Perpetual Ruminations

Saturday

It only takes a short time to get behind. Whether it be work, sleep, or even a relationship, it only takes a little effort and a short time to get behind. But, it takes a long time and great effort to catch back up.

As far as work goes, I stay pretty current, although I am behind on some filing. Not a lot, just a small stack of papers I need to go through and file. Other than that, I try and stay caught up, and even a little ahead when possible. I did get a little behind this summer, week by long, agonizing week, I went from being ahead on things to barely staying current, and by the end of the summer, I was about a week behind on some items.

But, when my work days became shorter, I quickly got caught back up, and now I'm current on everything. The insurance papers I didn't get until yesterday, that were due back at the corporate office yesterday almost set me back again, but I took the time and ran back into work late last night and got the last form signed and then faxed it.

As far as my relationships go, I only strive to keep one purring like a happy cat, the one between my wife, Rhonda, and myself. Other relationships, whether friend, child, or relative, takes a back seat to my partnership with Rhonda. It's more than just a marriage, it's a true partnership, for she is not only my wife, my partner in life, but also my best friend and confidant. Sure we have had our share of storms and rough seas, but we have weathered them, and only grew stronger and closer as a result. Yes, we still have our difficulties, but we face them down, and focus not always on our feelings, that would be selfish, but on each others.

Also, we both agree, love is not what you feel, it is what you think. What we feel are just emotions, and they change constantly. They are important, and a way to appreciate our love, but they are not what our love is built upon. No, love is what you think, and that, my friends, is something that can be controlled and depended upon. Well, if a person has at least a half a brain, anyway. What I'm saying is this, even on days like yesterday when Rhonda messed up a request from me, it did not diminish my love by one iota.

Sure, it cost me some time, some sleep, and messed up my plans for the evening. It hurt my feelings as well, but only because feelings are very tender and brittle. Even so, I did not focus on what I felt, I focused on what I needed to do to correct things, and pushing my hurt feelings aside, let her ride along, so I could still spend some time with the woman I love. I also focused my thoughts on her, how bad this made her feel, and how hard she tries always to not only meet my expectations, but exceeds them.

It's the same when some gal gets flirty and drops hints of interest. Sure it feels good, especially if she's pretty and sexy. But they are just feelings, and Rhonda does a fine job of flirting and getting those same feelings going, as well as many others. Instead of letting my feelings and libido take over my thinking, I keep my thinking in control of them, and keep my partner, my wife, my best friend in focus, especially all the wonderful times we share. In fact, working alongside Rhonda this summer, it was usually her that pointed out when some gal would be looking, flirting, and carrying on, and I usually didn't even notice. I suppose that means Rhonda has me trained pretty well, and frankly, I'm glad that she does.

That covers two of the three mentioned, leaving time. I don't think I will ever get caught up with time, but hope to at least get close. It's funny, as  child, I had more time than I had use for, now I have more to do than there are hours in the day. Something is always running behind, and it's usually sleep.

Time is the key, you understand. In order to stay current or ahead at the rest, you must stay caught up in time. If not, something will fall behind, and for me that is sleep. I run a pretty heavy deficit most days, and I have always know it was just a mater of time, no pun intended, before it caught up with me.

Yesterday set me back, but I took the time to correct things, and got the job done. In doing so, I fell even further behind on my sleep. I have not been sleeping nearly enough for months, and maybe get six hours on a good night. Luckily, there have been some of my days off that I have managed to sleep in and get some much needed rest, but fare to few and far between. It seems like I finally get a good night to catch up, but by the next twenty four hours, I'm falling behind again.

My new schedule was suppose to fix that, giving me three days off one week, and four the next. But, the person who would have picked up the extra days didn't want to work three and four day weeks opposite of me, and requested only two days a week. So,m that messed up the plan.

On a positive side, we moved back upstairs for our sleeping quarters, but it has a downside, too. A new room, new sounds, more light streaming in, and just the change itself have made it difficult to sleep. Our bed has been in need of a new mattress, so when we moved we put our bed in storage and used the bed that was in the room already. So, not only new surroundings, but a different bed, too.

