick up the kids it takes 20 seconds yet XW managed to get in that she took them snowmobiling and ice fishing last weekend. I knew that was OM activities, they're spending time as a family now. D8 mentioned it was XW, OM, and X-FIL/Partner...so he's being part of the official family, doing things with her side overall. I tried to figure out how I felt about that. It's kind of gross to me, but I understand that's his daughter and he believes her narrative and doesn't get to control her, so what's he going to do? Meanwhile it still is irritating to me that XW may never question her narrative about how we couldn't be together, when I've proven to myself I'm capable of amazing change and more than I ever expected from myself. It just surprises me I guess that she wouldn't see value in who I am. DB forums have helped. I understand WAS's but I don't understand it at the same time. It's like watching someone with a gambling problem and thinking, 'but don't they understand they aren't going to win?' even after you learn about the psychology of the addiction. I get how she felt and why she did what she did, it still just surprises me that people do that.

Finally for myself I sometimes wonder about other partners, I test the idea in my mind, and I still keep coming back to I'm not in the right universe as ready to seriously consider it. I know who I am and I know what I'm worth and I am not ready to go through this again. Reading DB forum may be a negative for me, all I see anymore are WASs and as a result I have no interest in considering a partnership when I don't trust humanity. But that's ok, I'm less than 2 months into my mandatory '12 months no date zone' anyway, so I say this more to measure my progress and growth (or lack of it) than because I'm worried about it. As GB said there is nothing wrong with taking a few years to guide my children through some hard times and enjoying what I've been given.

In the end nothing tremendously exciting. Got to get a little work done yet tonight, then I have to work hard this week, finally I have another pool tournament coming up this next weekend. Life keeps on marching. Thanks for sharing some of it my DB friends!