Being of two minds...

I've always been intrigued with the concept of being of two minds about something.

That phrase always puts me in mind of having two separate brains inside my skull, with each trying to convince the other of its point of view. Arguing sometimes, of course, but usually finding some accommodation.

It's a silly, scary image, but it is a pretty good approximation of what goes on in my head when I'm feeling ambivalent about something. Which is probably more often that I really want to admit, but that's a different post.

The reason I'm bringing the whole subject up is that I'm feeling very ambivalent, very much in two minds, about a memorial service I am going to attend tomorrow evening. I feel like I need to go, but I really don't want to go.

As some of you might know, my mother died in December. It's been a bit over four months now, and I'm mostly doing pretty good with it. Well, I saw a Mother's Day display in Barnes & Noble the other night when I went in there, and that kind of ruined the good mood I had been in. Still, I'm carrying on, doing the things I need to do. Getting a life.

So, the hospice organization that was caring for my mother at the end of her life is having a memorial...or as they call it, a remembrance service, tomorrow evening in the chapel at the hospital that operates the hospice. We had a celebration of life for my mother a bit over a month after she passed (the delay had to do with the holidays and arranging a time when the most people could attend), and that was a good thing. That service was largely (not completely) devoid of religion, as my mother was not a religious person. She followed the church of "God knows my intentions, and as long as I'm a good person I don't need an institution to tell me what I'm supposed to be doing." There was a lot more laughter than there were tears at that service, as she would have wanted it. And we all got together afterward for a meal and more remembrances.

But somehow, I feel like I need to go to this service tomorrow night as well. More as a show of respect for my mother than anything else, even though it is the kind of thing she would never have attended. Which, knowing that, makes me not want to attend.

I don't know if my feelings about the whole thing are complicated, or just convoluted. It's very possible that none of this makes any sense at all. That I'm over-analyzing something that is really very simple and straightforward...go, deal with the feelings that it brings up, and go on with life.

It'll probably be fine. But I'm still worried about it a bit.

I thought computers were supposed to save time...

I finished work over an hour ago.

I was determined to get off the stupid computer as soon as I finished work today.

Yes, I know. A computer is an inanimate object and therefore cannot be stupid. Still, my computer is stupid. Very stupid, sometimes.

Anyway. Sorry for the digression. I learned Tangents 101 from the best of them.

I was going to finish work, get off the computer, have some lunch and then read for awhile.

But then I thought: "I'll just check Ravelry (the knitting site I frequent) one more time." Fine. Didn't take long. Oops. Got to look at Twitter just once more before I log off. That didn't take long either. OH. Bills have to be paid. That took awhile. Always does.

Then another thing came up, and another.

And now, here I am, writing a blog post. Complaining about how much of my time my computer sucks up. Because it's stupid.

No. It isn't stupid. I am.

I'm going to go read a book now. Really.

What was that resolution I made...

Yes. I know. I wrote at the beginning of the year (which seems like a long, long time ago, by the way) that I was going to post here more than I did last year.

It seems, however, that that resolution has gone the way of most resolutions made around New Year's Day...I haven't posted very much at all in the past three and a half months.

Now, here are the excuses...I've been busy working. I've been busy knitting. I've been busy reading. I've been busy trying to get the novel I've been thinking about for years now started.

And all those excuses are the absolute truth. But none of that is any real reason not to post more often.

I mean, there's still plenty to complain about.

Starting with the weather. It's hot here today; in fact I've been thinking about closing the windows and turning on the air conditioner. In April. That is just pathetic and ridiculous. It isn't supposed to be hot enough for that until, oh, the beginning of May, at least.

Anyway, every time lately that I've sat down to write a post, I end up just blathering on. Kind of like I'm doing now. I think some of it, at least, has to do with my mother's passing at the end of last year. Her death, and the months leading up to it, just took so much out of me emotionally that I'm having to take some time to recharge my batteries before I can get really exercised about anything. I don't want to think about serious issues right now, much less deal with them at enough length to write about them.

I suppose this is not altogether surprising. One of the things they taught us in the grief support group I attended was that it takes between a year and two years to really process and "get over" the loss of someone close, to the extent that one ever really "gets over it" at all. It has just been four and a half months or so, and some of the emotions surrounding losing my mother are still pretty raw. On my way into Barnes and Noble the other night, just seeing a display about the upcoming Mother's Day upset me quite a bit. Much more than I had expected, although I should have suspected it considering that I still have issues about Father's Day, over thirty years after my father's passing. Which is probably silly, but he did pass just before Father's Day, which is probably part of all that.

At any rate, I should write more here. I'm going to try to write more here. It might get more personal for awhile than I've tended to make this blog in the past. But that's all right. It's probably good for me, in fact. One of the issues I've had my whole life revolves around a fear of opening myself up emotionally to others.

I guess we'll see what happens.