It's a good bed, and it has a very comfortable mattress on it. But, we had gotten used to our queen size, and this is a full size, so less room. It's nice, and it's very comfortable, more so than our queen size was, but it's different, and that makes it difficult to sleep, too. So, a lot of changes, as well as having to get up early five days a week now instead of four, and it's pretty easy to see why I'm getting farther and farther behind on sleep.

In time the whole thing will work itself out, the new surroundings will become normal, the bed will be better than the old one, and once I can get my sleep in each night, I won't have trouble getting up so dang blasted early every morning. But until then, it's taking a heavy toll. I suppose because I ran too high of a deficit all summer, and most of last winter. Whatever the reason is, I'm finding I cannot function on what's become my normal hours of sleep.

Today was the day I came to realize that. I did good most of the morning, but by nine I was dragging, and by ten I was starting to actually suffer from my lack of sleep this last week. I had a whopper of a headache going, I couldn't focus, and my stress levels were going through the ceiling with little or no reason to get stressed out.

Then, some butt-worm of a person showed up in a semi with a delivery for the store. He showed his anal personality as soon as he showed up. He did everything to make my job as difficult as possible. It had become pretty busy, and I had alreay begun to feel burned out from little sleep, but handled Mr. Sphincter -- not his real name -- with professionalism despite his rectal attitude.

I continued with the morning, and soon enough the load he had was unloaded and he was making his exit. I also had a handful of guests at the "In" gate, a return I was working on, and some guests pulling up ready to check out. I excused myself from the return, to let the truck out, let the guests in, and try to keep traffic flowing freely.

But having a rectal attitude, Mr, Sphincter will not cooperate and let me inspect his truck. With much cussing and especially the slanderous fornication term, he refused to cooperate. I remained professional and stated policy and eventually inspected the cab and trailer, and let him exit. But, it had me very stressed out, and it really took a toll on what little stamina I had left to go on. I did manage through, and I did manage to remain professional and did not let it reflect on any of the other guests even though I was feeling a strong need to just walk over to a quiet spot and collapse in the cool grass.

But, there was no time to relax at all, it was pretty busy. Soon enough Rhonda showed up for her shift, and I was able to vent a bit on the situation. It always helps to talk to someone and get the foulness of the anal personality cleansed from ones head. After assisting her for a little while, it slowed, and I was able to leave work shortly after my scheduled time. I stopped and picked up a few items at the grocery store, then it was homeward bound for this exhausted puppy.

Once I got home, I put the ice cream in the freezer, the meat in the fridge, and myself into bed. But, guess what? That's right, I could not sleep. I dozed off and on for about an hour, then got up and sipped on a little bourbon. After a half hour of just letting my mind drain, and some nice meditations while I sipped on a few ounces of bourbon, I returned to bed and managed to sleep for an hour, but woke to use the bathroom.

I was still very tired, and it was only four o'clock, so I lie back down and this time sleep came quickly and I drifted deeply. I woke up again about quarter to seven this evening. I took the dogs out, then made myself some dinner, enjoyed a solitary meal and then cleaned up after myself, fed the dogs, and settled in here to write in my journal.

Rhonda will be calling soon, being done with work on on her way home. I know I should be wide awake after sleeping so long this afternoon, but I find I am still pretty tired. Tomorrow is Sunday, and I don't have to be up until six, so I may have just caught myself up on sleep, or at least may have gotten close to caught up. Now, if tomorrow goes well, and I get to bed on time, I should be pretty well caught up by the time I get up at three on Monday. Then, it's two days off and maybe, just maybe, I will still be caught up when I return to work on Thursday and Friday.

Saturday I have the day off, my first Saturday off in a long time. I don't even remember the last time I didn't work on Saturday. Anyway, Rhonda and I have a birthday to attend in Minnesota, and will have to be up kind of early to get on the road. Then it's a day of fun with family, but we have to make the run back Saturday evening so we can be back to work on Sunday. Even though it will be fun, it sounds just like the kind of deal that will set me back once again. Luckily, I only have to be up by six on Sunday, then work a normal Monday before getting a couple days off, to catch back up, again.